Charges dismissed: Learning lab worker faces sex charges

A computer network technician at the Wade Edwards Learning Lab at Broughton High School was arrested Thursday on sex charges involving a 15-year-old student, police said Friday.

Nikolai Alexeevich Lifanov, 21, of 1032 Brighthurst Drive, was charged with two counts of statutory rape and one count of indecent liberties with a student. The alleged offenses occurred between March 10 and Wednesday, according to an arrest warrant.

Lifanov was being held Friday in the Wake County jail under $500,000 bond.

Learning lab officials said Friday that Lifanov has been fired.

The learning lab is an after-school computer center and academic support facility across the street from Broughton High. Former U.S. Sen. John Edwards and his wife, Elizabeth, created the center to honor their son, a Broughton High student who died in a 1996 wreck.

"Learning lab directors are working to be absolutely certain that its students are safe and secure at the learning lab and that such an incident never repeats itself," Sarah Lowder, director of the Wade Edwards Foundation, said in a statement.