Brooklyn teacher guilty of sex abuse
Tough-guy movie actor Stuart Whitman dead
A Brooklyn public school teacher was convicted Tuesday of repeatedly sexually abusing a 16-year-old student over a three-month period.
Mervyn Affoon, 65, a teacher at the Academy of Hospitality and Tourism at Erasmus Hall High School in Flatbush, sexually abused the teen about 15 times between March 2017 and June 2017. He rejected a 2018 plea deal offered by the Brooklyn District Attorney that would have landed him in prison for 1 to 4 years.
Prosecutors charged that Affoon abused the teenager first in the classroom where Affoon taught after other students left. He then groped the boy in an elevator at the school. Finally, he had the boy over to his East Flatbush home, where he had sex with the youngster, including oral sex.
“He used his position of authority to get what he wanted out of [the boy],” said Assistant District Attorney Christopher Mirabella during opening statements in Brooklyn Supreme Court. “This betrayal, this abuse, doesn’t happen once, it happens multiple times.”
Affoon’s lawyer had argued the victim was a “conniving” liar who made up the allegations of sexual abuse so his family could sue the city for millions.
Academy Award nominee Stuart Whitman, who had a half-century career playing rugged tough guys, died Monday at age 92.
The actor, known for working alongside John Wayne in a series of Westerns, had been suffering from skin cancer, according to TMZ.
He died at his home in California.
“Old Hollywood lost another one of its true stars,” his son, Justin, told the outlet. “Stuart Whitman was known for his rugged roles and handsome charm. We were proud of him for his TV, film roles and his Oscar nomination, but what we will really remember is his exuberant love of his family and friends.”
Whitman (inset) was nominated for Best Actor
for the 1961 “The Mask,” about a convicted child molester, but lost to Maximilian Schell in “Judgment at Nuremberg.”
He had more than 180 acting credits to his name, most recently the 2000 TV flick “The President’s Man” alongside Chuck Norris. But among his most famous films is the 1961 “The Comancheros” with Wayne.
According to his IMDB page, he was a lightheavyweight boxer while serving the Army, which helped land him the role of a prizefighter in the play “Dr. Christian.” The play was a springboard to his first Hollywood leading role, opposite Ethel Barrymore in the 1957 film “Dr. Trouble.”
His first film was an uncredited part in 1951’s “When Worlds Collide.”
Whitman is survived by his third wife and five children.