TV weatherman jailed over sex abuse of boys
FORMER TV weatherman Fred Talbot has been jailed for four years for a string of sex offences against schoolboys on trips to Scotland more than three decades ago.
The 67-year-old indecently assaulted seven teenage boys in his care during camping and boating trips in the 1970s and 1980s while working as a biology teacher at a school in the Manchester area.
He is already serving a fiveyear sentence imposed in Manchester in 2015 for indecently assaulting two other schoolboys.
During a nine-day trial at Lanark Sheriff Court last month, Talbot denied the allegations. But a jury took four hours to convict him of seven of the nine historic abuse charges against him.
The four-year sentence is due to start from August, at the end of the punishment part of his current jail term.
The television personality, who regularly appeared on a floating weather map in Liverpool’s Albert Dock for ITV’s This Morning show for several years, stood and nodded as Sheriff Nikola Stewart delivered her sentence yesterday.
She said he “grossly abused the trust” placed in him as a teacher with “systematic” abuse of schoolboys.
“It is beyond doubt these trips were organised with sexual exploitation of these boys very much in mind,” Sheriff Stewart said.
In mitigation, Talbot’s defence lawyer, Alan Gravelle, said it was recognised there is no alternative to a prison sentence, but he asked the sheriff to take into account his age and lack of offending over the last three decades.
The lawyer said: “His reputation is damaged beyond repair.”
Sheriff Stewart said the pupils who went on trips organised by Talbot had all trusted and liked the teacher.
“They were all utterly unsuspecting of the sexual threat you posed,” she told him.
Sheriff Stewart said he had “utter disregard” for his duties and the boys he preyed on were “too embarrassed and disempowered” to report his “disgraceful behaviour”.