NORWICH – A former Oxford Academy teacher's assistant, who was fired after the New York State Police charged her in January with raping a middle-school student, pleaded guilty Monday to second-degree attempted rape.

“My intentions were pure, the relationship wasn’t one sided,” the defendant, Heaven L. Parrish, 20, of Smithville Flats, told the court during her guilty plea.

The former teacher seemed to blame the underage victim for the incidents.

“While I agree that it was statutory rape, I was begged and prodded to go forward with the relationship,” she said.

She was sentenced to six months in jail, 10 years probation and will have to register as a sex offender.

“He bragged about our relationship to his friends,” she told the court, “He was willingly participating and begged me to go forth.”

“I didn’t do this as a way to abuse my authority,” said Parrish, a former full-time teacher's aide at the Oxford middle school and the victim's babysitter.

Her sex offender hearing will be at 1:30 p.m. on June 14, at the Chenango County Courthouse.