Former Greenwich Teacher Named in Ri Sex Abuse Scandal

By Robert Marchant
Greenwich Times
January 22, 2016

http://www.greenwichtime.com/news/article/Former-Greenwich-teacher-named-in-RI-sex-abuse-6777557.php

St. George’s School

A former Brunswick School teacher, now in jail, has been linked to an unfolding scandal involving sexual abuse at a Rhode Island prep school.

A Boston lawyer who has been representing former students at St. George’s School in Middletown, R.I., named Timothy Tefft as one of the previously unidentified alleged perpetrators of abuse at the school.

Tefft is serving five years in federal prison after his guilty plea in 2014 to a child pornography charge.

The former teacher and newspaper editor was at the center of abuse allegations at Brunswick School. Tefft, who taught there in the 1970s and 1980s, was accused in 2013 by three former students of molesting them in the 1980s. The abuse allegedly occurred in New York state. No criminal charges or lawsuits were ever brought. Brunswick School officials had no comment on Tefft this week.

Tefft, who was 65 at the time of his arrest in 2013, acknowledged possessing dozens of files of child pornography.

Attorney Eric MacLeish, who is working with some St. George’s alumni to uncover and remedy the damage inflicted on dozens of students at the Newport-area school, named Tefft as “Employee Perpetrator #5,” as he was described in a report commissioned by administrators at the school.

According to an account in the Boston Globe, citing the school report, Tefft was hired in 1971 and terminated “a few months later after providing alcohol to students.” The school report said he “reportedly sexually touched and attempted to perform oral sex on a student.”

MacLeish, who attended St. George’s and did legal work on behalf of victims of the Catholic priest abuse scandal, criticized the school for not reporting Tefft’s behavior to authorities, according to the Globe. Tefft later worked at other schools before coming to Brunswick as an English teacher.

Tefft is incarcerated at the Fort Dix Federal Correctional Institution in New Jersey and is eligible for release in January 2018.

Staff Writer Paul Schott contributed to this report.

Contact: Robert.Marchant@scni.com