Trainee priest claims he was victim of sex abuse

ART and design students at Kirklees College are preparing for their annual end of year show.

Create 18 – the biggest and most anticipated date in the department’s calendar – will take place at Batley School of Art in Dewsbury for the final time as the college will open its new Springfield Sixth Form Centre in the town in September.

It is hoped Create 18 will attract many visitors as the college shows off the work of talented students in areas including graphic design, textiles, fashion and photography.

The work has been produced by students from entry level through extended diplomas to final year shows from the higher education courses.

Create 18 is open from 6pm to 9pm today; 10.30am to 1.30pm on Saturday, June 16; 10am to 4pm on Monday, June 18; 10am to 8pm on Tuesday, June 19; and 10am to 4pm on Wednesday, June 20.

The exhibition is free and open to all.

Open days for people interested in courses will be held from 10.30am to 1pm on Saturday, June 16 at Batley School of Art and from 4pm to 6pm on Tuesday, July 3, at Springfield Sixth Form Centre at the college’s Dewsbury centre.

Call 01484 437070 or email info@kirkleescollege. ac.uk for details.

Miss O’Rourke said evidence showed that Mr Murray had endured “grooming, progressing to serious and repeated instances of abuse.”

Letters from Mr Riddle to Mr Murray “show a wholly inappropriate level of affection and intimacy,” she told the judge.

And she claimed that the order had “clearly failed in its duty of care to a 14-year-old boy in its care and when acting in loco parentis.”

Mr Murray, who has written a book about his experiences, had suffered “intense confusion and distress” as a result of the abuse.

He had been left “feeling emotionally troubled and insecure, guilty and anxious”, the court heard.

He has trouble sleeping, has endured suicidal thoughts and “preoccupation with the abuse, including flashbacks.”

A psychiatrist had in 2015 diagnosed him as suffering from severe post traumatic stress disorder.

After giving up thoughts of the priesthood, he forged a career as a nurse, but his working life had also been badly affected, said Miss O’Rourke.

Defence counsel, William Norris QC, said: “The order neither admits nor denies that Mr Murray was abused as alleged, or at all.”

It was for Mr Murray to prove his case and the barrister pinpointed alleged “inconsistencies” in his account of events.

His school records revealed an “unremarkable pattern” of a pupil doing well in some subjects and less well in others.

The barrister added: “The order’s case is that, even if the abuse by Mr Riddle happened exactly as Mr Murray describes, it had no long-term effect on his personality...or on his performance at school or upon his working life.

“The fact that he failed in his ambition to become a priest” had nothing to do with the alleged abuse, he claimed.

Mr Murray had in fact worked as “respected and effective nurse”, a profession which he described in his book as his ‘true calling.’

“Even if he lost a career as a priest because of abuse...it is clear that he must have earned more as a nurse,” added Mr Norris.

Although he accepted that the school owed Mr Murray a duty of care, the QC denied that it had been breached.

“There is no basis upon which to find that the school authorities knew at the time that Mr Riddle posed a risk to children and failed to take steps to eliminate or minimise such risk,” he told the judge.

The High Court hearing in London, expected to last several more days, continues.