Cultured Views

In our house right now we feel very deeply for deputy Head teacher, William Stuart, who was suspended from his job at a secondary school in England after an accusation of assault was levelled at him by a female pupil. This girl’s ‘complaint’ resulted in this excellent teacher being arrested, suspended from his job and his named dragged through the mud – all because the school failed to investigate the accusation properly and the parents of the girl ( a trouble maker by all accounts) who supported her ridiculous claim.

We have experienced first hand how inept some school principals are when they refuse to accept the word of the person the accusations are levelled at, and in every way encourage the accuser to go to the police. Mr Stuart’s case should never have gone beyond the walls of the principal’s office – this should have been dealt with internally and should never have resulted in an innocent man being hauled through the court system on the whim of a badly disciplined and dishonest pupil. The truth does come out in the end of course – as it also did in our case – when ‘witnesses’ are shown to be lying through their teeth and magistrates question the appalling failings of school procedures in handling such cases. In our case it was a case of bullying against our son and his dad who was forced to step in and protect him.

But the sad thing that comes out of this is that mud sticks – no matter how false the accusations or that the innocent party was vindicated. What happened to Mr Stuart was a disgrace and, hopefully, provides a note to school principals that a child’s word cannot be taken as law UNTIL every avenue has been investigated.

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