Public show of devotion for sex shame teacher and her husband
HOLDING hands in a show of unity, the teacher struck off for having sex with a pupil emerges with her husband from their flat.
Isabelle Graham, 27, was banned from her profession this week after a disciplinary panel heard that she spent the night in a budget hotel with a 17-year-old boy.
The former French teacher and her trainee clergyman husband Andrew Wilkie, also 27, were dressed casually as they left their home in Aldershot.
Miss Graham – who now uses the name Shona Wilkie – wore jeans and a cardigan while her husband wore a T-shirt and shorts. The couple, who married last year and had their first child last week, looked tired and strained – a far cry from the smiling, happy pictures taken on their wedding day.
Miss Graham, a devout Christian, was judged unfit to teach by a panel that heard allegations that she spent three hours in bed with the schoolboy at a Travelodge in Edinburgh on the night of his prom in June 2014, drinking alcohol and repeatedly engaging in sexual activity.
The former teacher denied the allegations, claiming her drink had been spiked and that she had no recollection of the night.
But police said CCTV footage showed her kissing the teenager and a photo shared online appeared to show her lying in his hotel bed while he stood in the doorway holding a bottle of champagne.
An investigation was launched after school staff were made aware of the photograph. Classmates said the teacher had bought drinks for students and rubbed the pupil’s legs under the table at the prom, held at an upmarket Edinburgh hotel.
Miss Graham resigned from her post at Whitburn Academy, West Lothian, after the allegations surfaced and has relocated to Aldershot, where she was seen on Wednesday with her husband.
They spent the day with Miss Graham’s father Peter, a pastor in Edinburgh, and her stepmother Amanda.
Mr Wilkie gave a statement to the tribunal defending his wife and saying he ‘never had any doubt’ that the allegations were false.
‘An active and practising Christian’
She had ‘ always put her Christian faith above all other things’, he said. Miss Graham chose not to attend the hearing, or give evidence via video link.
But in a statement she said she was the ‘victim’ and that if the photograph was of her, it had been posed and was of someone who was ‘ not in control of the situation’. She said she was an ‘active and practising Christian’ who was waiting until marriage before having sex.
Scottish prosecutors decided not pursue charges against Miss Graham.
Since relocating to England, she and her husband have been working with Soldiers’ and Airmen’s Scripture Readers Association (SASRA), which aims to spread Christianity among troops.
Mr Wilkie is still employed as a support worker. It is understood that his wife, a part-time donor relations officer, has been on maternity leave alhtough both their names have been removed from SASRA’s website. The charity said that Miss Graham is now the subject of an internal inquiry.