A tip submitted through a school safety website landed a former Cape Coral assistant principal in trouble, accused of sexual misconduct with a student.
Jason Punyahotra, 44, who has served as assistant principal at North Nicolas High School, in Cape Coral, faces charges of engaging in sexual conduct with a student and obstruction of justice. Police arrested him Sept. 2
According to a 38-page Cape Coral Police report, authorities on Feb. 21 received a tip through FortifyFL, created and funded by the 2018 Legislature as part of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Act.
Lee County Jail records show Cape Coral Police arrested Punyahotra Sept. 19 and the educator posted $40,000 bond the following day. His arraignment is Oct. 20.
North Nicolas High School officials had placed him on administrative leave before firing him in the spring as the accusations came to light.
Punyahotra’s arrest affidavit says that a school resource officer at the Cape Coral charter school, learned Punyahotra — then an assistant principal — texted a female student “explicit photographs of himself.”
The alert indicated that Punyahotra exposed his “private parts” to an 18-year-old girl while they were alone in a classroom and that Punyahotra threatened the student’s ability to graduate if she reported the incident.
According to the report, the tip did not include either of the parties’ names.
Acquaintance reported text messages
The report states that an acquaintance of the teen was with the girl when she received the explicit text message.
The teen told her friend that Punyahotra had been sending inappropriate texts for several months.
She told her friend that “the situation began because the teacher was helping her get her school credits, and in return, he sexually harassed the student without facing consequences.”
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Punyahotra’s classroom was used as a “filler classroom,” for students who fell behind or were failing and needed to catch up, according to the report.
When authorities spoke with the teen, she said “there were lot of things that happened” between Punyahotra and her, “and it just slowly led up to being more ‘weird’ stuff.”
Help with school and a sticky note
The teen told authorities she was 18 at the time and on probation, wearing an ankle monitor. She also explained that Punyahotra was not her teacher, but since she needed “extra help with her work, he told her that she could come to his room.”
The teen said she felt Punyahotra was being “flirty” when they interacted and added that a note raised a red flag. The note asked her to eat with Punyahotra, who provided his phone number.
The teen told authorities she declined Punyahotra’s offer, but he continued to call her to his desk.
According to the report, Punyahotra would dismiss other students to get her “alone with him.”
Punyahotra also asked the teen, who cleaned houses on the side, according to the report, to clean his parents’ home.
The teen told authorities she accepted the offer. She said Punyahotra made “weird comments” and he also had her sit down to talk to him inside the trailer.
According to the report, the teen believed she cleaned the Punyahotras’ home three times.
The report states that Punyahotra completed state testing for her and would check her out of school early.
‘More than welcome to go through it’
The report says that on Feb. 27 authorities met with Punyahotra at the school resource officer’s room.
When authorities explained why they were meeting with Punyahotra, the educator placed his cellphone on the desk and said, “You’re more than welcome to go through it.”
Punyahotra told authorities he had another cellphone, but said he did not use it and that it was in his office, according to the report.
“So you’re more than welcome to go through that one as well,” Punyahotra told authorities, according to a quoted conversation in the report.
Punyahotra told authorities he was not the assistant principal at the time he crossed paths with his accuser, and he was a “reading interventionist” and described his classroom as the “dumping ground of the school.”
Punyahotra denied being alone in the classroom with the teen and that if there ever was a student alone with him, he would “prop the door open.”
The educator also denied having the teen clean his parents’ house and said he sold his mother’s house in April 2024. He said he paid some students to clean the house, but not this particular teen.
Punyahotra also denied texting pictures of his privates or taking state tests on the teen’s behalf.
Authorities said records of communications from his cellphone between December 2023 and June 2024 yielded negative results in the search for explicit texts with the teen.
Allegations from another school
The lengthy report says that as authorities continued to investigate in late February, they found a 2018 report from the Lee County Sheriff’s Office, which involved Punyahotra.
According to the report, while Punyahotra was a teacher at Caloosa Middle School, in Cape Coral, a then-14-year-old accused Punyahotra of touching a student’s thigh and communicating via Snapchat, a social media platform that allows users to send videos and photos to contacts, which remain accessible for 24 hours.
Rob Spicker, spokesperson for the Lee County School District, said Punyahotra was a reading teacher at the middle school between August 2017 and December 2018. He was later a guest teacher until January 2022.
Cape Coral Police reviewed a video provided by the sheriff’s office, which lasted more than three minutes.
The report says that Punyahotra told the student he had a plan for both to “meet up.” The student declined, according to documents.
According to the report, the student was seeing Punyahotra because of her grades.
Punyahotra told the student he wanted to leave his wife and children to be with her, according to the report.
The allegations came to school staff’s attention in April 2018, the report says. The student recanted her words and said she did not know she was being recorded.
Authorities closed that case after the student’s parents refused to cooperate with them.
When authorities requested Punyahotra’s employment records, they found he had been employed with the Lee County School District from 2017 to 2019, and later with North Nicholas High School’s parent company — ALS Education LLC — between 2021 and 2024.
Authorities requested Punyahotra’s disciplinary records from the Lee County School District, but according to the report, the 222 pages provided did not raise any red flags.
The files did not include details about the Caloosa Middle School claims.
On June 27, Cape Coral Police submitted an arrest warrant for the State Attorney’s Office’s approval, charging Punyahotra with one count of offenses against students by authority figures and one count of tampering with or harassing a witness, victim or informant.
“As soon as we were made aware of the allegation last spring, the staff member was immediately placed on administrative leave and later terminated,” Jeff Dudek, principal at North Nicholas High School, wrote in an email to parents, shared with The News-Press on Sept. 23.
Ties to Pop Warner child sports league
Punyahotra has links to a youth sports league that recently came under fire.
An Aug. 29 News-Press report details a former pediatrician once accused of sexually assaulting a minor and barred from practicing medicine in Florida, who went on to lead the youth football league spanning five counties.
Peace River Conference of Pop Warner is a nonprofit that aims to “encourage and increase youth participation in football, cheerleading and dance (and) ensure a safe and positive playing environment for all participants.”
Punyahotra is a past treasurer at the conference.
Edward German, 58, a past president at the league, resigned after the August News-Press report.
The News-Press called Punyahotra and his attorney, Zachary Cantor for comment on the claims on Sept. 25. Neither responded by Sept. 26.
Staff writer Amy Bennett Williams contributed to this report.
Tomas Rodriguez is a Breaking/Live News Reporter for the Naples Daily News and The News-Press. You can reach Tomas at TRodriguez@gannett.com or 772-333-5501. Connect with him on Threads @tomasfrobeltran, Instagram @tomasfrobeltran, Facebook @tomasrodrigueznews and Bluesky @tomasfrodriguez.
This article originally appeared on Fort Myers News-Press: Assistant principal accused of improper contact with student