A former Trinity High School teacher is charged with stalking and cyberstalking after investigators say he used fake social media accounts to message a student.
TRINITY, N.C. — The 16-year-old Trinity high school student told WFMY News 2's Nixon Norman a person meant to protect her left her living in fear. The teen is sharing what happened, while also concealing her identity to protect her.
“When he was in jail for like a few hours it gave me a sense of like, peace that I didn’t have to look over my shoulder and wonder if I was accidentally going to run into him.”
That moment of relief was brief for the 16-year-old girl. The day deputies arrested former Trinity High School math teacher James Allen, he bonded out.
"It wasn’t the best to find out that he got out like, just a few hours later," the victim said. “Then it’s just like looking for him everywhere again.”
Deputies charged Allen with misdemeanor stalking and cyberstalking. Investigators said he created anonymous social media accounts to watch and repeatedly message the teenager.
Her mother told us the messages came from a fake TikTok account under the name “Reggie.” She said he sent more than 50 direct messages to her daughter, including comments prosecutors said crossed clear boundaries.
Initially, she didn’t suspect anything, "at first I was a little dumbfounded, I didn’t think too much of it.”
But as the messages continued and the behavior at school became more uncomfortable, she said the pieces started to fall into place.
“In the text messages when it says like, ‘let’s have fun with this’ and then he was like, ‘do you know who this is?’ That kind of like.. brought me back and made me think.”
Now, she’s left carrying the weight of what those interactions did to her sense of safety and self, "I would say that it just leaves the person that they do it to with a lot of like, questions."
She hopes sharing her story helps others trust their instincts, especially online, "be weary of it. Look out for it.”
A lesson learned too young and a reminder that even behind a screen, trust should never come at the cost of safety.
Allen no longer works for Randolph County Schools and is prohibited from contacting the victim. He’ll be back in court on March 10.