A former teacher has been found guilty of having a sexual relationship with a 17-year-old student who was under her care at a juvenile detention center.
After a two-day trial in Adair Circuit Court, a jury convicted former teacher Elena Bardin, 27, on multiple felony sex charges.
The charges included first-degree sexual abuse, unlawful transaction with a minor, and distribution of obscene material to a minor.
The jury ultimately recommended a prison sentence totaling 14 years, as per Kentucky.com.
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| Elena Bardin |
According to police reports, the relationship with the student began while Bardin was working as an English teacher at the state-run Adair Youth Development Center.
Soon, Bardin’s colleagues grew suspicious of the unusual amount of attention she was paying to the teen.
In response, facility staff transferred the boy to a different housing unit to separate the pair.
During a subsequent building-wide search, officials discovered 138 pages of handwritten letters and explicit photographs of Bardin in the boy’s new cell.
In these letters, Bardin talked about explicit fantasies and recounted real-life intimate encounters with the boy, including kissing and sexual touching.
This discovery prompted an immediate investigation by Kentucky State Police, who later arrested Bardin on April 2, 2025.
Upon further investigation, security footage showed that Bardin repeatedly entered the boy’s cell for extended periods, violating facility rules.
She also instructed the teen to hide her letters and the nude photos she had developed at a local Walmart.
“I can’t be classified as an effing pedophile,” she reportedly wrote in one of her letters.
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| Elena and her then husband |
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| Elena and her then husband |
During her trial, Commonwealth’s Attorney Brian Wright alleged that Bardin’s relationship with a student went beyond physical intimacy.
He claimed she had discussed her desire to have her husband murdered so she could avoid divorce and custody battle over their 5-year-old daughter.
The prosecution presented a letter where Bardin wrote to the boy, “I know you’ll take care of him, but shouldn’t someone else do it to take the suspicion away from you?”
However, her defense attorney, Steve Romines, argued that any talk of killing her husband was mere jokes and not a serious plot. He also fiercely challenged the credibility of the teen, who himself faces an unrelated murder charge in Jefferson County.
“In regard to her grooming him, he was grooming her just as much,” Romines told the jury, attempting to shift the narrative of who was truly the victim.
The jury eventually agreed with the defense and acquitted Bardin on the charge of solicitation to commit murder.
During the trial, the teen testified that while he eventually believed Bardin was serious about the murder-for-hire plot, he never intended to act on it.
He described the relationship as an amusing way to pass the time while incarcerated, as per Kentucky.com
As the Commonwealth's Attorney noted, this conviction of a teacher is “the latest black eye” for the department.
State officials recently confirmed that the U.S. Department of Justice is continuing a civil rights investigation into possible mistreatment of youths at Kentucky's juvenile detention centers, following years of reports about abuse and neglect.
Elena Bardin is now in jail as she awaits her formal sentencing, which is scheduled for November 13, 2025, by Circuit Judge Samuel Spalding.
Her personal life has also crumbled; her husband filed for divorce and sole custody of their daughter on May 7, 2025 after the allegations came to light.
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