To avoid school bullies Chase sought the protection of a teacher, who turned out to be a predator
All names and identifying details have been changed.
Participants have given us permission to share their experiences.
Chase was sexually abused in a residential school where a teacher faced allegations of child abuse.
He feels let down by the psychiatric and education professionals who sent him to the school.
Chase grew up in the 1950s and 60s in a deprived inner-city area.
He writes ‘I was considered a “troubled” child and underwent some therapy ... attending psychiatric sessions and additional tutoring’. These services were provided by the local authority.
Chase adds that the team of professionals he saw ‘agreed that a boarding school would be good for me’. At the age of 11 he was sent to what he describes as a ‘progressive’ school, that allowed pupils a good deal of freedom to smoke, swear and skip lessons.
Many of the single male teachers lived on the site.
Chase describes his feelings when he arrived at the school. ‘As a child who was experiencing my first time away from home in a totally new and different environment, I was very nervous and scared’.
He was badly bullied by some of the other boys. He explains ‘I had revealed my Jewish background and they decided to make this an issue. Much of my time was spent avoiding them which was difficult in such a closed environment’.
Chase says that the boys seemed to form groups around particular staff who lived in, and would be invited to their rooms to watch television. He joined one group with a teacher, Mr Williams. Initially he went with other boys to watch television, but to avoid the bullies he started visiting Mr Williams on his own.
He recalls that Mr Williams seemed happy for him to do this. But one evening, the teacher encouraged Chase to sit on his lap, then cuddled him and kissed him on the mouth. Chase was about 12 or 13 at the time. He remembers he felt confused but says that he responded to the comfort and closeness.
Over the following few days, the abuse by Mr Williams escalated to undressing Chase and getting him to masturbate him. The teacher would rub himself against Chase until he ejaculated, and also tried to make Chase perform oral sex on him.
Chase says the abuse occurred many times until he left the school.
During this time, Chase tried to run away from the school because he was so unhappy. The second time, he made it home to his parents. He did not tell them about the abuse, only that he didn’t like the school, and they agreed not to send him back.
A few months later Mr Williams contacted Chase and asked to meet him. He took Chase to a hotel and sexually abused him.
After that, Chase did not see Mr Williams for many years, until he went to a social gathering near his old school. He saw Mr Williams, but says ‘there was no reference to past events’.
Chase understands why his mother and father allowed him to be sent to the residential school. He says ‘I know that both my parents, at that time, would have followed the advice of the “authorities” without question’.
However, he feels let down that the psychiatric and education ‘experts’ who placed him in the residential school did not apparently check it was a safe environment.
Chase has since discovered that shortly before he was sent there, another teacher had been removed from the school and was later convicted of child sexual abuse offences. This teacher was a friend of Mr Williams. He has also heard that other pupils had similar experiences of abuse with Mr Williams.
Thinking about how he has been affected by the abuse, Chase says ‘It would be wrong to say that the experiences did not have an impact on me at that time or since, and may have contributed to some of the decisions I made afterwards but, over time, I have moved on’.
He is happily married with children.
Chase adds ‘As time has passed, I understand much more about what happened and the circumstances under which vulnerable children can be drawn into this sort of situation by predatory adults’.