School head and teacher guilty of abusing six boys
Pair brought to justice after 30 years
THE ex-headmaster of a school for troubled boys and a teacher who worked there have been convicted of sexually and physically abusing six pupils more than 30 years ago.
John Farrell, 73, and Paul Kelly, 64, preyed on youngsters at St Ninian’s, in Falkland, Fife, which was run by the Catholic Christian Brothers organisation.
The pair abused boys, aged 11 to 15, at the school between 1979 and 1983.
Former headmaster Farrell was convicted of physically abusing one boy and sexually abusing three others.
Kelly was convicted of sexually abusing two boys and sexually and physically abusing a third.
One of the victims was sexually abused by both men.
At the High Court in Glasgow yesterday, Farrell and Kelly were convicted of a total of 11 charges after a 13-week trial.
The pair, who had both denied all charges, were remanded in custody pending sentencing next month. Judge Lord Matthews also placed them on the sex offenders’ register. Farrell, of Newarthill, Lanarkshire, initially moved to England when St Ninian’s closed in 1983, but returned to Scotland where he was ordained as a priest.
A former chaplain at HMP Shotts, he retired from the priesthood in 2012.
The tenacity of one of his victims led to a police probe into the abuse, which uncovered many more complainers.
Kelly left the Christian Brothers but is believed to have remained teaching in England.
During the trial, the jury heard that his bedroom at St Ninian’s was regarded as an ‘open area’ where pupils often spent the night. He told his victims that he was abusing them for their ‘sexual education’.
Kelly, of Plymouth, Devon, told the jury: ‘I have never sexually molested anyone.’ He insisted that he spent his free time ‘reading Tolkien’.
But prosecutor Kath Harper asked him: ‘Did you really think having boys sleep in your room would be approved of in general terms?’ He replied: ‘No, but at St Ninian’s I just thought of it as the way it was.’
Yesterday, a leading charity praised the victim who had campaigned for justice. Alan Draper of In Care Abuse Survivors Scotland said: ‘It took the courage of one particular individual to come forward and be believed.
‘We congratulate the police, who did an excellent job.
‘Witnesses were put through several horrific weeks of giving evidence, which was very difficult for them. We applaud them.’
‘Horrific weeks of evidence’