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A 19-year-old woman testified Wednesday in Freeborn County District Court she was visiting a former Albert Lea High School counselor as many as six or seven times a day when she was a junior at the school and communicating with him on Snapchat sometimes daily before he invited her over to his house one night and they engaged in sexual activity.

The woman, who was 16 at the time of the alleged activity, was the first to testify in the case against former counselor Richard John Polley, 35, who faces one count of third-degree criminal sexual conduct involving penetration of an individual under 18 from a prohibited occupational relationship.

The Tribune does not release the names of alleged victims of criminal sexual conduct.

The woman said she met Polley at the start of the 2021-22 school year and at first started going to his office as an escape from class. She estimated she started out visiting him one to two times a day and advanced to six or seven times a day as the school year went on. She noted she was struggling with mental health conditions such as depression, anxiety, anorexia and ADHD at the time.

She said she looked at Polley as more than a school guidance counselor and developed what she described as a crush on him.

The day before her family went on a trip during the holiday break, she added Polley on Snapchat, to which he accepted the request. She changed his name in her phone to “Richard Ellingson” because she didn’t want her family to see his name on her phone.

She said the Snapchat conversations reportedly started casual before getting more personal. They texted and sent photos, and at one point reached a 14-day snap streak, which means they both sent photos to each other for 14 days. In Snapchat, there is no documentation that a person has sent a photo unless one of the parties takes a screenshot of the post.

Once school started up again and school was back in session, she said they had conversations about whether it was appropriate to have each other on Snapchat since they were both at the school. They also had conversations about not saving their messages, and he told her his life could be ruined if anyone found out about them talking.

On Jan. 8, 2022, she said she was hanging out with her best friend and sending Snapchat messages to Polley, who was at Bleacher’s Sports Bar & Grill. She said he had mentioned he needed a ride home from the bar. He ultimately drove himself home but had messaged her to swing by and say hi.

She said she went to the house, and when she arrived found him standing in the kitchen. They then sat in the living room where they talked a little and he then pulled her on to his lap.

While this was happening, her friend was messaging her, wondering where she was at and stating that they had to pick up her brother.

After a few minutes, she went to meet her friend in the Northbridge Mall parking lot, and they went to pick up her friend’s brother.

She said Polley reportedly told her his door would be unlocked if she wanted to swing by again, so when they got back from picking up her friend’s brother, she went back to Polley’s house.

He was at first sleeping, but then they started kissing and making out before he gave her oral sex and then had sexual intercourse, she said.

Her friend was messaging her asking where she was at because she was supposed to be spending the night at her house and it was her curfew. She ultimately returned from Polley’s house after midnight.

The woman said Polley told her not to tell anyone what had happened, though she ended up confiding in her friend.

She said she went back to school the Monday after, and she and Polley continued to send messages on Snapchat until Jan. 12, when he showed her a message in his office that he had received from his mother that she had told people that the two of them had sex. She said she could tell by his face that he was mad.

After that, he removed or blocked her from Snapchat.

That same day, she was brought to the office to speak with the dean of students and assistant principal. She said she didn’t say anything at first because she didn’t want to get Polley in trouble, but she eventually admitted to having sex with him after they brought it up to her.

She said she didn’t want him to be in trouble because she didn’t feel he had done anything wrong and felt bad after disclosing the information to school officials and police. She said she had made a promise she wasn’t going to tell anybody.

After word of the incident came out, she said she went to online school the rest of the school year before returning to in-person school her senior year and graduating in 2023.