A teacher has been banned from the profession after giving a pupil a hidden camera pen and urging her to change.
Matthew Udall, 33, a former science teacher, began working at a Warwickshire school in 2020.
On June 30, 2022, he handed a pen to a pupil to use in her journal, not telling her it contained a secret video camera which was recording.
After she went home, the young girl noticed the pen had a camera lens and told a friend, the panel said.
Read Also: Explosion at Germany's Augsburg Central train station injures several people
This was then told to a different teacher, who notified the headteacher and the authorities in turn.
Police arrested the teacher on July 2 that same year.
The judge, sentencing, told the court Udall had planned the incident, telling the student: “Get changed completely. Get changed. Try and refresh your brain. Sit down. Shut your room.”
He was convicted a little over two years later after pleading guilty to inciting or causing a girl under 13 to engage in sexual activity, no penetration, and attempting to observe a person doing a private act.
He was sentenced to 31 months in prison.
On Thursday, he was banned indefinitely after a Teaching Regulation Agency (TRA) panel determined his actions to be “sexually motivated and had the potential to cause serious harm to the pupil”.
The panel noted there was “no indication Mr Udall had succeeded in his attempt, but his intentions were clear from the conviction he received”.
The panel said that it “was not provided with any evidence to demonstrate that Mr Udall had shown insight and remorse in relation to his conduct”.
DODGY TEACHERS – READ MORE:
- Teacher at £37,500-a-year private school banned after admitting smoking crystal meth ‘to relax’
- Afghan teacher allowed to keep teaching despite sending 200 emails to vulnerable schoolgirl
- Paedophile teacher, who read Kama Sutra to class, guilty of having sex with 14-year-old boy
It recommended a prohibition order be “imposed with immediate effect” with no provision for a review period as it was “unable to say with any degree of certainty that there was a low risk of Mr Udall repeating his actions”.
The panel added Udall “sought to conceal” his actions by telling the pupil to “exclude their parent”.
David Oatley, acting on behalf of the secretary of state, agreed with the panel’s recommendations and made the prohibition order with no review period, owing to the serious nature of the offence, “the lack of evidence of insight and remorse, and the risk of repetition”.
Udall has been prohibited from the profession indefinitely and cannot teach in any school, sixth form college, children’s home or relevant youth accommodation.
“Furthermore, in view of the seriousness of the allegations found proved against him, I have decided that Mr Udall shall not be entitled to apply for restoration of his eligibility to teach,” Mr Oatley wrote.
Udall may appeal the order to the High Court within 28 days.
Our Standards: The GB News Editorial Charter
