In a bid to escape from the law for their crimes, an elementary school teacher, Aric Babbit, 40, and his 36-year-old husband, Matthew Deyo, killed themselves.

They were found dead in an apparent murder-suicide on an island in Washington state last August.

Babbit was not only seen as a teacher to some of his students, but as a mentor.

According to the St. Paul Pioneer Press, Police documents revealed that both men sexually abused eight underage boys for years.

The Police began investigating the couple on Aug. 14 after a 16-year-old boy and his parents told the police he had been sexually assaulted. As the days went by, investigators spoke with two other victims – the boy’s best friend and another teen who said he had known Babbitt since the second grade.

The boys told police that the couple intoxicated them with alcohol and marijuana to the point they almost blacked out and the couple had sex with them.

According to a search warrant filed on Aug. 23, police found drugs, paraphernalia, child pornography and Polaroid pictures of the victims in “various states of undress” in the couple’s house.

As the investigation continued, Babbit and Deyo emptied their bank accounts and fled the city.

They were found dead on Aug. 25 on Lopez Island in the northwest corner of Washington state. Authorities believe Deyo shot Babbitt in the head with a shotgun, then turned the weapon on himself, the paper reported.

After their death Deyo’s parent gave police a suicide note the couple sent to them days before their death.

It stated that the accusations were “too great to overcome” and that they decided to “choose their own destinies rather than experience the embarrassment, ridicule, hatred and inevitable loss of freedom that the justice system would give.”

Azeez