BRADENTON, Fla. — Newly-released arrest documents state the teenager that a Manatee County teacher allegedly had sex with was a runaway.
Steven Kempa, 34, was arrested Wednesday for having unlawful sexual activity with a minor.
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Kempa, who was officially fired Friday, was a world history teacher at Manatee School for the Arts, a Manatee County charter school.
An arrest warrant states the victim's mother reported her 16-year-old daughter missing on Jan. 1.
That same night, the parent discovered a social media post showing her daughter, "partially dressed, lying in bed with a shirtless unknown adult male," according to the warrant.
Investigators say Kempa invited the runaway teenager, and a 17-year-old girl, to his Bradenton apartment.
The 16-year-old victim told detectives she stayed with Kempa for three nights over the holiday break.
"She should have been taken somewhere, to the police, something like that," said neighbor Haley Richardson. "She should have been with her parents, not at some man's apartment here in Bradenton."
Richardson tells ABC Action News, she had no idea what was going on next door.
"It's terrible," said Richardson. "If I would have seen that, I would have said something."
When a Manatee investigator asked Kempa why he didn't report the girl as a runaway, as required by state law, he nervously replied, "I was just trying to help."
Kempa denies having sex with the teen, who is not a student at Manatee School for the Arts.
The victim told detectives that Kempa supplied her with alcohol and an unknown pill that made her feel "loopy," telling her it was aspirin.
Documents also state that the victim couldn't remember consenting to having sex, "due to her alcohol and drug fueled impairment that was facilitated by Steven."
Kempa is out of jail on bond. No one answered the door at his Bradenton apartment when ABC Action News went there for comment.
