Teacher gets 20 years for child sexual assaults
Sentence consecutive to term from previous trial
A disgraced former Catholic school teacher who is already serving time for sexually assaulting children in Waukesha County will spend an additional 20 years in prison for committing similar crimes in Milwaukee County.
A Milwaukee County jury convicted Kevin Buelow in January of two counts of first-degree child sex assault, where the child was under the age of 13.
Milwaukee County Circuit Judge Jeffrey A. Wagner on Thursday ordered Buelow, 50, of West Allis, to serve 10 years in prison on each count, followed by five years of extended supervision when he is released.
He ordered the sentences to run consecutively to one another and consecutive to the 61⁄ 2- year prison term he previously received for similar crimes in Waukesha County.
“Those children came to you for help. They left scarred ... because of your actions,” the judge said, calling Buelow’s crimes “egregious.”
Through his attorney, Buelow maintained his innocence. In court, family members of the victims clutched glossy photos of their loved ones as a defiant Buelow, sitting just a few feet away, shook his head as they shared impact statements and the judge explained how he arrived at his sentence.
The charges against Buelow in Milwaukee County stemmed from incidents that occurred at St. Matthias Parish School in Milwaukee between 2010 and 2012.
Buelow was convicted in Waukesha County in January 2023 of inappropriately touching two students while he was a fourth grade teacher at Holy Apostles in New Berlin between 2013 and 2018. He was sentenced in that matter to 61⁄ years in prison and must
2 register as a sex offender for the rest of his life.
Students at the New Berlin school came forward in 2018 after word of similar accusations at St. Matthias Parish School first surfaced.
At the hearing, one victim said she felt her her life had been “put on hold for six years” while prosecutors built their case and the matter wound its way through the court system. She described her efforts to recover from the ordeal as being similar to “being on a roller coaster blindfolded.” She told the judge it felt as if her mental health declined over the years, and that she felt worse as she came to learn there were other victims after what she experienced. “This assault has torn me to pieces,” she said.
A mother of one of the victims said having her daughter in a school connected to the family’s parish was not only a good academic fit, but also provided a sense of stability and a safe school environment. “(She) was 10 years old when Kevin Buelow was her tutor at school. He was supposed to be a teacher that she could trust and learn from. But instead, he brazenly violated her innocence and left her trust broken into a thousand pieces.” Buelow didn’t make a statement. In all, 24 letters of support for Buelow were sent to the judge in recent days, pleading for leniency. Defense attorney Jason Luczak said his client maintained his innocence and urged Wagner to consider a sentence comparable to that handed down in Waukesha County.
“He’s suffered and paid dearly as a result” of these allegations and trials, said Luczak, noting his client will never teach again and will remain under public scrutiny when he’s released.