‘Disabled’ Teacher Indicted --Taught Aerobics on Side

ST. LOUIS — A schoolteacher has been charged with illegally receiving $10,000 in Social Security disability benefits at the same time he conducted such strenuous aerobic dance classes that his adult students were unable to keep up.

The fourth-grade teacher, Ceven B. Sharboneau, was indicted Thursday by a federal grand jury.

Assistant U.S. Atty. Tim Wilson said Sharboneau had collected monthly disability checks from mid-1982 to mid-1984. In applying for benefits, Sharboneau claimed that he suffered from “a lack of energy” and job burnout, the indictment said.

“It’s a rip-off, and it’s an aggravated one,” Wilson said. “He was as fit as a fiddle--a complete, total physical specimen.”

Wilson said Sharboneau was tripped up when a worker at a Social Security office spotted him at her office. The worker was one of his aerobics students.

“She asked, ‘What’s that guy doing here? He’s my aerobics dance instructor,’ ” Wilson said.

Sharboneau, 34, worked full time as a teacher during the time he received the disability benefits and was employed in his spare time at a Vic Tanny International Health Club, authorities said.

A former Vic Tanny employee, Sheri Strebler, said club members complained that Sharboneau’s aerobics classes were too strenuous. “Nobody could keep up with it. I mean, I’m talking intense.”