Woman jailed on sex charge

Police say she had a relationship with a teenage relative.

By MICHAEL A. MOHAMMED
Published July 14, 2007

TAMPA - Tampa police charged a 28-year-old woman with lewd and lascivious battery Wednesday after she confessed to having consensual sex with a teen relative for more than a year, beginning when the boy was 14.

It started in late 2004 when Jennifer Lee Dodd was married with three young children, according to a police report.

Dodd told a detective the two had sex "several" times, the report stated. The boy, whom police did not name, said it happened "thousands" of times.

Dodd became pregnant and gave birth to a baby girl. Paternity test results are not yet known, said police spokeswoman Andrea Davis.

Dodd and the boy, related by marriage, have known each other since he was 8 years old, according to the report. In a May interview, the boy, then 17, told a detective that he and Dodd started having sex when he was a student at Memorial Middle School.

They stopped about three months after Dodd gave birth, the boy told police. Doug Dodd, her husband, caught them together, the boy said.

The boy told an investigator that if the baby turns out to be his, he wants to accept the responsibility of raising her.

"He doesn't care one way or the other if Jennifer goes to jail," the detective wrote. "He feels that she is a bad parent."

Police began investigating Jennifer Dodd after a Department of Children and Families investigation at her home generated suspicion, spokeswoman Davis said.

Davis said none of Dodd's children are currently in her care. The police report said Doug Dodd has custody of the three older children, 8, 6 and 4, but it isn't clear on the status of the youngest child.

Davis said the Dodds have separated.

Jennifer Dodd was released from the Orient Road Jail Wednesday on $7,500 bond. When reached by phone, she declined to comment.

Michael A. Mohammed can be reached at mmohammed@sptimes.com or 813 226-3404.

[Last modified July 14, 2007, 00:42:31]