Crime Fix with Angenette Levy - 'Obsessed' Teacher Hit With New Student Sex Charges

Episode Date: April 4, 2025

Allison Havemann-Niedrach faces new charges involving a student she's accused of having sex with in Monmouth County, New Jersey. Havemann-Niedrach now faces seven felony charges including ones involving creating child pornography by recording the sexual encounters. She has pleaded not guilty to the charges. Law&Crime's Angenette Levy looks at the allegations in this episode of Crime Fix — a daily show covering the biggest stories in crime.PLEASE SUPPORT THE SHOW: Get 50% off of confidential background reports at https://www.truthfinder.com/lccrimefix and access information about almost anyone!Host:Angenette Levy  https://twitter.com/Angenette5Guest: Dan Schorr https://x.com/danschorrCRIME FIX PRODUCTION:Head of Social Media, YouTube - Bobby SzokeSocial Media Management - Vanessa BeinVideo Editing - Daniel CamachoGuest Booking - Alyssa Fisher & Diane KayeSTAY UP-TO-DATE WITH THE LAW&CRIME NETWORK:Watch Law&Crime Network on YouTubeTV: https://bit.ly/3td2e3yWhere To Watch Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3akxLK5Sign Up For Law&Crime's Daily Newsletter: https://bit.ly/LawandCrimeNewsletterRead Fascinating Articles From Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3td2IqoLAW&CRIME NETWORK SOCIAL MEDIA:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lawandcrime/Twitter: https://twitter.com/LawCrimeNetworkFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/lawandcrimeTwitch: https://www.twitch.tv/lawandcrimenetworkTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@lawandcrimeSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can binge all episodes of this law and crimes series ad-free right now. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. We have a warrant for your arrest, so we're gonna take you in. Detectives took special ed teacher Allison Havenman-Niedrich in last summer after they said she had sex with an eighth grader. Now she's facing more charges. I have the details in why prosecutors say Havenman-Niedrich was obsessed with this boy. Welcome to Crime Fix.

I'm Anjanette Levy. Allison Havenman-Niedrich is facing very serious charges in New Jersey. A grand jury in Monmouth County indicted Havenman-Niedrich on seven counts, including aggravated sexual assault, sexual assault in the second degree, two counts of endangering the welfare of a child, and she's accused of endangering a child by manufacturing and possessing child pornography. Previously, prosecutors had said that detectives found videos of Havenman-Niedrich and the eighth grade boy having sex. She's accused of recording those

encounters. Havenman-Niedrich was a teacher at Freehold Intermediate School last year, and in June, she was arrested after the school went to police. Here's body camera footage of detectives taking her in as her parents and husband watched. Good evening. Yes. Detective Hernandez, Friarborough Police Department. Is Allison home? Yes. May I speak with her, please? No, we'll talk to her out here. Thank you. Hello. Hey, Michelle. How you doing? Hi. Detective Hernandez, Real World Police Department.

Detective Correa. Detective Hobbs. You know why we're here? No? Any idea? You want to move away from the house to speak to her? I don't feel comfortable talking about my attorney present. Okay, no problem.

Thank you. We have a warrant for your arrest, so we're gonna take you in. Is there anything on you that you want to leave with your family? No, my glasses come with me. Do I have medication that I need to bring with me? If you take medication, I will highly suggest for you to have someone get it for you. Okay, just give me a second. I don't have a phone. It got destroyed, Actually, I lost it today and got run over. OK, so Allison Havenman Niedrich said she didn't have a phone, that it got run over that very same day that Freehold Borough Police came to arrest her. Prosecutors would later say she had texted the eighth grade boy thousands and thousands of times and that some

of those messages included sexual videos and photos. The Asbury Park Press reported that the prosecutor on the case told a judge that Havenman Nedrick was obsessed with the boy. Let's listen to her talk about the phone one more time. I don't have a phone. It got destroyed. Actually, I lost it today and got run over. Okay. Um, just have them bring the medicine. Okay. Here, I got to put you on their cuff. So, okay. All right. Yeah. Joints are very fragile. I'm not going to hurt you in any shape or form. This is going to go on gently. Right. Still good. Thank you. gently right still good okay my husband's here with my kids okay you. And I see your parents there. Yeah, my parents are here. They're fine. My kids are safe. All right. Do me a favor. Go like this. I do have a lot of medical issues. I'm sorry. Okay. No problem. Now, at a hearing last July, Jersey Shore Online reported that a prosecutor said other teachers saw Havenman Niedrich rubbing the victim's neck and back

