Homestead teacher confesses to having sex in classroom with 12-year-old, police say
A teacher in Homestead was charged Wednesday with having sex with one of his students. Police said the victim told them the relationship was “romantic” after referring to him as her “boyfriend.”
Davis Augustine Hodge Jr., 30, is facing four counts of using his authority to have sex with a child. Investigators say Hodge used his position as a sponsor of the school’s chess club to lure the then-12-year-old into his classroom at the West Homestead K-8 Center after school on Fridays and engaged in sexual contact at least four times.
He asked the child “to tell her parents she was staying after school for tutoring.” Police say Hodges and the child had sex three times in November and again in January. The girl, now 13, told police that Hodge told her he was her boyfriend.
Hodge’s assigned MiamiDade public defender,
Anna Nicole-Cooke, hadn’t returned a phone call by mid-afternoon Thursday. Hodge remained jailed at the Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center Thursday afternoon and was denied bond at his initial court hearing that morning.
A Miami-Dade Public Schools district spokesperson said as soon as the school learned of Hodge’s alleged misdeeds, he was removed from the school and that termination proceedings have started.
Miami-Dade Public Schools has had its share of teacher misconduct in recent years. The alleged abuse of authority in the Hodge case is similar to the recent prosecution of former Palmetto Senior High School creative-writing teacher Jason Meyers, who was found guilty last week of three counts of statutory rape. Meyers, 47, flattered a teen and used his position of authority to lure her into his classroom on the pretense of improving her ability to write poetry and pass an Advanced Placement class.
And in 2020, Wendell Alfredo “Kimo” Nibbs, a then-53-year-old physical education teacher at Brownsville Middle School, was arrested after nine girls accused Nibbs of sexual assault and rape. He was sentenced to eight years in prison and is listed as a sexual predator for the rest of his life.
As for Hodge, the child’s parents went to the school at 1550 SW Sixth St. on Jan. 6, the last time police say the child and Hodge had sexual contact. Police said the child told them the two began communicating in October through direct messages on Instagram. At first, police said, they spoke about school. The conversations then grew sexual with the child and Hodge eventually sending naked pictures of themselves to each other.
At first they touched each other through their clothing, said police. But that graduated to oral sex and intercourse. The child, police said, provided text messages corroborating her account of their interaction. Hodge, police said, waived his right to remain silent and confessed.