Teacher guilty of 30 sexual assaults on teenage boys will be jailed

A senior school teacher from Lincolnshire faces jail after he was found guilty of sexual assaults on 14 boys.

Teacher Jack Smith, 28, was convicted of 39 sexual charges after a three week trial at Lincoln Crown Court.

The offences included 30 sexual assaults on 14 boys and nine charges of sexual communication with a child.

Smith, of Pleasance Way, Manby, near Louth, showed little reaction as the jury returned their unanimous guilty verdicts.

Judge Simon Hirst adjourned sentence until January 17 for the preparation of a probation report on Smith but warned him that a jail sentence was inevitable.

"I shall sentence you on January 17," Judge Hirst told Smith.

"The jury have rejected the defence you put forward.

"You know on January 17 you will a receive a sentence of imprisonment, the issue is how long that sentence will be."

Smith was granted conditional bail until his sentence hearing but will now have to notify with the Sex Offenders Register.

Judge Hirst told Smith: "When you are sentenced on January 17 I will remind you that you are now barred from working with children or any vulnerable person."

Jurors heard Smith began working as a probationary teacher in September 2019.

He was suspended in March this year after sexual allegations were made against him.

The name of the school where Smith worked and the ages of the victims can not be published to protect their anonymity.

Among the allegations made against Smith was that he would slap boys on the bottom or put his hand on their waistband or in their trousers.

It was also alleged that Smith pulled a boy towards him and touched his hip, and touched the chest of another child between his shirt buttons.

Smith also talked to some boys about sexual matters, the jury was told, asking how often they masturbated, if they were virgins and how many girls they had sex with.

Other topics included how often they watched pornography and if they used protection, it was alleged.

During the trial jurors were directed to find Smith not guilty of five futher sexual assault charges.

Giving evidence in court, Smith accepted much of his behaviour as described by the boys did happen but claimed it was not sexually motivated.

In a defence statement made before the trial Smith had claimed the allegations were either fabricated or the result of collusion between his victims.

But in the witness box Smith said he did not remember many of the events and confirmed he no longer maintained there had been collusion.

Prosecution barrister Michael Cranmer-Brown asked Smith: "You say any tucking in of a shirt or patting on a bottom was not sexual?" Smith replied: "Yes."

Smith also claimed that any discussion of sexual matters was "innocent."