Fettes pays out £400,000 to ‘molested’ former pupil

SCOTLAND’S most expensive private school has paid out £400,000 in damages to a former pupil, who alleged he was repeatedly sexually assaulted and beaten by a maths teacher, in the first abuse claim brought against the school.

Fettes College, which charges up to £36,500 per year, reached an out-ofcourt settlement with the now 67-yearold victim, The Scotsman reported.

Twenty former pupils have also launched claims for damages against the 152-year-old boarding school, with more than a dozen naming the former teacher as an alleged abuser.

Extradition processes are underway to bring back the teacher, known only as Edgar, from South Africa, the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service (COPFS) said. He is yet to respond to these allegations.

The victim, known only as Frank, had sued the Governors of the Fettes Trust, which manages the school, after giving evidence to the Scottish Child Abuse Inquiry (SCAI) in November last year.

Frank, who attended the school between 1975 and 1981, said he had been repeatedly assaulted from the age of 12 by the married teacher. He said the school had a “totalitarian Right-wing command structure” and said some pupils “were beaten to the point of unconsciousness”.

Frank claimed he was singled out for abuse as he had been the first to show signs of puberty among his classmates.

Recounting the abuse he endured, he said: “He’d molest me while I stood at his desk as he marked my class work and one day when I was kept back at end of class he pinned me against a door frame and assaulted me.

“It was terrifying and I was frozen – I could even hear people walk past outside. At that time teachers had a supreme authority.”

The headmaster of the Fettes Junior School, named only as Matt, told the inquiry that Edgar had, in his view, admitted to touching Frank when it was first reported by the boy’s mother in 1975.

Frank said he now hopes his case will prompt further legal actions, adding: “I know I am not the only survivor of abuse at Fettes and I don’t believe my attacker was the only teacher”.

In a statement to the SCAI, Fettes issued a “full and unreserved apology”.