MIAMI BEACH, Fla. – Students at Miami Beach Senior High School shared mixed reactions Thursday after police arrested one of the school’s math teachers on child pornography and other charges.
Detectives say Paul Urquiza, 32, shared pornography with a 16-year-old girl from the United Kingdom, sent her sexually explicit messages, and inappropriate images. Police said Urquiza later confessed to the crimes.
“It caught me off guard,” student Liam Castro said. “I didn’t expect him to be doing that type of stuff.”
Castro said Urquiza had been his algebra teacher.
“He was pretty good,” Castro said. “He got me through the grade.”
While Castro expressed surprise, a student, who identified herself only as “Leah”, said she wasn’t surprised about the allegations.
“We found on Twitter where he was saying weird stuff,” she said.
Urquiza has been a teacher with the Miami-Dade school district since 2017. Police said the victim was not his student. He walked out of jail on bond late Wednesday night.
“Send nudes by order of King Paul,” he wrote the girl, according to the arrest report.
Urquiza connected with the girl from England on Reddit, and about a week later he told her he loved her, police said. The girl said Urquiza helped her with her homework and read Harry Potter aloud to her, police said. She knew he would ignore her if she didn’t send the nude pictures, police said.
“We see a lot of 13-16-year-olds on Reddit being horny,” Urquiza wrote her in a message, according to the arrest form.
Police said the girl’s mother found out about the relationship after her daughter accidentally sent her a nude photograph of herself.
“For the charged individual to be working as a high school teacher, with the potential of victimizing the very students he is entrusted to educate, terrifies every parent and worries every member of the law enforcement community and every school administrator at every level,” Miami-Dade State Attorney Katherine Fernandez Rundle said.
The school district sent Local 10 a statement Wednesday.
“These allegations are disturbing and understandably upsetting; we will fully cooperate with partner law enforcement agencies in the investigation of this case,” it said. “The District has initiated employment termination proceedings and he will be precluded from seeking future employment with this District.”