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ALBANY---While the former English teacher at Christian Brothers Academy was having sexual relations last May and June with teenage male students at the Catholic school, her prominent banker husband was allegedly engaged in an affair with a married woman, the New York Post reports.
Sandra “Beth” Geisel, 42, of Latham mother of four  children, estranged from her husband, Thomas Geisel, served six months in jail after pleading guilty to a single court of third degree rape and an unrelated charge of driving while intoxicated, admitting that she had had sexual relations with a 16-year-old student at the Colonie Catholic prep school last spring.
 The Post reports that Thomas Geisel, president of the Northeast Region for Key Community Bank and responsible for retail, business and commercial banking for Key throughout New York, Vermont and Maine, is named as the “other man” in divorce papers which have been filed by David Bean, who works in the public relations field, against his estranged wife, Karen Bean.
The lawsuit was filed in Albany state Supreme Court.
According to the court papers, Karen Bean “openly, publicly, arrogantly and notoriously committed adultery”, with Thomas Geisel at her home, his home, and hotels in Boston, Saratoga Springs and New York City, in an affair that allegedly began last May, the same month that Geisel’s wife was accused of having sex with the students.
The papers allege that on one occasion, Geisel and Bean went to her “marital residence” highly intoxicated and after talking with her son, stepdaughter and others at the house, they went into the Beans’ bedroom together where they remained for several hours.
Beth Geisel was charged with allegedly having sex with the student last May on three occasions with his consent, once at her and Geisel’s Latham home, once at the student’s Ravena home and once in the press box at the CBA football stadium on campus while some of the boy’s friends, who had taken him to the school grounds, waited nearby.
Karen Bean reportedly says she wasn’t having any affair and that she had filed first for divorce in December, 2004.
Beth Geisel was released from jail in December after completing her sentence and immediately entered a court-ordered 90 day alcohol and drug rehabilitation program.
She was required to register in the state registry as a Level I sex offender, the lowest risk, and will be on 10 years of probation.
Police initially found Beth Geisel in a parked car with a 17-year-old male student last June. No criminal charges were filed because 17 is the legal age for consensual sex in New York State. She was fired from her CBA teaching position the day after the car incident.
While police were investigating that incident, the 16-year-old told police he had sexual relations with her and another 17-year-old also came forward.
One of the 17-year-olds, identified only as Michael, appeared last fall on "Inside Edition" the TV show, and said he'd had sex with Geisel 10 or 11 times. He said Geisel was "a friend to have sex with."
When Geisel was sentenced in Albany County Court, Judge Stephen Herrick said that the 16-year-old in the case was a victim only in the statutory sense.
"He certainly was not victimized by you in any other sense of the word", the judge told Geisel.
Herrick told Geisel that "at the time this occurred, you were needy, drinking heavily and had a low self esteem. While you looked at this as affection, you were being used, abused and sexually abused. You became their playmate. " Herrick said that Geisel failed to realize that she was being used for sex and was being laughed at by the boys behind her back.
The credibility of the 16-year-old student who cried rape became an issue after it was revealed that his parents and he only filed their complaint against Geisel after he had been expelled from CBA for allegedly threatening another student, allegedly blowing up a mailbox, keying an automobile and obtaining a master key to the school building.
He was reportedly informed by the school on June 1 that he was not invited to return for his senior year. It was the following Monday that the student's father approached CBA officials and charged that his son had had sexual relations with Geisel. According to a letter written by CBA officials to parents, the father allegedly threatened a "s---storm" of media attention at the same time he was appealing his son's explusion from the school-in essence threatening retaliation against the school if his son was not reinstated.
Following the explusion hearing and two days after the ruling was issued upholding the decision to expel the student, the student gave a statement to the Colonie Police alleging that Geisel had raped him. 2-21-06
© 2005 North
Country Gazette
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