New sex crime charges filed against Ocean Springs Middle School substitute teacher
Former South Mississippi substitute teacher Keshawn Tre’Vyune Belcher is facing new felony sex crimes charges in a nine-count indictment handed down in Jackson County, according to court records.
Belcher was a substitute teacher at Ocean Springs Middle School when he was initially arrested in April 2023 on one count of touching a child for lustful purposes or molestation and one count of child exploitation.
The grand jury found enough evidence to indict Belcher on one count of touching a child lustful purposes, five counts of child exploitation and three counts of dissemination of sexually-oriented material to minors.
He has remained jailed without bond since his arrest last year.
According to court papers, Belcher committed the crimes over five days in April 2023.
During that time, the records say, Belcher touched one minor student sexually, sent pictures and videos of himself naked and masturbating to several minor students, solicited one student to perform oral sex, and tried unsuccessfully to get a minor student to video themselves masturbating and send the video back to Belcher.
Ocean Springs police said Belcher used Snapchat to communicate with students and send them inappropriate sexual content and videos of himself.
More details about Belcher’s alleged crimes came out in three individual lawsuits filed by the parents of three minor students against Belcher, the Ocean Springs School District, and the temporary employment agency Kelly Services, Inc., and other unnamed defendants have since been transferred to federal court in Gulfport.
The school district contracts with Kelly Services, Inc., to hire substitute teachers at Mississippi Coast schools. Kelly Services sent Belcher to work as a substitute teacher at Ocean Springs Middle School.
The Ocean Springs Middle School lawsuits involved three students: two girls and one boy.
In one case, a then 13-year-old Ocean Springs Middle School student said she was held against her will and molested by Belcher after he summoned her to his classroom on the premise that he was going to help her with an assignment.
When the girl got there, Belcher was the only person in the room and blocked the girl from leaving when he grabbed her face and started kissing her and touching her body inappropriately, the records say
The girl said she couldn’t get away because Belcher “held her in his grip,” the lawsuit says.
When the school bell rang and momentarily distracted Belcher, the records say the girl escaped his grasp and ran out of the classroom. The girl then reported what had happened to her parents and the school.
In a separate incident, Belcher is accused of sending inappropriate text messages to a then-12-year-old student at Ocean Springs Middle School. He later messaged her on Snapchat and social media, asking if he could stop by her home to watch TV with her, but the girl’s parents wouldn’t allow it.
Subsequently, the records say Belcher made sexual remarks to the girl at school and asked her to perform oral sex on him.
In a third incident, this time involving a then 14-year-old Ocean Springs Middle School student, Belcher is accused of sending inappropriate messages over Snapchat to the young boy.
In one exchange, for example, Belcher sent the boy a text saying that he was horny before following that up with an image of himself naked and then a video of himself masturbating, the records say.
The students reported what had happened to their parents, who reported the allegations to Ocean Springs police.
In the lawsuits, the parents accuse the school district and Kelly Services of negligence in hiring, failure to investigate and prosecute misconduct, and failure to properly train and hire qualified people to monitor teacher activities.
They accuse Belcher of false imprisonment, harassment, assault and battery, and intentional infliction of emotional distress and allege that Belcher’s actions “exceeded all bounds of decency and is far beyond what is tolerated in a civilized society.”
The Sun Herald is not identifying the parents who filed the lawsuits to protect the identity of the minor students. The Sun Herald does not identify victims of sex crimes.
According to records obtained by the Sun Herald, Belcher had problems as a substitute teacher at Gulfport High School prior to the incident in Ocean Springsran into problems when he served as a substitute teacher at Gulfport High School, according to records obtained by the Sun Herald.
