Bail review ordered for Paso Robles teacher charged with sex crimes in Merced

A Merced County judge on Monday ordered a bail review for a high school teacher and former Merced resident charged with having a sexual relationship with a 15-year-old student.

Jeremy Ryan Monn, 31, has pleaded not guilty to more than a dozen sex crime charges, including committing lewd and lascivious acts with a minor, oral copulation and unlawful sexual intercourse, according to Merced Superior Court records.

Merced County prosecutors on Monday asked Judge Ronald W. Hansen to increase Monn’s bail, which was set at $250,000. Hansen, however, delayed the decision and ordered a full bail report to determine the appropriate amount. Monn was ordered to return to court Dec. 29 for further proceedings, according to court records.

Monn, an agriculture teacher, also faces a similar case involving a person in San Luis Obispo County, according to Monn’s attorney, David Vogel, who declined to comment on either case.

Michael McKinney, the deputy district attorney prosecuting the Merced County case, said it was too early to know which case will move forward first.

“Typically, the fact he’s in custody here would give this case priority, but they’re already in the pretrial phase (in San Luis Obispo), so we’re still working all those details out,” McKinney said.

Monn was a teacher at Don Pedro High School in Tuolumne County but lived in Merced during the three-month period in which authorities believe the incidents occurred in the Merced County case. Monn left Don Pedro High last year for a teaching position in Paso Robles High School, prosecutors said.

Monn was arrested June 1 by the Paso Robles Police Department, police confirmed.

The San Luis Obispo County District Attorney’s Office could not be reached Monday for comment about the case there.

According to the San Luis Obispo Tribune, Monn is accused of having a sexual relationship with a 16-year-old female student in Paso Robles. The Tribune reported in June that the school district had placed Monn on administrative leave.

Merced prosecutors said the Paso Robles investigation eventually led authorities to a victim from Monn’s time at Don Pedro High School in 2013, when he lived in Merced. He was arrested Dec. 16 in the Merced County case, according to booking records.

McKinney said the Merced County incidents occurred from April 14, 2013, to July 1, 2013.

Monn is accused of sexual contact with the 15-year-old girl at his Merced apartment in April and again in July 2013. He is also accused of having sexual contact with the girl during an FFA conference in Fresno County in the summer of 2013. Investigators believe he had inappropriate contact with the girl at least once in Tuolumne County, prosecutors said.

All the incidents in Tuolumne, Fresno and Merced are being prosecuted in the Merced County case, McKinney said.

This story was originally published December 22, 2014 at 5:56 PM with the headline "Bail review ordered for Paso Robles teacher charged with sex crimes in Merced."