REDWOOD CITY, Calif. -- The San Mateo County District Attorney's Office Monday dropped child molestation charges against a piano teacher whose 2006 conviction for allegedly molesting one of his students was overturned upon appeal.

Boping Chen, 58, had faced 43 counts of child molestation for allegedly repeatedly molesting one of his piano students from March 2001 to August 2004, Assistant District Attorney Karen Guidotti said.

He was found guilty of the charges on March 9, 2006, and sentenced the following June to 14 years in prison, Guidotti said.

Chen, who emigrated to the United States from Shanghai, China, in 2000, served three years in prison while his case went through the appeal process. The conviction was ultimately reversed after a state appeals court determined his attorney in the trial was incompetent.

Guidotti said Chen's defense attorney failed to present psychiatric evidence showing Chen lacked the characteristics of a child molester.

The district attorney's office decided to drop the charges against Chen Monday because the victim, now 13, and her family did not want her to testify again in another trial, Guidotti said.