and flirting with him and noticed her touching his leg. A vice principal reported concerns to police at the beginning of June of 2024. Police then contacted the boy's mother, who was also concerned because her daughter had seen her brother sitting in Havenman Niedrich's car and he was on the phone late at night. The victim had also told a friend that he was dating a teacher. The boy denied anything was going on with Haveman Niedrich and claimed he was dating her daughter, according to the Asbury Park Press. This case involving teacher Allison Haveman Niedrich is Exhibit A of why it's so important to know who's around you and your family. And to research the people in your life, you can use Truthfinder.com. Truthfinder is one of the largest public record search services out there. It's great because it will show you a person's

past and current addresses, phone numbers, social media accounts, and of course, criminal and traffic records. If you want to try it out, you can get 50% off of confidential background reports. Just log on to www.truthfinder.com slash lccrimefix, log on and start accessing information about almost anyone. A criminal complaint filed last June charging Havenman Nedrick with sexually assaulting the boy said that he turned over his cell phone and police found a lot of evidence of the relationship. At first, she faced just two charges. Now that total is up to seven, and it includes official misconduct because she was a teacher and in a position of power over the student. When Havenman-Niedrich was arrested, she didn't seem surprised. Here's more of the video from her arrest,

where she told police she needed medication. My husband can get it. Can you let her know? Can you get my antibiotics on my side? On the counter in the same same container There's just they're the same pills out same like one was just wanting empty. So I just only got you same thing Sorry my mom had strokes recently, okay, no problem. I'm my parents' caretaker. Okay. Where is she going now? She's going to come back to the freehold for her police station. She's going to her police station in freehold. Freehold?

Yes. Do you know their numbers? Our parents? Yeah. Okay. And they have my attorney's number. Okay. Should I keep that with me as well?

If you don't know it by heart. I don't know my attorney's phone number. Yeah, I highly recommend for you to get it because that way you have that piece of paper. We'll get it. Yeah. Where's it at? Where's the campus? It's, if you want my husband to get it, he knows where it is. Yeah. Just tell him what to get.

Is there a two? Go ahead, sir. No, no, you can come back to it. Now, after the issue of the medication is sorted out, Havenman-Niedrich asks her husband again to get her attorney's phone number as her mother stands by. Allison, where is the red paper? Look at the cabinet by where you just got the meds. There's two white pieces of paper with red crayon writing. Look straight ahead. Taped.

Ow. Nope. Get my oxygen, please. Not that. I know. You okay? No. Are you okay? She's on full-time oxygen. I wasn't dead. Iaped. Ow. Nope. Get me oxygen, please. Not that. I know. You okay? No. Are you okay? She's on full-time oxygen. I'm on oxygen all night long. Okay.

Okay. Are you little? Do you need medical attention? No. You sure? Yeah. Okay. Is this it? Yes, that's it. That's my pastor. Okay. Is there anything else that you want to take? Okay. And you know the numbers if you need to call? My parents and my husband, yes.

Okay. Excellent. All right. So we're going to get going, okay? Like I said, we're going to process her. We don't make the decision because of bail reform. We only take the Hernandez batch 101, and you guys can, you know. She's going to freehold.

Wait a minute. What? I didn't need to write down his number. Thank you. She'll call you later, okay, Eric? Yeah. We'll let her make a call or two before, once we know what's happening. Okay.

Okay. She's going to get to call the attorney? She's going to have every right to do what she needs to do. Can you answer that question? Sure. I mean, that's what I'm saying. She's going to have every right to call, will allow people to make calls. If she chooses to call her attorney, by all means.

If she chooses to call you guys, by all means. It's a very nice and civil process that we're doing with her. But it would be with your phone. She doesn't have her own phone. There's a phone that we provide at the headquarters for people to make calls. We don't, you know. She's going to have every ability to make calls and that's as needed. If they decide to put her in the county, then we have to, you know, that will be something that we have to process. The detectives drive Havenman Niedrich to the police station where she is processed.

All right, just step out, please. It's a little tight because the door won't go any further, but just come this way. Thank you. And that way. Straight forward and to that right and that door. All right. So to talk about this case, I want to bring in Dan Shore. He is a former sex crimes prosecutor, and he's actually written a book about institutions dealing with sex crimes involving this exact type of thing. It's called Open Bar. It'll be coming out in August. So, Dan, thanks for coming back on Crime Fix to discuss this case. Another one with really, really disturbing allegations.

