Former Maryland ROTC Teacher Pleads Guilty to Sex with Student

ALEXANDRIA, VA—Mark Allen Jackson, 43, of Alexandria, Va., pleaded guilty today to traveling across state lines to have sex with a high school student.

Neil H. MacBride, United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia; Joseph Persichini Jr., Assistant Director in Charge of the FBI Washington Field Office; and Colonel David Rohrer, Fairfax County Chief of Police, made the announcement after the plea was accepted by United States District Judge Leonie M. Brinkema.

Jackson faces a maximum penalty of 30 years in prison when he is sentenced on Jan. 8, 2010, before United States District Judge Gerald Bruce Lee.

In a statement of facts filed with his plea agreement, Jackson admitted that he was an ROTC instructor at Charles Herbert Flowers High School in Springdale, Md., and that he became acquainted with a female student in 2007. In approximately August 2008, Jackson became the student’s ROTC instructor. On two occasions in December 2008 and one occasion in January 2009, when the student was 16 and Jackson was her ROTC instructor, Jackson picked the student up from her house in Maryland and drove her to his apartment in Virginia, where he engaged in sexual intercourse with her.

This case was investigated by the FBI’s Washington Field Office and Fairfax County Police Department. Assistant United States Attorneys Patricia Haynes and Morris Parker are prosecuting the case on behalf of the United States.

A copy of this press release may be found on the website of the United States Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Virginia at http://www.usdoj.gov/usao/vae. Related court documents and information may be found on the website of the District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia at http://www.vaed.uscourts.gov or on https://pacer.login.uscourts.gov.