South Carolina Babysitter Gets Prison in Sex Case - Updated

(Hilton Head Island, South Carolina) Earlier today, babysitter and convicted child sex abuser Susan Tappeiner was sentenced to 51 months in prison.

Tappeiner, 42, also must serve three years of probation after being released from prison and undergo mental health and sexual abuse counseling, according to the sentence issued Monday by Judge Carmen Mullen at the Beaufort County Courthouse in Beaufort.

Mullen said she recognized that Tappeiner had experienced sexual abuse as a child and suffered from anxiety and drug- and alcohol-related problems. But the hardest part of the sentencing, Mullen said, was that Tappeiner's two children would "lose" their mother while she served time.

"The fact remains that you sexually assaulted a 13-year-old child," Mullen said. "That we cannot forget." [...]

Under state law, Tappeiner must serve at least 85 percent of her five-year sentence -- or 51 months -- before she could be released because it is a violent crime. If she violates the conditions of her sentence, she could have to serve 10 years of the suspended sentence.

Tappeiner was ordered to register as a sex offender.

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South Carolina Babysitter Guilty of Sex with Boy
[Previous 10/29/09 post]
(Bluffton, South Carolina) In March 2009, a 42-year-old Bluffton woman, Susan Tappeiner, was accused of sexually assaulting a 13-year-old boy while she was babysitting him in August 2008.

Yesterday in the Beaufort County Courthouse, Tappeiner was convicted by a jury of second-degree criminal sexual conduct with a minor after two hours of deliberation.

In February, the boy told Michael Creason, a Bluffton police officer stationed at the school the teen was attending, H.E. McCracken Middle, about the encounter, the officer testified Tuesday. The boy is now in the eighth grade in another state, according to testimony.

The boy testified that on Aug. 15, 2008, he was watching movies with Tappeiner, her husband and two daughters, his sisters and another neighborhood girl at the Tappeiners' home.

After everyone fell asleep, he said, Tappeiner grabbed him by the arm and dragged him to her daughter's bedroom. She locked the door and struck him when he tried to escape, he told jurors. He testified that Tappeiner forced him to perform oral sex on her, then have sexual intercourse. He said Tappeiner told him not to tell anyone what had happened.

Tappeiner was whisked away to the county jail immediately after the verdict was announced. Since Tappeiner claims she was abused and is mentally unhealthy, sentencing will await an evaluation by the Department of Probation, Parole and Pardons.