Your thoughts right off the bat about this case. Well, whenever a teacher is with an underage student in some type of sexual relationship, that's very concerning. Here, it's a special education student who may be even more vulnerable for being preyed upon by a teacher. And it's alarming that it seems if the evidence is accurate that the prosecution is putting forward, this seems to have been going on for a while. There's a lot of electronic communication regarding what was happening. So it's very concerning that this wasn't noticed earlier and that it was allowed to continue for so long. Yeah, I mean, it sounds like from what the prosecution is saying, what they've claimed in court, this started back in January of 2024. And it sounds like staff possibly saw her rubbing him, you know, doing some things that were questionable, you know, and then nothing really happened until around June. And that is really weird because that's a long time. And

apparently they were meeting up at her house in hotels, that type of thing. So a period of time had elapsed before the school contacted law enforcement. And you mentioned that there were electronic communications, apparently thousands and thousands and thousands of text messages, videos. So yikes, is the gut reaction of some of these institutions to kind of like not want to believe it? It depends. I work with a lot of schools. Besides being a writer, I investigate sexual misconduct at schools across the country. That's what I do full time. I was a sex crimes prosecutor originally. And some schools I've seen, unfortunately, look the other way when they see concerning signs. Some some people reported and it doesn't go to the right place and there's miscommunication. And I write about that in my book where there's a lot of times where there's maybe an employee who did see something and they either didn't say something about it or they went to someone and nothing was done. But there's always two parts of an investigation when a school is looking at this,

because they have a responsibility to investigate it in addition to law enforcement's investigation. And one is what was this teacher doing? And second, the second part of it is what institutional failings were there that allowed this to continue? Was it where the policies and procedures not clear to people to know to report this? But it's amazing how if the allegations are true, it's amazing how brazen this was, where other people allegedly saw touching in public in school. And there were supposedly 25,000 text messages. So if that's true, this is going on for a long time. So unfortunately, it seems like nothing was done until this went on for a while. And even if this defendant is prosecuted, even if she's sent to prison,

that doesn't undo the harm to this child who was a special education student. And if it's true that he was sexually abused for a significant period of time, that's going to require a lot of support in order to rebuild his life. Right. And his mom, apparently, you know, once all of this became discovered, they took him to the hospital. They thought he was having like a mental health crisis, which is just, you know, I'm sure possibly he was. She has pleaded not guilty to these charges. But when she was initially picked up in June of 2024, which it's on body camera footage, she didn't seem surprised. She was very calm. She said, you know, I have a lawyer. I don't feel comfortable without talking without my lawyer, which is totally within her right, obviously. But she almost seemed resigned to this fact and knew that it was coming. I mean, her parents and her husband are there while she's being taken in. It's pretty late at night. But, you know, they say she was obsessed. The prosecutor said in court last July she was obsessed with this boy. How does a woman, a mom with kids become obsessed with an eighth grade boy?

And then they're just meeting up in hotels and wherever else. I mean, I just, I have a really hard time and we've covered so many of these wrapping my head around that where you're basically allegedly meeting up with somebody who could be your child and having a sexual relationship with them. Right. And we don't know the particular details of this person's life, but I can tell you what I've seen in other similar cases. And sometimes it's about not just the sex part of it, it's the power and control part of it that maybe the teacher in other parts of their lives feels not in control. And this is a situation where they can be in control and can be looked up to by someone who's younger and take control of a situation. I've seen situations where the

perpetrator of incidents like this has been sexually abused in their past. Obviously, I don't know if that's true here, but I've seen that in other cases where it becomes almost learned behavior that someone was very young and someone treated them like this, so they treat someone else like that. And there's this cycle that continues that's tragic. And also, we don't know what was happening in this defendant's life at the time, in their marriage, in their friendship, and in just their own mental health. So there's a lot of unanswered questions that we may never get answers to. But in cases I've investigated and prosecuted, those are the types of issues I've seen that help explain why someone might do this. Although none of that, of course, justifies these allegations if they're true. She said when she was picked up, there was something that really stood out to me.

The one thing that she said was they asked for her phone. Obviously, they had the teenage boy's phone. He had handed it over to law enforcement. And this is where they say they discovered text messages between the two of them that include these sexual videos, you know, inappropriate sexual photographs. And she says, oh, I don't I I don't, she said, I don't have my phone. It was run over today. I mean, just happens, you know, just happens the day she's getting picked up by the cops at her house before midnight, her phone gets run over. Apparently this is her claim. I don't know if that's really true or not, but it seems like rather convenient and something that will definitely be used against her by the police. Yeah, I mean, it's very well might have been run over, might have been run over intentionally. Right. Like, I don't think the police are probably going to ask for corroboration that it was run over. And I wouldn't be surprised if someone who says their phone was run over, that it was run over, but they might have arranged that intentionally in order to hide evidence.

