A Salem teacher has been charged following a police sting operation after he allegedly tried to meet up with an underage girl for “sex acts.”

Gym and health teacher Darren Benedick, 42, was apparently unaware that the person he was communicating with online was not a 14-year-old girl, but rather an undercover Newbury cop who had been monitoring a “teens-only” chat room.

The teacher at Salem Academy Charter School was arrested by Newbury Police, with help from Salem Police. He was charged with one count of child enticement and one count of dissemination of matter harmful to minors.

“At this time, authorities have no allegations that any students at the school were subject to the defendant’s alleged misconduct,” the Essex DA’s Office said in a statement.

Benedick was arraigned in Newburyport District Court on Wednesday following the sting operation.

“The defendant is alleged to have engaged in online conversations with the undercover officer expressing a desire to meet in person and engage in sexual activities, to have sent an obscene image to the officer, and to have described the sex acts that he wished to perform,” the Essex DA’s Office said.

Benedick made plans to meet the person on Wednesday, and he was taken into custody when he arrived for the intended encounter.

Prosecutors at the arraignment requested cash bail of $50,000 with GPS monitoring, home confinement, and no contact with children. The court set bail at $5,000 and granted the non-monetary terms, including the no contact with children order.

The Essex DA and the police chiefs in Salem and Newbury “advise parents and guardians to engage youth in age-appropriate discussions about proper online and social media behavior, and to encourage them to speak up if they encounter inappropriate contact from an adult.”

During her time in office, the AG has helped create an abortion legal hotline for the state, helped implement the state’s abortion provider shield law, and more.

Shortly after taking office last year, Massachusetts Attorney General Andrea Joy Campbell created a Reproductive Justice Unit that has worked tirelessly to protect and expand reproductive health, rights and justice. This Unit has focused on eliminating disparities in maternal health, combatting anti-abortion crisis pregnancy centers, working across state lines to respond to national attacks on reproductive health care, and defending and enforcing Massachusetts’ strong legal protections for reproductive rights.

“We are doing this work with a hands-on and expert-led approach,” said AG Campbell, the first Black woman to hold statewide office in Massachusetts. Upon taking office, she pledged to “be a national leader in protecting reproductive rights and gender affirming care.”

On June 18, AG Campbell and her Reproductive Justice Unit (headed by Sapna Khatri) convened more than 120 reproductive justice experts at Western New England Law School in Springfield, Massachusetts.

Participants included community organizations, healthcare providers, legal advocates and academics. During a listening session, Campbell heard how her office could better champion reproductive justice on a local, state and national level, particularly with national efforts to roll back these rights. 

“As bodily autonomy is under relentless attack nationwide, Massachusetts is doubling down on its efforts to champion, defend and expand access to sexual and reproductive health care,” said AG Campbell.

Before the convening, Campbell toured Seven Sisters Midwifery and Community Birthing Center in Florence, Massachusetts—the state’s only midwife-owned and operated independent birth center. 

At the convening, Campbell announced the release of five new “Know Your Rights” guides focused on abortion, gender affirming care, contraception, the state shield law and anti-abortion clinics.

“To help ensure that people in Massachusetts know their rights in the confusing and evolving post-Dobbs world, I am glad to release new resources to help people navigate common issues associated with reproductive care,” said AG Campbell.

As one of her first actions in office, AG Campbell worked with Reproductive Equity Now to create the Abortion Legal Hotline—a free and confidential hotline that assists Massachusetts healthcare providers and patients by providing legal advice related to abortion access and care. 

The AG has also led efforts to fully implement and operationalize the state’s abortion provider shield law, including Massachusetts’ first-of-its-kind telehealth provider shield provision, which protects clinicians in the state who serve patients living in states banning abortion. Seven other states have since passed similar telehealth provider shield laws (WA, CO, VT, NY, CA, ME, RI) and four practices—Aid Access, Abuzz, The MAP, and Armadillo Clinic—are now serving over 12,000 women living in ban states each month with telehealth abortion and FDA-approved pills by mail.

AG Campbell has filed amicus briefs with the Supreme Court of the United States to protect access to medication abortion and emergency abortion care, fought to defend access to gender affirming care on behalf of trans youth, and leveraged the tools of her office to address the maternal health crisis in Massachusetts. This is evident in her launching and distributing a $1.5 million maternal health equity grant. AG Campbell’s predecessor, now-Governor Maura Healey, issued a consumer advisory on anti-abortion crisis pregnancy centers in July 2022, and the AG has aggressively pursued complaints filed against these centers. 

The reproductive justice convening concluded with a fireside chat between AG Campbell and the nationally renowned reproductive justice activist Loretta J. Ross, now a professor of women’s and gender studies at Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts. Campbell and Ross discussed the history of the reproductive justice movement, the state of reproductive care access today and the government’s role in sustaining long-term systemic change.

“True reproductive justice is all-encompassing and accounts for liberties such as the right to have or not have a child, along with the opportunity to raise children in environments where they can thrive,” said Ross. “Attorney General Campbell is one of few leaders nationwide to use a truly comprehensive and expert-based approach to championing reproductive justice, and it is my deep honor to support her in this work.” 

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