A former Minnesota Teacher of the Year was sentenced to 14 years in prison Friday for repeatedly sexually assaulting his eighth-grade student at a Minneapolis charter school nearly a decade ago.
The victim came forward with the allegations against Harvest Best Academy teacher Abdul Jameel Wright in May 2024 when she was 21 years old. She said the assaults began in 2017, when she was 14, and occurred for nearly a year in school classrooms, his car and elsewhere in Hennepin County.
Wright, 39, of Brooklyn Park, was charged in Hennepin County District Court with first-degree criminal sexual conduct by a person in a position of authority. He opted for a court trial, and Judge Sarah West found him guilty of the charge in September.
State sentencing guidelines called for a presumptive sentence of 12 years in prison. The prosecution asked for a 14-year, three-month sentence, which West handed down.
After incarceration, Wright will be required to register as a predatory offender and be on conditional release for 10 years.
Abdul Jameel Wright (Courtesy of the Hennepin County Sheriff’s Office)
“Mr. Wright abused his authority and engaged in grossly inappropriate behavior,” Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty said in a statement following his sentence. “My thoughts are with the victim in this case, who exhibited incredible courage in providing her testimony to help secure a conviction.”
Wright was named Minnesota Teacher of the Year in September 2016, becoming the first charter school teacher to receive the honor. He joined the North Minneapolis school in 2012, with a bachelor’s degree from Concordia University in St. Paul.
According to court documents:
The woman reported that Wright, her former English teacher, began “grooming” her by singling her out. She described eating lunch with Wright in his classroom and him playing music for her.
Wright eventually started calling the girl every day and developed a relationship with her mother. He would pick the girl up for school and drop her off at home after she stayed after school to babysit his children.
The sexual contact began in January 2017 with Wright kissing and fondling her during a ride home, she reported, adding that after that he would do “a little more.” She said he put cushions on the floor of a classroom before the assaults, one of which happened while his children were in the next room watching a movie.
She reported the assaults ended around the time she entered ninth grade.
The woman testified during Wright’s court trial that she was in college when she began to fully understand what Wright had done to her, according to Judge West’s Sept. 19 written verdict.
“As she learned about grooming in a psychology course,” the document read, “as she reflected on how it felt to be alone processing it, and as she experienced the stress from the experiences with Mr. Wright, she realized she needed to release it.”
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