Teacher is jailed for filming children

A SCHOOL teacher has been jailed after admitting covertly filming children while they got changed for PE and swimming.

Simon Mark Knowles, 52, disguised cameras as a pen and even as a shirt button to film unsuspecting youngsters as they got changed. Parents at the North Yorkshire school where he worked were unaware of Knowles’ crimes until police arrested him last year.

Yesterday he was sentenced to four-and-a-half years in prison after pleading guilty to 24 offences at York Crown Court.

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Det Sgt Mark Jackson, of North Yorkshire Police, said afterwards: “He is an educated man but in reality, he was calculating and deceitful.”

Knowles admitted charges including making indecent images of children, possessing indecent images of children, distributing indecent images of children and recording a person doing a private act.

Officers found 19,541 indecent photographs of children on Knowles’ computer along with 174 indecent videos. They also found evidence he had distributed 147 indecent photographs of children.

Knowles, formerly of Harrogate, but now of Bridlington, committed his offences from 2009 up until he was arrested in April last year.

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“He completely abused his position of trust for his own sexual gratification,” Det Sgt Jackson added.

In a statement, North Yorkshire County Council said afterwards: “The school and the local authority have fully cooperated with the police throughout the investigation, and the school has supported parents throughout this terrible ordeal.

“Child protection remains the highest priority for the county and all proper child protection procedures and safeguards are followed by the local authority when employing staff to work with children.”