Crime
The former science teacher used a Discord account to have sexualized conversations with minors and receive sexually explicit images.
Photos that John Magee Gavin, a former science teacher, sent to minors. U.S. District Court filings
March 15, 2026 | 9:53 AM
2 minutes to read
A former science teacher at Boston’s Josiah Quincy Upper School was sentenced Friday to 10 years in prison for child exploitation, according to prosecutors.
John Magee Gavin, 35, of Brookline, pleaded guilty in December 2025 to one count each of coercion and enticement of a minor, receipt of child pornography, and possession of child pornography, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Massachusetts said in a statement. He was sentenced in federal court to 10 years in prison followed by five years of supervised release.
Before teaching at Josiah Quincy, Gavin was a sixth-grade teacher at the Academy of the Pacific Rim Charter Public School in Hyde Park and a paraprofessional at the Hayes School in Brookline. He was indicted by a federal grand jury in July 2025, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said.
Gavin coerced at least one underage girl to have sexualized conversations with him online and asked her to send him child sexual abuse material (CSAM) of herself, prosecutors said. Investigators found that he was in possession of CSAM depicting rape of boys and girls who ranged in age from five to 17 years old.
In January 2025, authorities identified Gavin as the owner of a Discord account used to contact at least 20 underage girls between 12 and 17 years old, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office. The girls Gavin messaged lived in several states, including Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and West Virginia, as well as in Canada and the United Kingdom.
Gavin told the minors that he was a teacher, had sexualized conversations with them, and often asked them to send sexually explicit pictures of themselves, according to prosecutors. Authorities arrested him in February 2025, and he was charged in Brookline District Court with enticing a child under 16, possession of child pornography, disseminating obscene matter to a minor, and posing a child in a nude or lascivious pose, according to court records.
Investigators found approximately 147 files — including 94 images and 53 videos — depicting CSAM on Gavin’s cellphone, prosecutors said. These images and videos depicted rape of male and female minors between five and 17 years old.
Gavin’s Discord account revealed that he had online masturbation sessions with underage girls while chatting with them, according to prosecutors. He also solicited images from them, exchanged images with them, and had sexualized conversations with them while he was at school.
In some chats, Gavin expressed sexual interest in certain students at Josiah Quincy, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office. One of these conversations involved Gavin discussing his sexual interest in a freshman student, whom he said he fantasized about having sex with.
The victims in these incidents have since been identified, and law enforcement officials have contacted their families, prosecutors said.
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