Gumleaf
April 18th, 2008, 06:59 PM
Friday Apr 18 12:00 AEST
A former Melbourne teacher who made his 16-year-old student pregnant and paid for her to have an abortion will serve a minimum four years in jail.
Stephen Peter Morrow, 55, was today sentenced in the Victorian County Court after a jury last week found him guilty of nine counts of sexual penetration of a minor under his care.
The court had heard Morrow caused the 16-year-old girl to become pregnant after having unprotected sex with her about two times a week in the last six months of her final school year.
Morrow had been a physics teacher at the girl's inner Melbourne school when the crimes took place in the late 1990s.
The pair had sex in a motel for his birthday the day before Morrow took her to a clinic to have an abortion.
Sentencing him to six years jail with a non-parole period of four years, Judge Thomas Wodak said Morrow had shown no remorse for his crimes.
"You still maintain that you did not commit these offences," Judge Wodak said.
"There is not and can not be any remorse shown by you."
Judge Wodak said some of Morrow's comments in court had revealed a "disturbing callousness and disingenuousness and a profound lack of understanding of the wrongfulness" of his conduct.
He said Morrow had been a very experienced teacher and his student was a vulnerable teenager who developed an infatuation with him which he most likely fostered while giving her extra tuition classes over the course of her final school years.
He said the victim was entitled to have trust in him to act in a manner appropriate to a teacher-student relationship.
"Instead of doing that, you seduced a naive young female to pander selfishly to your sexual desires," Judge Wodak said.
"In doing so you ignored every consideration of responsibility, decency, propriety and good teaching practice."
The court heard Morrow has a new partner and two young children living in Queensland and that he was likely to apply to transfer his prison term to that state.
A spokesman for the victim, who is now 25, said outside court she was pleased with the judge's comments, which would help her find closure and that she was looking forward to moving on.
©AAP 2008
A former Melbourne teacher who made his 16-year-old student pregnant and paid for her to have an abortion will serve a minimum four years in jail.
Stephen Peter Morrow, 55, was today sentenced in the Victorian County Court after a jury last week found him guilty of nine counts of sexual penetration of a minor under his care.
The court had heard Morrow caused the 16-year-old girl to become pregnant after having unprotected sex with her about two times a week in the last six months of her final school year.
Morrow had been a physics teacher at the girl's inner Melbourne school when the crimes took place in the late 1990s.
The pair had sex in a motel for his birthday the day before Morrow took her to a clinic to have an abortion.
Sentencing him to six years jail with a non-parole period of four years, Judge Thomas Wodak said Morrow had shown no remorse for his crimes.
"You still maintain that you did not commit these offences," Judge Wodak said.
"There is not and can not be any remorse shown by you."
Judge Wodak said some of Morrow's comments in court had revealed a "disturbing callousness and disingenuousness and a profound lack of understanding of the wrongfulness" of his conduct.
He said Morrow had been a very experienced teacher and his student was a vulnerable teenager who developed an infatuation with him which he most likely fostered while giving her extra tuition classes over the course of her final school years.
He said the victim was entitled to have trust in him to act in a manner appropriate to a teacher-student relationship.
"Instead of doing that, you seduced a naive young female to pander selfishly to your sexual desires," Judge Wodak said.
"In doing so you ignored every consideration of responsibility, decency, propriety and good teaching practice."
The court heard Morrow has a new partner and two young children living in Queensland and that he was likely to apply to transfer his prison term to that state.
A spokesman for the victim, who is now 25, said outside court she was pleased with the judge's comments, which would help her find closure and that she was looking forward to moving on.
©AAP 2008