Paedophile primary head with more than a million child abuse images gets life ban from classroom

A primary school head teacher who was jailed after more than a million child abuse images were found on his computer has been officially banned from teaching for life.

Tom Singleton of Framlingham in Suffolk, was head master of Mendlesham Primary School in the county when he was arrested in 2021.

The Teaching Regulation Agency met earlier this month to consider whether the Secretary of State should ban him from the profession for life, and has now published its judgement.

The final decision was made by David Oatley, on behalf of the education secretary, who said a ban was "necessary".

Singleton, then 41, was jailed in October 2022 after National Crime Agency Officers found that he had created "deep-fake" style pictures, superimposing himself into photos so it looked like he was engaging in sexual activity with children.

He also owned a "paedophile manual" that detailed how to sexually abuse children without getting caught, as well as laptops and hard drives with 1,050,448 indecent images of children, 45,216 prohibited images of children, and 52 extreme pornographic images.

Officers also recovered a number of online chat logs in which Singleton had conversed with other paedophiles about child sexual abuse.

Hand-drawn flow charts linked with documents describing child abuse scenarios were also found in his house.

Singleton - who was the safeguarding lead at his school at the time of the investigation - resigned as a teacher during the course of the investigation.

The panel said Singleton had fallen "significantly short of the standards expected" of a teacher.

Mr Oatley described Singleton's misconduct as "particularly serious" and said the order would protect future children and safeguard pupils.

"In my view, it is necessary to impose a prohibition order, in order to maintain public confidence in the profession," he said.

"In view of the seriousness of the allegations found proved against him, I have decided that Mr Singleton shall not be entitled to apply for restoration of his eligibility to teach."

That order will prevent Singleton from teaching in any school, sixth form college, youth accommodation or children's home in England.

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