A man who has tutored hundreds of children was given a two-year deferred judgment Monday and ordered to register as a sex offender for fondling one of his students a decade ago.
Denver District Judge Morris Hoffman also told Alexander Naroditsky, 79, to stay away from children and discontinue his tutoring.
Naroditsky had pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor count of unlawful sexual contact after a Denver jury last year couldn’t decide if he had done anything more serious.
The tutor originally was accused of multiple counts of sexual assault on a child. Naroditsky’s now-23-year-old accuser had claimed that over a period of time in 1995, when she was 12, Naroditsky had become increasingly sexually aggressive, first hugging her, then fondling her and finally raping her.
She came forward in 2004, after she saw a film on victims of sexual assault.
Hoffman said he had agonized over whether to accept the plea bargain, presented to him by prosecutor Aaron Suazo and defense attorney Gary Lozow.
“After I accepted it, I felt terrible,” the judge said. “This process is about truth-finding. I want to know what happened. I don’t know what happened.”
The victim told the judge that she believed Naroditsky’s reason for teaching was because he wanted to exploit children.
“I will never forget the pain,” she said. “I firmly believe that his passion for teaching … shouldn’t be allowed … anymore.”
Staff writer Howard Pankratz can be reached at 303-954-1939 or hpankratz@denverpost.com.
