Kent teacher spared jail after pupil affair

A former religious studies teacher from Kent convicted of repeatedly having sex with a student has walked free from a London court, after a judge declared that his teenage victim "pursued" and "groomed" him.

Stuart Kerner, 44, from Aylesford had sex with the girl at school and at his home when she was 16.

Jurors heard he took her virginity on a yoga mat on the floor of a Bexleyheath Academy storeroom, the same week his wife miscarried their second child.

He later drove her to his home where the pair had sex, kissed and cuddled, Inner London Crown Court heard.

Handing him a suspended 18-month sentence, Judge Joanna Greenberg QC said it was clear the young victim - who was present in court but cannot be identified for legal reasons - was "obsessed" with Kerner.

"(The victim) pursued you," the judge told him.

"Her friends described her, accurately in my view, as stalking you.

"If grooming is the right word to use, it was she who groomed you, (and) you gave in to temptation."

Kerner, of Aylesford, was found guilty last month of two counts of sexual activity with a child by a person in a position of trust.

Prosecutors said mobile phone records and student attendance logs backed up those charges.

But Kerner was cleared of four counts of the same offence, and also acquitted of two counts of sexual activity with a child that related to alleged behaviour when the victim was only 15.

The court has heard he maintained his innocence in the face of his convictions.

She described the victim as an "intelligent and manipulative" girl who had been known to make up outlandish stories that she maintained for weeks at a time, and that when confronted by teachers she would respond: "That's what I do. I lie."

But she was also young and vulnerable, the judge said, and Kerner was in a position of trust: "The law demands that you are the responsible adult and that you show restraint, and we know that you failed to do so."

Judge Greenberg said Kerner was "emotionally fragile" at the time of the offending and that while this did not excuse his behaviour, it did help explain why someone with an "exemplary" character and clean record would commit such offences.

"It's a tragedy that somebody like you committed offences of this nature, and now fall to be sentenced," she said.

Though he will not serve time for his crimes if he remains on good behaviour, Kerner's name will go on the sex offenders register and his wife has been sent on enforced leave from her job, the court heard.

Defence lawyer Edward Ellis said that on the night the jury gave its verdicts, Kerner was in such a state of shock that paramedics and mental health specialists were called in.

During his trial, jurors heard that Kerner took advantage of the "besotted" schoolgirl.

They also heard he once told the teenager their relationship was "written in the stars".

In a video interview with police, played to jurors, the schoolgirl said: "It felt special. But, I dunno, it wasn't really. And admitting that does kind of hurt."

Kerner walked straight from the court complex into a waiting car.