FORMER SCHOOL TEACHER JAILED FOR SEX OFFENCES
A former teacher has been jailed for 14 months for sexually abusing three teenage girls.Leo Norman groomed pupils at St Anne's Catholic School and Sixth Form College in Southampton and touched them inappropriately, Portsmouth Crown Court heard.
The 46-year-old, of Peartree Avenue, Southampton, pleaded guilty to three counts of sexual activity with a child by a person in a position of trust.
Prosecutors said Norman "exhibited a deeply troubling pattern of behaviour over a number of years".
One of his victims told the court that other adults at the school knew what was happening but failed to act.
Reading a statement, she said: "He was in the wrong.
He was a teacher and I was a pupil.
I was not safe at St Anne's.
No-one thought to protect me or anyone else." In another statement read by a barrister, a second woman said: "You have impacted my life significantly and I have recurring nightmares." Norman committed the offences in his office and elsewhere on the school premises between 2014 and 2019.
He paid the girls compliments and took an interest in their personal lives to build trust.
His advances left victims feeling confused and uncomfortable.
He was handed a Sexual Harm Prevention Order and ordered to sign the sex offenders register for 10 years.
The school acknowledged the bravery of the women who came forward and said they would be monitoring students closely.
