A teacher from Eton College was sentenced to five years in jail today for sexually abusing his pupils. Matthew Mowbray, 49, was found guilty on eight counts of sexual activity with a child as well as running a photography club as a front to create indecent images of children. He would take pictures of his students and combine them with downloaded child abuse material to create his own.

Mowbray, who teaches geography at the school, admitted to superimposing photos of his students' faces onto images of naked bodies of random children on his computer.

He had previously denied nine counts of sexual activity with four boys and one girl which occurred over a period of several years. However, the jury found Mowbray guilty on eight charges in connection with the boys. He also admitted to offences of voyeurism after making a series of covert videos that showed a boy from the school getting dressed.

During the trial, the Reading Crown Court heard how Mowbray had entered boys' rooms on the pretext of discussing schoolwork but then would end up touching them for sexual gratification.
His offences only came to light after a boy made a complaint about his teacher touching him. This then convinced Mowbray to send an email to the deputy school headmaster.

Another victim told the court how his teacher would make late-night visits to his bedroom. He would sit on his bed and chat with him in the dark "while he would gently put his hand down on my thigh and knee and rub his hand up and down my thigh over and over."

The boy said this happened on "five to six occasions", the Daily Mail reported.

"A big part of the awful feeling I have of the situation is that, regardless of whether it's true or not, it would be impossible to stop the rumours that will inevitably spread among the boys and around the school," Mowbray wrote in his email.

"It leaves me with a feeling I will never go back to normal unless this is managed very carefully."

His letter paved the way for prosecutors to question his intentions for sending the email.

"When he spoke of the complaint being managed very carefully so that he can get back to normal, did he mean prevent it coming out to minimise risk of others coming forward?," prosecutor John Price said.

The jury reached their verdicts after deliberating for six hours and 34 minutes.

child grooming
The arrests come after 27 men and two women were charged over child sex abuse in the Huddersfield area earlier this year Getty