The pedophile drift of a former math teacher in court

The case had provoked the anger of the parents of pupils, an internal investigation and the mea culpa of the Minister of National Education at the time.

Former professor of mathematics at the Blaise Pascal college in Villemoisson-sur-Orge (Essonne), Richard A., 60, appears this Wednesday at the criminal court of Evry in particular for sexual assault of a minor under 15 and complicity in assault sexual.

Jean-Pierre P., 67, met on the Internet and with whom the teacher had developed a sexual friendship based on pedophilia, is meanwhile prosecuted for possession of child pornography and corruption of minors.

Richard A. would have shared with him his impressive collection of photos as well as his modus operandi: creation of fake profiles on instant messengers to ask minors to undress and masturbate.

This is only one aspect of the disturbing profile of Richard A., arrested almost by chance in February 2016 when young people, who had found a memory card with explicit content, were planning a punitive expedition against him.

Respected teacher, father of four children - including two from a first bed - Richard A. had been convicted years earlier for sexual exhibition.

He had mainly served nine months in prison in England for having assaulted six young people during a trip in 2005. But on his return, a disciplinary commission, judging the facts little substantiated, had authorized him to teach again, deciding simply to change it a few kilometers ... A decision marred by "serious errors of assessment", then pointed out the Minister of Education Najat Vallaud-Belkacem.

Intense internet activity

The investigation would reveal a man consumed by his pedophile impulses, both ready to curb them by going to consult, for a while, a psychologist… but also to maintain them via intense activity on the Internet.

With other pedophiles, Richard A. exchanged on specialized forums photos, videos, but also “good addresses” (naturist beaches, swimming pools, saunas…), in France and abroad, to meet young boys.

On one of the videos, for example, we see him in conversation with a man in China, whom he asks to undress and touch a young sleeping child.

He had also made many trips to Asia, alone.

And discussed the idea, with Jean-Pierre P., of taking "a little Romanian" to a hotel room ...

One of his identified victims, whose assault he had filmed in his car, is none other than a nine-year-old beggar of Romanian origin, seen in the parking lot of a shopping center in Corbeil-Essonnes.

Richard A. threatened him by pretending to be a policeman, before offering him some clothes and a handful of euros ...

Thanks to the investigation, a former student of Richard A., to whom he also gave guitar lessons, had also come forward.

In 2005, when he was 12 years old, the teacher allegedly assaulted him after having deliberately spilled a glass of water on his pants… An incident which was then settled amicably with the parents of the young boy, the wife of Richard A., herself a teacher, imploring them not to ruin their future family life.

Facts today "fully recognized, regretted, assumed", underlines his lawyer Louise Tort.

"He fooled everyone back then, and him first…"

Now dismissed from National Education and separated from his wife, Richard A., who has recognized an attraction to boys for more than forty years, has started a real introspection and a medical process to put an end to his impulses.

"He spent two years in pre-trial detention and when he was released he set up psychological and psychiatric follow-up, he also participates in support groups and had started an experimental chemical castration treatment that he only had to stop. 'because of a risk of cancer, underlines the criminal.

He is not in self-pity, he works to understand the causes of his problem that he thought he could curb at one point, wrongly.

He fooled everyone at the time, and him first… ”

Beyond the turpitudes of this man - who led to a second in his deviances ... - it is the attitude of the National Education that questioned the many associations for the protection of children, civil parties in the case.

Lawyer of the Fondation pour l'Enfance, Me Céline Astolfe calls for "the establishment of safeguards to avoid serious institutional dysfunctions, as in this case".

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"The disciplinary commission of the rectorate took no account of the conviction of this teacher by the English criminal justice for acts of sexual assault on minors," she is indignant.

Worse, this commission had allowed itself to advance that the materiality of the facts would have been in doubt, while it did not have the file in hand!

Was it not rather the obvious responsibility to seek additional information before considering the transfer of this teacher and entrusting him with new children for ten years, until his arrest in 2016?

This is mind boggling!

», Accuses the penalist.

Contacted, Jean-Pierre P.'s lawyer, for his part, did not follow up.