29/04/2005

Four year sentence for paedophile headmaster

A former Derry primary school principal who pleaded guilty to sex offences against three boys has been handed a four year prison sentence today.

Admitting a series of 30 charges of gross indecency and indecent assault, 44-year-old Jude Lynch whose address was given as Learmont Road, Park, was part of a paedophile gay sex ring which contacted young boys on the internet.

Two other men 22-year-old Richard George Alan Scott from Parklands, Antrim and 24-year-old Ryan Alexander McInnes of Westwinds Terrace Annahilt, were found guilty of related offences. Scott was jailed for eight months and Park was given a six-month suspended sentence.

Sentencing today Judge David Smith said that there had been "no grooming, seduction or inducement" of the boys who had been contacted while visiting a gay chatroom. But, he said that children could not consent to that type of behaviour.

Lynch resigned from his post as headmaster of Good Shepherd Primary School in Derry's Waterside last October.

None of the three boys concerned in the case had attended the primary school.

(SP/MB)

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