Soldier turned teacher jailed for sexual assaulting teenage pupil

A soldier turned teacher who lost his leg while serving in Afghanistan has been jailed for four years and six months after sexually assaulting a teenage girl.

Army veteran Simon Taylor, who had part of his right leg amputated after his vehicle was hit by a roadside bomb in 2009, went on to work in education.

The 43-year-old was a teacher at Hethersett Academy in Norfolk and his offending began while his teenage victim was a pupil there, Norwich Crown Court heard.

Judge Andrew Shaw, sentencing, said Taylor “targeted” the girl, adding: “You groomed her, you manipulated her, you sent her indecent images of your genitalia.”

He said Taylor sent the girl “messages detailing some of the sexual acts you hoped to perform on her”.

Taylor admitted at an earlier hearing to five offences, including sexual activity with a child by a person in a position of trust after touching the girl’s thigh under her skirt at school.

He also admitted two counts of sexual communication with a child, and two counts of sexual assault – touching the girl’s breasts in his car, once while she was a pupil and once after she had left the school.

The judge said the girl had “suffered severe psychological harm”.

He told Taylor: “I acknowledge immediately your service to your country and the wider world in the Armed Forces and note with sadness that you were severely injured by an improvised explosive device that ultimately led to the amputation of one of your legs.”

But the judge said he could “see no identifiable link between your PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder) and your decision” to offend.

He jailed Taylor for four years and six months, and the defendant showed no reaction as he was led to the cells.

Taylor was also ordered to sign the Sex Offenders’ Register, made subject to a lifelong Sexual Harm Prevention Order and to a restraining order not to contact the girl or her parents or go to their address.

He was also told he would be barred from working with children.

Isobel Ascherson, prosecuting, said on the first day of the two-day hearing on Monday that the offending spanned more than two years and continued after the girl left the school.

She said Taylor had made the girl “think that he was the only one who cared or could help her or would help her”.

The prosecutor said that married father Taylor, now of Leamington Spa, Warwickshire, would contact the girl on the school’s messaging platform. The court heard he deleted messages from the platform.

She said Taylor “wanted to have sex with (the girl) and wanted to meet outside school”.

Ms Ascherson said Taylor said he would harm himself if the girl did not send him images.

The girl reported Taylor to police in 2022, and also “told his wife what he had done to her”, Ms Ascherson said.

Reading her victim impact statement in court on Monday, the girl said: “My childhood was stolen from me.

“I never had the chance to be a normal teenager.”

Richard English KC said in mitigation that Taylor “accepts he has caused real and great harm”.