By the Daily Post staff
A former teacher at an East Palo Alto charter school was sentenced yesterday (Dec. 1) to five years in prison for sex charges involving a teenage student, according to
the San Mateo County District Attorney’s Office.
Danielle Matko, 35, of Belmont, was convicted on Sept. 27 by a jury after an 11-day trial.
Matko was a teacher at the Aspire East Palo Alto Phoenix Academy, 1039 Garden St., and was fired by the school after allegations arose in 2015, District Attorney Steve Wagstaffe said.
Prosecutors said in September 2015, she was talking with the student in her classroom during a free period and showed him her bare breasts, allowed him to touch them and then touched him sexually. On a later occasion, she orally copulated him, prosecutors said.
The jury found her guilty of four charges — one count of oral copulation on a minor and three counts of lewd acts on a child.
The charges involved two victims, both 15-year-old boys who were her students. Five of the six charges applied to one of the boys while the other boy was named as
a victim of only lewd conduct.
