Former Teacher and Baptist Minister Found Guilty of Historic Sexual Abuse

Derbyshire Times
August 4, 2016

http://www.derbyshiretimes.co.uk/news/former-teacher-and-baptist-minister-found-guilty-of-historic-sexual-abuse-1-8053925

Derby Crown Court.

A former teacher turned Baptist minister has been found guilty of sexually abusing a boy he taught at a Derbyshire school in the 1970s. John Thompson had denied sexually touching the boy over a four-year period at Crich C of E Junior School 40 years ago. He faced charges of six counts of indecent assault and two of gross indecency with the pupil. A jury of six men and six women at Derby Crown Court took just over three hours to reach a unanimous verdict against Thompson, of Tutbury Road, Burton. Thompson, a father of four boys, lived in Crich and was a third year teacher at the school between 1968 and 1981. He then left teaching to study theology, becoming employed as a Baptist minister, working at Babington Hospital in Belper, Crich Baptist Church, and a church in Sutton-in-Ashfield before becoming a minister in Burton in 1988. Judge Nirmal Shant QC remanded Thompson in custody for a sentencing hearing on September 12. Speaking during the trial this week, the victim, who is now in his 50s, said Thompson would make him undress in an office at the school and then went on to touch him sexually. The man said his experiences at the hands of Thompson “destroyed my life” and that he did not come forward until 40 years after the alleged abuse as he was “ashamed and embarrassed with myself”. Giving evidence he said: “He has destroyed my life and taken my dreams. He has left me in fear. I came to expect it (the abuse) as the norm.