Tory MP’s half-brother jailed for sex assaults on boys
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Version 0 of 1. The half-brother of a senior Conservative MP has been jailed for 13 years for carrying out hundreds of sexual assaults on young boys. Former teacher Charles Napier, 67, who is related to Maldon MP John Whittingdale, conducted a “campaign of abuse” at the school where he worked in the late 1960s and early 1970s, grooming and assaulting 21 victims as young as eight. In November, he pleaded guilty to 28 counts of indecent assault – including many covering multiple incidents – and one indecency charge in relation to those crimes. On Tuesday, he admitted two further historical allegations of indecent assault against two 13-year-old boys after he left the school, the first in 1979 and the second in 1983. Napier stared straight ahead and showed no emotion as Judge Nicholas Loraine-Smith sentenced him at Southwark crown court in London. It was also revealed on Tuesday that he has twice previously been convicted of abuse against boys. Napier, of Sherborne, Dorset, faces jail for the latest convictions when he is sentenced later on Tuesday. The court heard Napier’s offending was prolific, with more than 100 indecent assaults committed against 21 pupils aged between eight and 13 over a period of around two and a half years. Referring to the scale of the abuse, Loraine-Smith said: “It must have been hundreds.” Peter Clement, prosecuting, said: “The offences are characterised by a campaign of sexual abuse involving significant planning, grooming and abuse of many pupils. “It was sexual abuse of particularly vulnerable victims. The defendant ensured each child’s compliance and silence through grooming to the extent that he abused several of the victims many, many times. “The defendant abused the high degree of trust placed in him by his colleagues, the children’s parents and the children themselves and exploited his role for his own sexual gratification.” The court heard Napier would give his victims treats including fizzy drinks and chocolate, often abusing them in a carpentry workshop, which, Clement said, “became something of his den”. Napier told one victim “don’t be a baby” while another suffered “profound effects” from being repeatedly abused and attempted suicide later in life, the court heard. Some pupils were targeted as often as once a week, with one boy alone said to have been abused more than 100 times. Napier abused some victims in the presence of other children, the court heard. On two occasions he made a boy perform oral sex on him, telling the child: “That’s what grown-ups do.” If those two offences occurred today Napier would have been charged with rape, the court heard. It emerged on Tuesday that one boy made a complaint that resulted in Napier pleading guilty to indecent assaults on five pupils not involved in this case in 1972. He was sentenced to a three-year probation order at the time. In another case, he was jailed for nine months in 1995 after he was convicted of assaulting two children. The two victims contacted police after reading news coverage about their abuser’s arrest earlier this year. Napier joined the school, which cannot be named, after leaving university. When he was arrested last year he told police he already knew then that he was a paedophile. He said he underwent electric shock treatment but it had no impact on his attraction to children. The court heard that Napier told police he went on to join the Paedophile Information Exchange as treasurer after being dismissed from the school. He said when interviewed that he felt “ghastly” and “desperately sorry”, telling officers: “I was a very young man, I was completely out of control and completely out of order, putting it about everywhere.” Benjamin Hargreaves, defending, said his client was “genuinely remorseful” and “realises how appalling his actions were”. He added: “He knows that he is responsible for a most serious and grave period [of offending] but he is no threat now.” |