By Zachary-Taylor Wright
Staff Writer
A convicted child sex offender was sentenced to seven-and-a-half years of probation Wednesday afternoon, which her defense attorney clarified to the jury didn’t mean she was “off the hook.”
Shareda Rawls, 31, of Universal City, was convicted by a jury Tuesday for sexually assaulting a 16-year-old Roy Maas Youth Alternative Center resident when she was a 29-year-old case aide for the facility in 2020. Rawls filed an application to have her jail sentence probated, which the jury accepted during the punishment phase of the trial.
Kendall County Assistant District Attorney Nick Socias represented the state in the matter, and he expressed frustration with the jury’s sentencing verdict, noting the outcome likely would have been very different if the victim and perpetrator’s genders had been reversed.
“Our society holds onto a myth that only males are the sexual predators and females are the victims,” Socias said. “To the millions of male victims of sexual abuse, this is incredibly damaging, hurtful and a barrier to disclosure. It is hard to think of a graver violation of trust or more heinous act then to sexually abuse a child within a foster care facility for already abused children. But those who commit crimes against children in Kendall County and all of Texas need to know that the Kendall County Criminal District Attorney’s Office will still do everything within our power to protect our children and hold these predators accountable.”
Rawls was facing two to 20 years in state prison for the second-degree felony of sexually assaulting a child, but successfully evaded a prison term by applying for a probationary sentence. After about an hour-and-a-half of deliberation, the jury comprised of six women and five men handed down a five-year sentence but approved the probation application.
"The staff and board of directors at RMYA remain deeply saddened by the behavior of this former employee and the impact that her actions had on a child in our care,” Roy Maas CEO Blair Thompson told The Star. "RMYA reported the crime to law enforcement, and today’s sentence is the result. There is nothing more important than the safety of children. The safety and well-being of the children living under our RMYA roof is our top priority. It’s our job to project them as they go through their journey of healing."
State code leaves the probation sentence to the bench, so after some consideration in her chambers, 451st District Court Judge Kirsten Cohoon probated the five-year sentence for seven-and-a-half years.
While this wasn’t the outcome the prosecution hoped to see, Rawls’ defense attorney, Cole Nettles, repeatedly told the jury sentencing the defendant to probation was not letting her “off the hook,” saying she would be facing stricter guidelines as a convicted sex offender and would be required to file under the national sex offender registry for the rest of her life.
Rawls – a mother of three children between the ages of 4 and 12 – will no longer be allowed to attend any place where youth are expected to reasonably congregate, including schools, malls, parks and other places. Further, Rawls will not be allowed to engage with other minors except for her own children if her probationary officer grants her permission to retain custody. Rawls is a single mother.
Under the sex-offender probation terms, Rawls also will be subjected to annual polygraph tests, have all of her internet-accessible devices tracked and be subject to regular drug and alcohol screenings during her required monthly check-ins with her probation officer.
Should Rawls violate any of the terms of her probation, she may face the five-year prison sentence underlying her more than seven-year probation term.
Although Nettles succeeded in convincing a jury to grant Rawls a probationary term, Socias noted the predatory nature of the defendant’s crime as she assaulted an already marginalized minor in the community and pointed Rawls’ awareness that what happened was wrong. A non-custodial interview with Rawls at the Boerne Police Department showed her saying, “I’m like really, really grown, and you’re like a little kid. I could go to jail for something like this.”
Socias not only addressed the vulnerability of the victim, but pointed out Rawls should have understood the young man’s circumstances as she went through the system as a child and is a mother of young boys herself.
“Since this is a male victim and a female perpetrator though, she feels entitled to a probation,” Socias said. “The government placed this child in this facility because he was such an at-risk youth. These children not only are in foster care, but a facility for children who have been neglected, abused, abandoned or exposed to violence. The very person that was in charge of taking care of this child took advantage of his vulnerability for her own sexual pleasure. It is impossible to imagine someone committing a crime like this in a facility designed to be a safe healing environment for at-risk children and never seeing the inside of a prison cell for it.”
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