Two more teachers who worked at a top private school are facing jail after being found guilty of sexually abusing pupils.



Five teachers from Christ’s Hospital school have now been convicted after police investigated complaints made by 22 former students.

A jury of seven women and five men at Hove crown court deliberated for 25 hours and 43 minutes before returning their verdicts on the 21 counts against James Husband and Gary Dobbie on Thursday.

The two men, who were friends, would laugh together about their crimes, which took place over the course of 13 years while they lived and worked at the school in Horsham, West Sussex, the court was told.

James Husband, who has been found guilty of sexually abusing pupils at Christ’s Hospital school. Photograph: Steve Parsons/PA

Dobbie and Husband looked straight ahead from the dock and did not react as the verdicts were read out. The NSPCC described them as “predatory and calculated”.

Peter Webb and Peter Burr were both jailed in the last year after admitting committing offences at the school between the 1960s and 1980s. Ajaz Karim was found guilty in April of assaulting six girls between 1985 and 1993 and is due to be sentenced in August.

Husband, 68, of Wigginton in York, was convicted of one count of rape and five of indecently assaulting a girl as young as 14 between 1990 and 1994. He had claimed they had “consensual sex” once when she was 16.

He told a 15-year-old pupil: “It’s OK, I’ve had a vasectomy,” before raping her, the court heard.

Afterwards, he confided in Dobbie about the encounter, who later joked with the girl that she had “beard rash”, indicating that he knew what had happened, the court heard. He also indecently assaulted the same pupil later on.

Husband’s victim described being “disgusted with herself” and said she felt suicidal. She reported him to the school’s chaplain but no action was taken. She said her mother did not believe her story.

Husband left the school after it emerged he was having a consensual affair with a 17-year-old pupil who was not underage and not a complainant in the case.

The married father, whose children were attending the school at the time, “deceived” senior staff by embarking on the affair, jurors heard. The former tutor and head of department talked about the “spur-of-the-moment” encounter which involved several instances leading from holding hands and kissing to sex.

Giving evidence in his defence, he spoke of his desire to kiss her during a period when he felt disgruntled with how the school was being run.

In a diary entry read to the court, the girl said: “Told too many people at school then decided to go for it. The fling. So got off with him on Saturday night. The most amazing thing. Happy.”

Dobbie, 66, of Albi in France and formerly of Hereford, was found guilty of 15 counts involving multiple offences against six boys and two girls as young as 12 between 1998 and 2001.

He was teaching at independent Shrewsbury school in Shropshire at the time of his arrest in 2016.

Dobbie groomed pupils by hosting dinner parties with favourite students at his house in the school grounds, the court heard. He would ply them with whisky and wine while encouraging them to talk about their sexual encounters.

He took a boy as young as 12 to a bedroom, telling him to take off his breeches and underwear while Dobbie performed a sex act on himself, the court heard. Another boy recalls falling asleep on his sofa and waking up to find him kneeling beside him with his hand in his shirt.

Dobbie also helped to raise money for another pupil, who was abused over a period of six years, to take a gap year after leaving school and assaulted him when he returned for a visit.

Sussex police began investigating teachers at the school in 2016 after allegations were made about Husband.

Publicity around the prosecutions prompted several more former pupils to come forward with complaints.