Somerville teacher charged with statutory rape of student

Three months after a former Somerville teacher was charged with possessing child pornography, a Somerville teacher has been arraigned on rape charges for conducting an inappropriate relationship with a 13-year-old minor on school grounds, according the the district attorney's office.
Alexandra Romanos, 41, of Stoneham, a 5th grade teacher at the East Somerville Neighborhood School, was arrested and arraigned July 2 on charges of aggravated rape of a child (two counts), and indecent assault and battery on a child under the age of 14 (three counts).
According to a press release from the mayor's office, Romanos has taught in Somerville for seven years. She has been placed on administrative leave.
Somerville District Court Judge Neil Walker ordered Romanos held on $50,000 with conditions that if she posts bail she is to have no contact with the victim or victim’s family; no unsupervised contact with children under 16; stay away from Somerville School system; have a GPS monitor and remain under house arrest.
Romanos' next court date is July 29th for a probable cause hearing.
“The safety and well-being of our students is always our highest priority, so it is all the more disturbing that a teacher—the very individual most entrusted to ensure that safety on a daily basis—has allegedly blatantly violated that trust,” said Mayor Joseph Curtatone in a press release from the district attorney's office.
In the press release, Curtatone said a parent reported the alleged abuse and the DA's office said the investigation began at the end of June. The investigation by the DA's office and Somerville police reportedly discovered Romanos had begun a sexual relationship with the minor that occurred on and off school grounds.
According to a pres release from the mayor's office, at the start of the investigation Romanos was placed on administrative leave and barred from all school properties and functions.
Romanos is the second Somerville-connected teacher to be charged with sexual crimes relating to children in the past several months. In April, federal officials then-Cambridge and former Healey School teacher Josh Wairi with transporting child pornography. Wairi also reportedly admitted to videotaping children undressing in a locker room.