I see a lot of cases I investigate where someone says, you know, my phone fell in the swimming pool last water and it seems inoperable, there are amazing technicians who have expertise in these phones who can recover data that you think is destroyed. So if law enforcement does get a hold of the device, even if it's in really bad shape, I've seen amazing work by these experts in recovering things. But as you said, they do have what the student provided in terms of text messages. Law enforcement saying it's 25,000 messages that includes photos and videos. And if that's true, and there's no reason to doubt that, it's hard for this teacher to explain that away. Because if you're saying, well, I never had an inappropriate relationship, why would you have those many messages, especially with the sexual content over time?

Right. I think it's going to be difficult to refute that. And especially these days, even if the phone's destroyed, if you have, you know, a cloud or, you know, whatever your phone is, Android, Apple, if you're backed up to a Google account or a cloud or whatever, they can get that stuff, whether the phone is destroyed or not. So, you know, there's it's amazing what they can do these days. Let's talk about the videos and the text messages on the phone, Dan, because the prosecutors have really upped the ante here. As I mentioned earlier, when she was first arrested in June, she was facing two counts of sexual assault. I believe one of them was aggravated sexual assault.

She's still facing those charges after indictment, but now they've added these other charges of child endangering, including manufacturing and possessing child pornography. They're saying she taped, videotaped, recorded these sex encounters with this child. So I'm like, oh, my God. So you start getting into the realm of manufacturing child pornography and distributing it and sending it. You're really, really getting into some territory where you are going to face some serious, serious, serious time. Right. And you mentioned earlier how she pled not guilty. That is very common. That's usually what happens at this stage, because when you are facing such significant charges that you just outlined, you want time to assess what evidence there is against you, talk to a lawyer, try to

negotiate a plea bargain, because if the evidence that the prosecution says they have is true, and again, there's no reason to doubt it, then there's probably going to be a conviction here. It's just a matter of what would the conviction be for, what kind of sentencing would there be. And most of these cases, and in some kind of plea agreement, because there's no benefit to a defendant if there's overwhelming evidence to go to trial, because usually then judges give a harsher sentence. So that may take a certain amount of time to get to a trial. Sometimes the prosecution will give a little more lenient sentence in return for a plea bargain. Also to spare the victim having to come into court and to recount everything that happened in public, which can also be re-traumatizing.

So those are some of the considerations that we'll see play out. Yeah, most definitely. And she, you know, she did plead not guilty. I mean, that's, that's basically what everybody does. Nobody's going to go into court after an indictment, unless they've been working something behind the scenes and plead guilty. That's not how these things work. So, and I did reach out to her lawyer for a comment and he has not yet responded, at least at the time of this recording. So, I mean, there's some really serious things going on here. They're also seeking Dan a sentencing enhancement because she was in a position of power over this student. So, you know, you also add in that factor when you're working in an official capacity as a teacher that always kind of makes the possible penalty even worse.

Definitely. If that would be an abuse of power and someone who's in a teacher position has control over a student, a student, we tell our kids, listen to your teachers. Right. If your teacher tells you to do something, generally we want them to do it. So if teacher, a coach, a family member, a friend. It's there are strangers who commit sex crimes, of course, but more often than not, I see it is someone who's in a position of trust and takes advantage of the trust to abuse that trust and really hurt someone. And that's what we're seeing with the allegations here. Well, it will be interesting to see how this case is eventually resolved. It could be heading toward a plea bargain. We don't know. But how much time she'll get if she does indeed plead guilty, it'll be interesting to see what that amount of time will be if it does end up going that direction. So Dan Shore, thank you so much. Again, Open Bar coming out in August.

Appreciate your time. It's always great talking with you. Thanks for having me on. And let's take a look one more time at Allison Havenman-Niedrich talking about her cell phone. I don't have a phone. It got destroyed, actually. I lost it today and got run over. Okay.

Just have them bring the medicine. Okay. Here, I got to put you on their call, so. Okay. All right? Yeah. Joints are very fragile. I'm not going to hurt you in any shape or form.

This is going to go on gently. Right? Still good? Mm-hmm. Thank you. Okay. Okay. Okay. Give me a second.

My husband's here with my kids. Okay. Thank you. And I see your parents there. Yeah, my parents are here. They're fine. My kids are safe. All right.

Do me a favor. Go like this. I do have a lot of medical issues. I'm sorry. Okay. No problem. I do have a lot of medical issues. I'm sorry. Okay. And again, I want to make it clear that I reached out to Allison Havenman, Nedrick's attorney at the time of this recording. He has not yet responded. And that's it for this episode of Crime Fix. I'm Anjanette Levy.

Thanks so much for being with me. I'll see you back here next time.