If looks could kill
Heartbroken mother of Gannon Stauch stares down Letecia Stauch in court as she is charged with his murder
THE mother of Gannon Stauch stared down the woman accused of killing her little boy in court on Wednesday night.
Letecia Stauch was in court for the first time to be arraigned for the murder of Gannon, and drew the ire of the young boy's mother who stared daggers at the woman during the entire proceeding.
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Landon Buillet Holt arrived with Gannon's father, who just last week filed paperwork to divorce Letecia.
She was arrested last week in Myrtle Beach on suspicion of first-degree murder in relation to the tragic disappearance of .
"We do not believe Gannon is alive," said officials, five weeks after they first began to search for the 11 year old.
Letecia was reportedly the last person known to have seen the boy, saying he left the house through a side door on January 26 to go visit a friend.
She was charged with suspicion of child abuse resulting in death, tampering with a deceased body and tampering with evidence.
Police had never named her as a suspect prior to last week, and she herself claimed to have been cleared of any wrongdoing by law enforcement.
She had not been cleared however, and on Wednesday as formally charged in court.
She is due back again Thursday to face off with his estranged husband.
The Sun broke the story last week that Al Stauch had filed for divorce from his wife just days after her arrest.
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Letecia already has a lengthy arrest record for Letecia that goes back two decades.
Letecia Hardin was an accomplished student who was frequently named to the honor role and excelled in extracurricular activities when she was first picked up by police.
It was soon after she graduated high school in 2001 that she was arrested for stealing a car in North Carolina.
The Robesonian reported at the time that she "was found guilty of felony larceny which was reduced to misdemeanor unauthorized use of a vehicle."
For that offense, Letecia was sentenced to 45 days in jail but given credit for time served.
She was also for 18 months and order to pay just over $1,000.
That same year she was also charged with communicating threats and simple assault, but those counts seemed to be dropped as part of her deal with prosecutors in the felony larceny case, court docs show.
It was also traffic offenses that got Letecia picked up in Virginia a few years later, but she was able to get off after paying a fine for these minor offenses, according to court records.
Her next arrest was in 2010, by which time she was going by Letecia Hunt.
The newly-married teacher, who had graduated from Liberty University by then, was cited for domestic violence and domestic abuse in Horry County, South Carolina, court docs show.
That is the same county she was arrested in on Monday.
Those charges were eventually dropped and there is no online record of the court filing.
The Clerk of Courts for Horry County did not respond to multiple requests for comment over the past week.
Letecia Hunt began going by Tecia soon after that arrest, and eventually got a job teaching in South Carolina.
It was not long before that job led to problems between Letecia and the school district however when she abandoned her position
Letecia left her job at one school just two days into the school year without any warning or notice.
In an email sent two days later, Letecia claimed she left after being subject to bullying because the district superintendent was the uncle of Gannon’s mother Landon Hiott.
She had married Gannon’s father Eugene Albert Stauch by then, a little over a year after divorcing her first husband.
It was the second marriage for both husband and wife.
The South Carolina Board of Education investigated the alleged harassment and retaliation campaign, and determined Letecia’s claims were “unsubstantiated” at a hearing.
That investigation also found that Letecia had breached her contract by abandoning her post, and the board ruled to suspend her teaching license for 180 days.
The Order of Suspension handed down by the South Carolina Board of Education states that Letecia signed a contract in 2015 with the Marion County School District.
She then attended the five-day training program for the district before starting her job as a middle school social studies teacher.
According to the order, two days into the school year, Letecia stopped showing up to work.
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The Board of Education ruled that LeTecia had breached her contract after they failed to substantiate any of her claims.
“In that email Mrs Stauch indicated that she left the district because she experienced harassment and retaliation after requesting to be released fro her contract due to a pending military move, which she claims had been denied,” reads the Board of Education filing on the matter.
“She also alleged that district superintendent’s niece was her husband’s ex-wife and that the harassment and retaliation were due to this relationship.”
An investigation into these allegations failed to substantiate even one of Letecia’s claims according to the order.
The case file also states that Letecia threatened to file a complaint against the district with Equal Employment Opportunity Commission if she were not let out of her contract.
It was the district who ultimately filed a complaint though, ruling that Letecia had in abandoned her position and breached her contract.
This decision was also based on the discovery that Letecia had accepted a position in another school district as well that year, the order states.
As a result of this breach in her contract, the state suspended her educator’s certification for 180 days.
On her Linked In profile, Letecia claims to have gone back to work after that suspension and worked as an Education Specialist for the state until 2018.
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The Board of Education confirmed this, telling The Sun that Letecia took a job in Dorchester County in 2017, and the following year in Berkeley County.
She was certified to teach elementary school, special education and secondary social studies Colorado as of March 2019, but is unclear if she ever began at any schools in the area.
She wrote on her LinkedIn that shed was working as a Curriculum Developer at School District 49 in Peyton, but there was no record of her having been employed by that county.
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