Innocent teacher charged with rape is told he could sue
A JUDGE has cleared the way for a teacher falsely accused of raping a pupil to seek damages after ruling that his prosecution was an ‘improper act’.
Kato Harris, 38, was cleared by a jury in 15 minutes of preying on the millionaire’s daughter, who named him as her attacker only after being flown to New York for weekly sessions with her therapist.
Her parents also hired exScotland Yard deputy assistant commissioner Sue Akers and Alison Levitt, QC, a former principal legal adviser to the Director of Public Prosecutions.
In a damning report, the trial judge has now concluded that the Crown Prosecution Service pressed charges despite serious doubts over the teenager’s story after facing ‘enormous pressure’ from the eminent pair – and in a highly unusual move ordered it to pay his £183,000 legal costs.
His finding could allow Mr Harris to seek damages for loss of career. A source close to the case told the Daily Mail: ‘That sort of action could be targeted at the police, the CPS, the girls’ Kato Harris: Unemployed parents or their lawyers. But I’m not sure he has the appetite for that kind of fight.’
Indeed, Mr Harris has decided not to return to the classroom, fearing he will never fully escape the cloud of suspicion.
Unemployed and facing a life on benefits, the ex-geography teacher said yesterday: ‘If you have enough money, there are former senior members of the police and the CPS who you can pay to use their experience and contacts in these organisations to improve your chances of securing a prosecution. What they did was perfectly legal. The system allowed them to do it.’
Mr Harris, who was deputy head at a £33,000-a-year girls’ school, was arrested in 2014 after being accused of raping a 14-year-old at a former school.
Her family hired lawyers Mischon de Reya which is believed to have recruited Miss Akers, who was working as a private investigator, and Miss Levitt.
According to a report by trial judge Martin Edmunds revealed in the Mail on Sunday, Miss Akers compiled an ‘actions list’ for police. It also says Miss Levitt demanded they contact every pupil he ever taught and seize his computer – though nothing incriminating was found.
She also lobbied prosecutors and police, with one email containing an attachment from former Director of Public Prosecutions Keir Starmer – now a Labour MP – which the judge said posed ‘a real risk’ that her role acting for the girls’ parents ‘may be misunderstood’.
He concluded: ‘The decision to prosecute and thereafter to continue the prosecution was an unnecessary or improper act.
While the report says those acting for the parents did nothing wrong and did not prevent police and the CPS conducting a proper inquiry, it leaves both facing difficult questions.
The judge, who heard the case at Isleworth Crown Court last year, ordered the CPS to pay his legal fees – but it has so far offered only £140,000.
Mr Harris’s solicitor John Martyn, of Howard Kennedy, told the Daily Mail: ‘The refusal by the CPS to provide a proper account of their own decisionmaking process means we will never know whether the decision was made as a result of improper pressure exerted upon the CPS by those acting for the complainant’s family.’
The CPS said Mr Harris’s lawyers never argued there was no case to answer, and ‘strongly refuted’ any idea that the decision to charge him was handled differently from any other case.
The Metropolitan Police said an independent review found no evidence of the girls’ representatives receiving ‘inappropriate’ access to information. Mishcon de Reya said it was ‘perfectly reasonable’ for the girls’ parents to have fought for a thorough investigation.
‘Unnecessary or improper act’