Former Concord teacher Howie Leung charged with sexual assault in New Hampshire

Primo “Howie” Leung, 36, of Concord

Primo “Howie” Leung, 36, of Concord

By JEREMY MARGOLIS

Monitor staff

Published: 09-20-2024 5:10 PM

Howie Leung, a former Concord teacher serving prison time in Massachusetts for sexually assaulting a Concord student during a summer program there, will face new sexual assault charges in New Hampshire, Concord police and Merrimack County Attorney Paul Halvorsen announced Thursday.

Prosecutors allege Leung, who worked as a special education teacher at Rundlett Middle School and Concord High from 2006 to 2019, repeatedly sexually assaulted the same student in Concord that he plead guilty to raping in Massachusetts.

The assaults in Concord allegedly occurred from 2014 to 2016, starting when the girl was 12 or 13, according to court records.

The new charges, which had long been speculated, open a new chapter in the Leung scandal, which rocked the Concord School District when the teacher was arrested in 2019 and led to the resignations of former superintendent Terri Forsten and principal Tom Sica.

Though an investigator concluded the sexual relationship between Leung and the student, who has spoken publicly about what she endured, began in Concord, the criminal case proceeded in Massachusetts because the charges were stronger there, Concord Deputy Chief John Thomas previously told the Monitor.

Thomas and Halvorsen, the Merrimack County Attorney, both declined to comment on Friday. The state’s public defender’s office, which is representing Leung, did not respond to a request for comment.

Leung is currently serving a six- to seven-year sentence at a state prison in Gardner, Massachusetts after pleading guilty to two child rape counts last July. Those rapes occurred at the Fessenden School in Newton, Massachusetts during a summer program where Leung worked and the student served as an unpaid assistant.

“He would take students from up here in Concord to go down there to help with the program,” Concord police Lt. Sean Ford said following Leung’s arraignment on the Massachusetts charges in 2019.

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The 39-count indictment announced Thursday alleges that Leung kissed the student and touched her breasts during the fall or winter of the 2014-15 school year, while she was a student at Rundlett. The bulk of the charges involve repeated digital penetration and oral sex during the summer of 2015.

Leung is also charged with attempting to get another student to lie during the investigation in late 2018 or 2019 and for deleting files on his electronic devices.

“The district is grateful to the Concord Police Department and the Merrimack County Attorney’s Office for their continued investigation and effort to seek justice for the egregious actions of former teacher Howie Leung,” Concord Superintendent Kathleen Murphy wrote in a statement.

Murphy wrote that the district has since “enacted policies, procedures and practices to ensure something like this will not happen.”

Leung is scheduled to be arraigned on the new charges on Oct. 7 in Merrimack County Superior Court.

Jeremy Margolis can be contacted at jmargolis@cmonitor.com.