Former teacher from Cheltenham faces jail for historic child abuse offences
64 year-old Paul Dodd was previously given a suspended sentence.
A former teacher from Cheltenham - previously spared jail over historic child abuse offences - faces four years in prison after the Court of Appeal increased his sentence.
64 year-old Paul Dodd, admitted offending against three pupils aged between 10 and 12 while he was a history teacher at Whitgift School in South Croydon in the 1980s.
In April, Dodd pleaded guilty to one offence of child cruelty and two offences of indecent assault on a boy.
At Gloucester Crown Court in July, he was handed a two-year prison sentence, suspended for two years.
The judge imposed that sentence because of conerns about Dodd's wife, who has a chronic medical condition and is cared for by him.
But at a Court of Appeal hearing in London on Thursday, the Attorney General's Office (AGO) challenged the sentence as being "unduly lenient".
Ben Lloyd, for the AGO, said at Thursday's hearing that Dodd's sentence was "too low", adding that the "overall total was not sufficient to reflect all of the criminality".
The AGO's written arguments said the sentence should be increased due to the "gross abuse of trust, the deliberate isolation, and the location of the offending", alongside the "severe psychological harm" to one victim.
Victims had previously described their anxiety, nightmares and depression after the offending in personal statements, the AGO said.
Sarah Jenkins, for Dodd, said he had previously shown remorse over his offending, adding that what had "weighed the most heavily" in his sentencing was the impact on his wife given her medical condition.
"It is not a sentence that was unduly lenient," she said.
Lord Justice William Davis said the approach of the sentencing judge was "driven by his concern for the position of the offender's wife", which "tipped the balance" towards a suspended sentence.
But he said the Court of Appeal found that "the least sentence that could have been imposed by the judge" that reflected the "totality of the offending" on two offences was four years.
He added there was no way in which the sentencing judge "could achieve the result which allowed him to suspend the sentence".
Dodd was given until 4pm on Friday to surrender to a police station.