This article is more than 1 year old

This article is more than 1 year old

A teacher who was accused of having sex with a 16-year-old pupil in a plane toilet as they returned from a school trip will not face a retrial.

Jurors at Bristol crown court failed to agree a verdict last week in the trial of Eleanor Wilson, 29, who had been accused of beckoning the boy into the cubicle during the night flight and having sexual intercourse with him.

The foreman of the jury said there was no “realistic prospect” it could reach majority verdicts on any of the four charges against Wilson.

The Crown Prosecution Service was given a week to decide whether there should be a retrial.

It is understood the CPS decided not to seek a retrial after consultation with the complainant. The teenager, now 19, had to give evidence in court and also appeared at a disciplinary hearing last year.

The jurors deliberated for more than 10 hours before the judge discharged them.

Wilson is now working as a civil servant. She declined to comment on the CPS’s decision.

A CPS spokesperson said: “The CPS has decided not to seek a retrial in this case. This decision follows careful consideration including speaking with the complainant.”

A spokesperson for the boy’s family said he would not be commenting.

The court had been told that after the trip in the summer of 2015, the pair visited Tintern Abbey in Monmouthshire and Ashton Court near Bristol. The boy also bought her chocolates and flowers.

Wilson allegedly told him she was pregnant and he was the father, but that she would have an abortion.

The allegations against her emerged after another pupil threatened to reveal what had happened unless she had sex with him.

Wilson told police the toilet allegation sounded like the script of a “weird porn film” and claimed the complainant had imagined the episode.

But the court heard analysis of his mobile phone had revealed that between August 2015 and March 2016, there were 339 “contacts” between the boy and Wilson, whose number was saved as “Smurfette” in his contacts book. This included 295 texts.

Wilson accepted she gave the teenager her phone number and they were in contact almost daily over the summer, after the alleged incident. She described the claims as untrue and horrifying.

The teacher said she formed a bond with the boy because she had no other friends, and apart from her then boyfriend, Andrew Hall, there was no one she could talk to.

“He was really the only person I had that was a friend. He was the only person I would talk to apart from Andy,” Wilson said. “I was lonely and I wanted to spend a day out with someone. He was my only friend.”

Wilson was banned from teaching in England last year after a professional conduct hearing decided that “on the balance of probabilities”, it was “more likely than not” she did have sex with him in the plane toilet.

That hearing found the boy to be a “credible, reliable witness”.

Wilson, of Dursley, Gloucestershire, denied four charges of sexual activity with a child by a person in a position of trust.