Teacher who relocated to Falklands faces child sex trial
A TEACHER who moved his family 8,000 miles to the South Atlantic after landing a job as deputy head at the Falklands Islands’ school has been charged with child sex offences.
Paul Barton, 41, is on bail in Stanley awaiting trial, and last month was refused permission to fly back to the UK to attend his father’s funeral.
A former captain in the Territorial Army, Mr Barton relocated to the Falklands in January 2016 with his wife, two children and three dogs after leaving his job as acting assistant principal at the De Warenne Academy in Doncaster, South Yorkshire.
He was appointed deputy head teacher at the Community School in Stanley. But he was suspended last month after being charged with possessing indecent images of children and attempting to engage a youngster in sexual activity.
His wife and two sons are understood to have left the island and returned to the UK, but Mr Barton has been forced to hand over his passport and will have to remain until the conclusion of the court case.
The offences relate to alleged activities in internet chat rooms and do not involve any children living in the Falklands. Mr Barton is accused of contacting a 12-year-old girl online and asking her to engage in sexual conversations and send indecent photographs of herself. When she refused it is claimed he asked her to send image of girls that looked like her.
Police investigating the allegations seized his computers and allegedly found around 30 indecent images. Mr Barton will claim he thought he was engaging in role play with other adults in chat rooms and had no recollection of looking at the indecent images.