Shamed Ex-council Chief Sent down for Sex Abuse

Tewkesbury Admag
April 6, 2012

http://www.tewkesburyadmag.co.uk/news/evesham/9633576.Shamed_ex_council_chief_sent_down_for_sex_abuse/

THE disgraced former leader of Worcestershire County Council has been jailed for four years for indecent assaults on an underage girl and a sex attack on a vulnerable woman.

Dr George Lord was sentenced to four years in prison when he appeared at Birmingham Crown Court on Tuesday. Lord had admitted three indecent assaults on a girl aged 14 and 15 in the late 1970s – when he was a church minister – and had already been found guilty after a trial in January of a sex attack on a 19-yearold woman at County Hall, Worcester, in October 2010.

Judge Nigel Godsmark, describing the assaults in the 1970s, spoke directly to the grim-faced 79-year-old, telling him he had groomed the youngster for his sexual self-gratification.

He said: “As a minister, you should have been her protector, not her abuser.”

Bernard Linnemann, prosecuting, said Lord was a married man in his 40s, a man of education and a church minister who was ‘popular with young people’ when he built up trust with a naive young woman then aged just 11. She was having troubles at home and was flattered by the attention of a man of his age and status, she told police.

Mr Linnemann said Lord squeezed her hand, cuddled her closely and rubbed himself against her. He said: “His actions demonstrate a progressive course of behaviour which the prosecution say was by way of grooming her. She felt loved by him in the context of her difficulties at home. By the time she was 14 he was telling her she was ‘gorgeous and sensual’.”

On one occasion Lord took her to a wildlife sanctuary and into a bird hide for privacy where he touched her sexually and on another made her perform a sex act on him while he was driving on the A38 near the Chateau Impney in Droitwich, almost crashing his car. He added: “The sound of a car horn made her jump up. She described herself as not – to use her words – particularly willing.”

During the course of about 30 indecent assaults on the girl – all covered by the three charges – he told her it was all ‘an experiment’. The girl confided in two school friends but not her parents, afraid of how they might react, Mr Linnemann said.

He added: “He had told her that they had a special secret relationship which could not be discussed with other people.”

By the time she was 17 the girl had entered a relationship with a man she had confided in when he was 14. They married, but the marriage collapsed after just two years because of the trauma she suffered at Lord’s hands. Her husband never forgave himself, wrongly the judge said, for not doing more to help her.

Although Lord pleaded guilty to the 70s offences he told police initially that the girl had a crush on him and had pursued him, dismissing the allegations as ‘fantasies of hers’.

Lord was found guilty of the more recent sexual assault, which took place in October 2010, after a trial. He sexually assaulted a 19-year old woman as she bent over a plaque in County Hall.

Lord invited her to see his office and the council chamber, asked her if she had a boyfriend or if she was married, told her she was beautiful and should not have to worry about money and stroked her arm. He suggested she looked at a plaque, knowing she would have to bend over to look at it, then touched her.

The court was told how Lord had served with the RAF, worked as a lecturer, a teacher and examiner for Cambridge University and joined Bromsgrove District Council in 1976 before joining the county council in 1997.

Mr Wilson said: “He was recommended for an MBE but clearly that may not be on the horizon.”

Mr Wilson also said Lord was supported by his children and grandchildren although he had asked them not to come to court.

The judge said: “It is difficult to imagine more serious examples of sexual assault. They were perpetrated over years by you and in abuse of your position.”

Lord was sentenced to four years in prison, 12 months for each of the offences and he was told he would serve at least half of his sentence before he was eligible for release on licence.

The 26 days Lord has already served in custody will count towards his sentence.