Teachers and staff at the Redlands Unified School District can’t keep their hands off of students, and it’s costing taxpayers bigtime.

In just the last three years, the California district has agreed to settlements totaling more than $30 million with students who were sexually abused by teachers or staff, the Redland Daily Facts reports.

MORE NEWS: Know These Before Moving From Cyprus To The UK

The most recent settlement came on Friday, when the district agreed to pay $8.5 million to four students who alleged former drama teacher Joel Koonce molested them between 2016 and 2018.

Koonce was working as a substitute teacher at Ontario High School when he was arrested Nov. 8 on 15 felony charges related to his work with students in the district. He previously worked at Redlands High School, but was fired in November 2017 amid allegations sexual misconduct with students.

The initial investigation could not prove criminal wrongdoing, but a second investigation following renewed allegations in July 2018 ultimately led to his arrest for oral copulation with a person under the age of 18, sexual intercourse, child molestation, sexual penetration by a foreign object, distributing or showing pornography to a minor, sodomy of a person under 18, and sexual exploitation of a child, the Daily Facts reports.

Officials settled the massive payout less than a month after victims filed a claim against the Redlands district and without the victims actually filing a lawsuit in court. It’s a trend dating back to 2016 involving several multi-million dollar payouts to avoid the legal system.

The victims’ attorney, Morgan Stewart, said the quick cash out “reflects the gravity of the offenses and the immense harm done to our clients.”

“Redlands Unified recognized the harm to these students and acted honorably in settling the cases without extensive litigation to allow these students to heal from this abuse,” he said.

MORE NEWS: How to prepare for face-to-face classes

Koonce pleaded not guilty to the charges and is currently awaiting trial at the High Desert Detention Center in Adelanto, California.

His alleged victims provided investigators with pictures and video of two 16-year-old female students in a threesome with the teacher, and described sex at Koonce’s home, where he plied the girls with alcohol and marijuana. One girl said she had sex with Koonce 40 to 50 times at numerous locations in school. His students described him as a red-eyed stoner who taught class high, kept bongs stashed in the theater, and shared his fetishes for “12-year-old girls, pregnant women and transgender boys” with his alleged victims, the Daily Facts reports.

The married teacher encouraged the teen girls to call him “daddy,” role play as Hermione Granger from Harry Potter, and told his victims he was previously fired from a summer camp in his native Texas for having sex with an underage girl, according to police reports.

The settlement with his alleged victims is the latest in a string of multi-million dollar payouts to victims of teacher sexual misconduct in the district since 2016. That year the district agreed to pay $6 million to settle a case involving teacher Laura Whitehurst, who was convicted of having sex with students, including one who fathered her child.

Redlands Unified then spent $15.7 million to settle lawsuits from students victimized by teachers Kevin Patrick Kirkland and Brian Townsley, and theater technician Daniel Bachman, the Daily Facts reports.

Kirkland worked as a special education teacher and golf coach between June 2014 and May 2016, when he sexually abused students. He served 13 months in jail after pleading guilty to eight felonies and three misdemeanors.

Townsley, an English teacher, allegedly sexually abused a student in 2008 and 2009 when the girl was 15 years old, though she denied the relationship to police and the teacher did not face criminal charges.

Bachman dated a girl while theater technical director at Redlands High School between 2011 and 2013 and allegedly admitted to having sex, but the District Attorney’s Office declined to press charges in that case, as well.

“The latest settlement follows an investigation spanning more than a year by the Southern California News group into allegations that Redlands Unified officials repeatedly failed to properly report teachers accused of sexually abusing or having inappropriate relationships with students,” the Daily Facts reports.

“A review of more than 2,000 pages of police reports, affidavits and depositions, along with more than 100 hours of recordings, also revealed that the school district obstructed the Whitehurst criminal investigation, and that Assistant Superintendent of human Resources Sabine Robertson-Phillips might have destroyed evidence.”