A York Region teacher has been stripped of his certification for failing to reveal child pornography convictions.

The Ontario College of Teachers Discipline Committee has found Alistair Martin-Smith guilty of misconduct when he failed to disclose criminal convictions relating to child pornography when applying for a long-term occasional teaching position with the York Region District School Board. At his hearing, Martin-Smith pled guilty to professional misconduct and his certification and qualification with the organization was revoked immediately.

While the school board is unable to speak about specific cases and would not confirm or deny if this teacher set foot in a classroom, the board’s recruitment and retention manager, Gail Long, said many teachers are hired on a conditional agreement.

“The full hiring process isn’t complete until the applicant’s vulnerable sector screening is complete and comes back clean and clear,” she said. “If there is a red flag in the results, human resources will take a closer look.”

An item of concern on a screening report would trigger an adjudication process within the human resources department, she added. The issue would be further examined, the applicant may be asked questions for clarification and it is at the discretion of the department whether employment should be approved or denied.

“Our priority is student safety,” Long said. “We do our due diligence and ensure screening reports are clean and clear before a teacher sets foot in a classroom.”

In 2006, Martin-Smith lived and worked in the United Kingdom. He took his laptop into a repair shop where a technician checked the hard drive and found what looked like pornographic images of children, according to the agreed statements of facts released by the Ontario College of Teachers.

The repair shop reported it to police and Martin-Smith was arrested and charged. The images found included more than 1,700 pornographic images and videos of individuals who were or who appeared to be children.

In 2007, he was convicted of one count of taking an indecent photograph and 14 counts of making indecent photographs of children relating to the images he had downloaded from the Internet.

In 2012, he applied for a long-term occasional teacher position with the York Region District School Board. After completing the required paperwork and completing an interim offense declaration, he was hired.

Following consent by Martin-Smith, the York Regional Police and Toronto Police Service proceeded with a reference check and a vulnerability sector screening report, which all board staff must undergo. In 2013, the report uncovered his criminal record in the United Kingdom.

The Ontario College of Teachers investigated the allegations of Martin-Smith providing false information regarding his professional qualifications, failing to reveal criminal convictions and signing a declaration with false or omitted information.

It was also decided Martin-Smith’s name would be made public in the college’s monthly publication to act as a deterrent, not only for the applicant himself, but others who may consider providing false or omitting information on applications in the future.