Megan teacher to be sent to UK

THE British teacher who fled to France with his 15-year-old pupil Megan is to be extradited back to the UK in the next few days.

A Bordeaux court ratified a European arrest warrant issued by the UK and ordered Jeremy Forrest to be handed over to British justice, where he will face charges of child abduction.

Forrest, 30, who has been in prison in Bordeaux, made no objection to the ruling, reportedly answering with an “almost inaudible yes [in English]” when asked if he accepted it.

He and Megan were found by French police in Bordeaux on September 20, strolling hand in hand. Megan flew back to London last weekend.

The case follows two recent cases of French teachers having sexual relations with minors in their care – respectively aged 12 and 14 when the incidents began (under the French age of consent of 15); in both of which the sentences appeared surprisingly lenient.

A female teacher in a Catholic school in the Vendée, known as Florence B., was given six months of prison and a €6,000 fine after she was found to have had relations with an English boy pupil over a four-year period, starting when he was 12 and she was 33.

She admitted to a “mortal sin” and said it was a “crazy passion” though she added she “had not had the impression [I] was abusing him” and “I thought he loved me”.

Le Nouvel Observateur said the boy had confessed the matter to priests for some time and been told to recite “Our Fathers”, when one decided to call in his mother and the teacher, who admitted her guilt. The mother lodged charges and the teacher turned herself in.

In another recent case a retired male teacher aged 62 who had a six-month relationship with a female ex-pupil aged 14 to whom he was giving private lessons was given a year’s suspended sentence and a €3,000 fine by a court in Grenoble.

Previous article:
Missing Megan found safe