Teacher gets jail for child sex offence

A MARRIED deputy head teacher was yesterday jailed for seven years for encouraging and watching the rape of a three-year-old girl.

Patrick Lennon had taught for decades at the all-girl Greenbank High School in Southport, Merseyside, where he was a regarded as a "pillar of society".

But he had secretly struck up a friendship with two other paedophiles, Joseph John Hawley, 38, and Phillip Skitt, 54.

In 2008, Lennon and Skitt, of Wigan, watched on webcams as Hawley raped the little girl and broadcast it over the internet.

The pair encouraged Hawley, of Bolton, by sending him messages. A transcript of the conversation during the abuse was read to Liverpool Crown Court, but is too disturbing to report in detail.

Merseyside Police detectives raided the teacher's home in Crosby, Merseyside, in September last year and he was arrested.

His computer revealed his encounters with Skitt and Hawley.