Former Stratford teacher gets 2 years for having sex with boy

Michelle Sulzicki, a former teacher at Chapel Street School in Stratford, pleaded guilty to second-degree sexual assault and risk of injury to a child. Michelle Sulzicki, a former teacher at Chapel Street School in Stratford, pleaded guilty to second-degree sexual assault and risk of injury to a child. Photo: Contributed Photo Photo: Contributed Photo Image 1 of / 5 Caption Close Former Stratford teacher gets 2 years for having sex with boy 1 / 5 Back to Gallery

BRIDGEPORT - Her husband, parents and in laws sitting behind her, a former Stratford elementary school teacher was sentenced Friday to two years in prison for having a 2-year-sexual affair with a 12-year-old boy.

“I just want to apologize for all the pain and suffering I have caused,” 29-year-old Michelle Sulzicki tearfully told Superior Court Judge Robert Devlin.

The judge said he was giving Sulzicki, who taught special education at the Chapel Street School in Stratford for four years, credit for all the good she has done.

“You appear to be a pretty good person who did very bad things,” he told her.

But Devlin continued, “This whole thing came up when you learned this 12-year-old boy was looking at pornography. That should have been a teaching moment but instead that is what triggered this sexual activity. All teachers are hurt when one does a bad thing.”

He then sentenced Sulzicki, who previously pleaded guilty to second-degree sexual assault and risk of injury to a child for the crime, to 10 years suspended after she serves two years in prison and followed by 10 years of probation.

Devlin also ordered that Sulzicki register as a sex offender and have no further contact with the victim.

Neither Sulzicki’s husband, a music teacher in the Danbury school system nor her lawyer, William Westcott, would comment as they later left the Main Street courthouse.

During the hearing Westcott urged the judge for leniency for his client, pointing out that she is the mother of a 1-year-old daughter and that her family came together to come up with the money to pay for the boy’s counseling.

“I’m satisfied in my mind that my client did not go trolling for this boy,” Westcott told the judge.

But Senior Assistant State’s Attorney Ann Lawlor urged the judge to impose a 4-year prison term.

“She (Sulzicki) was in a supervisory role and she took advantage of a vulnerable child. She saw an opportunity and took it,” Lawlor said.

The prosecutor told the judge the victim family’s declined to come to the sentencing hearing.

Police said Sulzicki began having sex with the boy when he was 12 and she was tutoring him at his Stratford home.

They said the boy told them that the first time he did not wear a condom Sulzicki “forced him to have sex with her,” the arrest warrant affidavit states.

Over the next two years the boy said he had sex with Sulzicki up to 20 times, the affidavit states. While the boy claimed he was the father of Sulzicki’s daughter, police said that was later determined not to be the case.

When confronted, police said Sulzicki admitted she had sex with the boy once when he was 12.

“She said she did not charge the family for tutoring him,” the affidavit adds.