Former sheriff's deputy gets deferred sentence
BRATTLEBORO, Vt. --A former sheriff's deputy who took a 17-year-old girl to Florida without permission has pleaded no contest to unlawful restraint and guilty to disorderly conduct.
Forty-two-year-old Heidi Nelson was charged after taking the trip last winter with a former student from Brattleboro Union High School's vocational center, where Nelson taught and coached the girl's softball team.
The girl told police she didn't have a sexual relationship with Nelson, but Windham County Sheriff Keith Clark told investigators he didn't fully believe that.
Police say the girl told her mother she was going on the trip with a classmate, but that Nelson denied knowing anything about the trip when she was asked.
Nelson, who resigned her job with the Windham County Sheriff's Department after being charged, got a three-year deferred sentence Thursday on the unlawful restraint charge, meaning she's essentially on probation for that long.
If she adheres to restrictions and isn't charged with any other offenses, the conviction will be erased.
She got 45 to 60 days in jail -- all suspended -- on the disorderly conduct count, according to Windham County State's Attorney Tracy Kelly Shriver.