A former Riverside school teacher who pleaded guilty to sexually abusing two female students after one of them came forward in a YouTube video that went viral was sentenced to 10 years in prison Monday.
Andrea Cardosa, a former teacher and administrator at two Inland Empire schools faces up to 10 years and eight months in prison when she is sentenced at the Riverside Hall of Justice.
She avoided a potential life sentence with the guilty plea to three counts of lewd acts with a child, according to the Riverside County District Attorney’s Office. She was initially charged with 16 counts.
In the YouTube video, titled “A call to my childhood rapist teacher,” Cardosa admitted to the abuse after she was confronted by one of the two known victims.
The victim who posted the video knew Cardosa when she was a student at a Riverside school. The abuse took place between 1997 and 2001. By the time of the 2013 recording, Cardosa had become assistant principal at Alhambra High School.
A second victim came forward after the YouTube video went viral.
"I trusted her... but she preyed on my innocence," one of the victims said Monday. They have not been publicly identified because they were minors at the time of the abuse.
Civil lawsuits against Riverside Unified School District and Val Verde Unified School District by the victims are on-going.
Photo Credit: Tony Shin