Ex-teacher Accused of Soliciting Sex from Teen

WDBO
July 26, 2012

http://www.wdbo.com/news/news/local/video-shows-former-orange-co-teacher-interrogated-/nP4MJ/

A newly released video of a former teacher shows him being grilled by detectives after he was arrested in a sex sting.

Brian Shriner, who was also an Episcopalian priest, was arrested last month after being accused of traveling to have sex with a 14-year-old girl.

Shriner told detectives he wanted to meet the girl because he was writing a book, according to officials.

He apparently had aspirations to be an author, so Shriner told detectives he needed to speak to a 14-year-old girl, and he went online to find one, according to investigators.

Shriner's unease was apparent as he sat in an interrogation room and waited for a sheriff's detective.

He was in a blue shirt and flip-flops and moved his legs nervously.

Then, he described how he felt after being arrested, accused of soliciting sex from a 14-year-old girl.

"This is stupid. I realize the level of stupidity. I've never touched a child that way. I will never touch a child that way. This is not where I am or who I am," he said.

Shriner told the detective that he planned to write a novel and needed a young girl for a part of the story.

"There's a level for lust and there's several stories that deal with the level of lust," he said in the video.

But, he claimed he never told anyone about that novel, not even his own wife.

Shriner was picked up last month after detectives were called by a woman who believed her daughter was talking to a teen online. They began their own investigation.

Shriner worked at the Geneva School in Winter Park. He's also a priest at the New Covenant Anglican Church in Winter Springs.

Shriner claimed he never wanted to anything more than speak to the girl.

"I told her I wasn't going to meet her unless we were going to chill out and talk," he said.

"Talk, and if more happens, more happens?" asked a detective.

"No, that's what she said," said Shriner.

Shriner no longer works for the Geneva School.

He has pleaded not guilty to the charges and has since bonded out of jail.