Regina teacher accused of sexual offences tells court he didn't realize he was messaging teen student
Adam Hunter | CBC News | Posted: June 28, 2024 12:12 AM | Last Updated: June 28
Jeffrey Dumba, 52, has pleaded not guilty to 5 charges, including possessing child pornography
WARNING: This story contains distressing details.
Regina high school teacher Jeffrey Dumba told a court Thursday that he stopped sending sexually explicit messages to a girl once he realized she was a 15-year-old student.
Dumba, 52, is on trial at Court of King's Bench in Regina, where he has pleaded not guilty to five charges, including inviting a minor to touch herself sexually, distributing sexually explicit material to a minor and possessing child pornography.
Earlier this week, his trial heard testimony from a girl who alleges that a messaging relationship with Dumba in 2021 eventually led to an exchange of explicit photos and videos.
The identity of the teen, who was 15 at the time of the alleged offences, is subject to a publication ban.
On Thursday afternoon, Dumba took the stand as the defence's first witness and described how he began messaging the teen in the summer of 2021, and how those conversations evolved.
Dumba told the court he did not know the teen in the 2020-21 school year, as he did not teach her. He also noted students were required to wear masks during that school year. He said he may have interacted with her in a colleague's class, but denied any physical contact with her.
The teen earlier testified that Dumba hugged her at the end of the school year, and spoke with her occasionally in the school.
Dumba said that summer, he was "hanging out" in his backyard, "having some drinks and doing some drugs." He said that happened a few times a week. He also said over that summer he was sharing intimate images with five or six women.
He said he did not recall the teen adding him as a contact on the social media platform Snapchat, and said that while he did not know who she was, he added her anyway.
Dumba said he had students try to add him as a contact in the past but did not accept.
'Got a really sinking feeling': Dumba
He testified that the girl told him she was 20 and a "student," which he said he assumed meant she was in post-secondary school.
"The pictures that I saw, she looked 20," Dumba said.
The initial messages were about "normal, everyday stuff," but eventually turned sexual, he told the court.
"I remember her sending me nude photos and me sending nude photos, probably through Snapchat," he testified. "I saw a picture of her face, and I thought, 'That doesn't look like a 20-year-old at all.'"
Dumba said he became worried that the girl may be a high school student.
"I got a really sinking feeling — 'oh my God. what if this person goes [to his school]?'" he testified. CBC is not naming the school to protect the girl's identity.
Dumba said he sent her a message saying, "You knew who I was all along, didn't you?" She responded, "I don't know," he told court.
He said he invited her over on July 15 "to get intimate," but that he didn't know who she was at that point.
Teen tried to continue conversations, Dumba testifies
He said he stopped sending her nude images and didn't engage in any further sexual conversations once he realized that she was a student.
"I said, 'This is not who I am. I can't do this,'" he testified. The teen responded by expressing sadness, and tried "a number of times" to continue sexual conversations, Dumba said.
He deleted the nude photos and all of the text messages from his phone by the end of August, he told court.
Asked by his lawyer Darren Kraushaar why he deleted the messages, Dumba replied "panic."
The 15-year-old gave him "an ultimatum," Dumba said.
"I was scared of what she might do with this information. I was terrified. I felt bad for her."
He said before school started in September, he messaged the teen, telling her to "be normal" in the school.
The girl told court earlier this week that she interacted with Dumba in the hallway and his classroom on the first two days of school.
Dumba said her locker was near his classroom, and he may have spoken to her on the first day of school.
On Sept. 3, 2021, the third day of school, Dumba was arrested by the Regina police vice unit in a Walmart parking lot.
Asked by Kraushaar how he felt when he was arrested, Dumba responded, "I don't think there's a word in the English language."
"Something beyond terror. Initially, I thought I'd been arrested for drugs."
Teen cross-examined
On Thursday morning, the teen girl returned to the witness stand for a third straight day as Kraushaar continued his cross-examination.
The focus of the questioning centred around July 15, 2021, which Kraushaar suggested was the day everything "unravelled."
He asked the teen if that was the day Dumba invited her to his home for sex, and then realized who she was. The teen disagreed, saying she had been invited on other occasions, but only once did he send his address.
Kraushaar asked why there was a screenshot of a portion of that conversation on her phone, but not the entire thing.
"I'm going to suggest you took this screenshot because this is a significant day for you, because it's the day he found out who you were," Kraushaar said. The teen disagreed with the statement.
The teen said after that day she sent him nude images unprompted.
Kraushaar also suggested that after July 15, Dumba became "cold" in his messages to her, which the teen also disputed.
The judge-alone trial, being presided over by Justice Neil Robertson, began Monday and is scheduled to last a week. It continues Friday.