Owner of Queen Ethelburga's School jailed for non-recent sexual offences
71-year-old Brian Richard Martin will spend 3 years and 3 months behind bars
Last updated 2nd Jul 2021
The owner of Queen Ethelburga's School, between York and Harrogate, has been jailed for non-recent sexual abuse of a boy and a girl.
71-year-old Brian Richard Martin, of Ferrensby in Knaresborough, was sentenced after a re-trial for sexual assault of a boy in the late 2000s.
The case was first heard in 2018, when Martin was aquitted of six other child sexual abuse offences.
In 2019, at another retrial, he was found guilty of indecent assault on a girl in the 1990s.
As well as a prison sentence, Martin has been placed on the Sex Offenders' Register.
Detective Sergeant Graeme Bevington, who led the North Yorkshire Police investigation, said: "Brian Martin was a well-respected member of society and a successful businessman. It was due to his success as a businessman that he was able to purchase Queen Ethelburga’s School which he moved from Harrogate to the Thorpe Underwood Estate where he lived with his family.
"The students who attended the school considered it to be safe and family oriented, and Brian Martin was a key figure at the school.
“Despite significant investment being made in the school, all this served to do was to create an environment that Martin could exploit for his own sinister gains.
“He preyed on the vulnerability of the students and was able to manipulate circumstances which allowed him to sexually abuse two children who were boarding students and therefore isolated from their families.
“The school was supposed to be a safe place for the victims, and they should have been able to trust all adults and staff at the school.
“They could not have possibly conceived that it would be at this supposed safe place where they would be harmed so significantly by someone in a position of trust.”
Praising the victims' bravery
A spokesperson for children's charity, the NSPCC, said: “Brian Martin’s appalling manipulation of a position of trust at a school is every parent’s worst nightmare.
“The courage shown by his victims in coming forward cannot be understated, and we hope they are receiving the support they need following not just Martin’s abuse, but years of reliving those horrific experiences during the trials.
“Today’s sentencing has shown that time is not a barrier to justice, and we would urge anyone who has experienced sexual abuse, no matter when it happened or who the perpetrator was, to speak out and seek support.”
DS Bevington, of North Yorkshire Police, added: “The bravery shown by the victims in this case to speak out against their abuser cannot be praised highly enough.
“They have had to give evidence in open court about the most vulnerable and traumatic experiences of their lives and re-live the dreadful abuse that was forced upon them many years ago when they were just children.
“The courage and conviction behind their evidence has led to Brian Martin being publicly exposed as the predatory paedophile that he really is.
“They have finally had justice for what they have had to endure for so long.”