‘Absolutely unthinkable’: Delaware principal admits to raping student when she was a teacher

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A Delaware middle school principal whose August arrest for repeatedly raping a female student wasn’t disclosed to the public until WHYY News revealed the charges seven months later has pleaded guilty.

Tasha Oliver, who also uses the name Tasha Purnell, faces six to 75 years in prison after admitting in Superior Court this week to two counts of third-degee rape and one count of continuous sexual abuse of a child she taught more than a decade ago. In return, prosecutors dropped charges for 16 other felony sexual crimes against the girl.

Prosecutor Nicholas Wynn will seek a maximum of eight years behind bars and then “extended probation” against Oliver at her August sentencing, court documents show. Oliver, 44, also agreed to avoid contact with the victim, who is now an adult, and to undergo sex offender counseling and mental health evaluation and treatment.

The crimes occurred over the four-year period from 2010 to 2014 when Oliver taught at Stanton Middle School in the Red Clay Consolidated School District. She worked at Stanton from 2006 to 2016, state employment records show.

Oliver later worked at Red Clay’s three other middle schools — Skyline, H.B. du Pont and A.I. du Pont. She became principal at A.I. du Pont in 2020 and was still running that school on Wilmington’s outskirts in September 2023 when state police notified Red Clay officials that they were investigating Oliver for sexual crimes against the former Stanton Middle School student.

The district put her on paid leave at that time, and she continued collecting her $142,000 salary. She was charged in August in an indictment that didn’t provide many details, except to allege Oliver engaged in “penetration” and “intercourse” with the child for several years.

Yet at that time, the Delaware Attorney General’s Office didn’t notify the public, which typically occurs after an educator is indicted without police first obtaining an arrest warrant.

Mat Marshall, spokesman for Attorney General Kathy Jennings, said “communications breakdown” led to no press release being issued about the principal’s child sex charges.

Marshall was on family leave when Oliver was arrested but said he accepted the blame because there should have been better disclosure procedures in place during his absence.

Red Clay also never notified A.I. Middle School’s staff or families about the fact that Oliver was on leave. Police notified the district in August after Oliver was arrested, and she was fired, but the district didn’t tell the school community.

Red Clay officials said in March that law enforcement authorities didn’t provide them with details of the investigation or charges, but officials also took no affirmative steps to review the court file that contained details of Oliver’s alleged sex crimes against the girl.

WHYY News was notified in March about the mystery surrounding Oliver’s departure from the school by an educator associated with Red Clay. A reporter checked court records and found Oliver’s indictment.

Oliver, who has been free on $205,000 secured bail since her arrest, pleaded guilty Monday, as her trial was about to start. After she entered her plea, a judge revoked her bond and she will be held at the Delores J. Baylor Correctional Center near New Castle while awaiting sentencing.

Attorney General Kathy Jennings decried Oliver’s crimes.

“The sexual abuse of a child, in any case, is heinous,” she said. “When that abuse comes from an adult, much less a person in a position of trust such as a principal or teacher whose entire purpose is to guide and protect children, it is absolutely unthinkable.”

Oliver’s attorney, John Malik, did not respond to a request for comment.

Red Clay Superintendent Dorrell Green did not agree to be interviewed about the crimes of the former education leader who worked for nearly two decades in the district.

District spokeswoman Alva Mobley issued a statement that called Oliver’s crimes “both devastating and overwhelmingly serious. Our hearts go out to the survivor and everyone impacted” by Oliver’s crimes.