A San Diego County educator, once appointed as "Teacher of the Year", was sentenced to 30 years in life imprisonment for embellishing and sexually assaulting two young boys in her elementary school classroom in the National City.

According to the San Diego County District Attorney’s Office, Jacqueline MA played her role in Lincoln Acres’ fifth and sixth grade teachers to manipulate victims, attract their gifts, pay special attention and even complete assignments.

Prosecutors said she even set up an unauthorized after-school program when one of her victims was not allowed to use social media or personal electronic devices at home and directed him to send her a message through a school chat application.

The 36-year-old teacher pleaded guilty in February on two counts of forced lust, one count of obscene acts against a child, and one count of possessing child sexual abuse materials.

The mother of one victim reported that she was arrested by the National City Police Department in March 2023 after her son and immediately found inappropriate news on her home tablet. Investigators learned that the boy had been retouched for more than a year and then sexually abused him when he was 12 years old.

Prosecutors said that within three months, the boy was immediately sexually engaged in a classroom, and his parents believed he was participating in an after-school basketball program.

Investigators also found that she sexually assaulted and sexually assaulted the second victim (the 11-year-old boy) in 2020.

“The defendant violated her trust in her students in the most extreme and traumatic way, and her behavior was mean," Dist. Atti. Summer Stephen said in a statement. "Her victims will have to deal with the negative impact of their lifetime, and her 30-year prison sentence is appropriate."

Jack Ma was named Teacher of the Year for the 2022-23 academic year by the San Diego County Education Office. According to a profile from San Diego Union-Tribune, she received her Master of Science in Biology and Education from San Diego and teaches in the National School District for fifth and sixth grades.

Prosecutors said she invested in the trust of her parents with her success in her students’ reputation as an educator.

"No child deserves what the defendant did," Stephen said. "I hope this sentence brings a certain level of justice to the victims, their families and communities, and these sentences are removed from the defendant's crimes."