A woman who had sex with teacher Tom Ellison when she was a student then stayed in a relationship with him for 13 years went to police after she learned he had another girlfriend, his defence lawyer said yesterday in court.

Bridget Ross was 17 when she and two other young women the same age went on a six-week sailing trip and took turns sleeping with Mr. Ellison on his boat. There weren't enough beds, so Ms. Ross, who asked the court to allow her name to be published, shared a bed with the teacher, then 34, every third night.

Mr. Ellison, now 61, is facing 16 sex-related charges involving a dozen of his former female students in the 1970s and early 1980s.

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Ms. Ross, 44, said that on the third night she shared the teacher's bed, after a back massage and rubs on her forehead, cheek and chin, she was shocked when he stuck his finger in her vagina.

The trial has already heard from a number of Mr. Ellison's alleged victims, including one who felt so ashamed that she placed a pillow over her head while he was performing oral sex on her, and another who said the sex was consensual. The testimonies share some similarities: The alleged sexual activities took place mainly on Mr. Ellison's boat and each girl thought she was being singled out by the teacher.

That was Ms. Ross's testimony yesterday. She said that although she was not attracted to Mr. Ellison before she went on the sailing trip after her Grade 11 year, his sexual advances convinced her that she was special.

"I felt it was the first time it happened for me or him," said Ms. Ross, who is now a high-school teacher herself. "I felt special, like he had chosen me over other students. I was very flattered."

Ms. Ross and most of the other alleged victims were students in the Prince of Wales Secondary School's acclaimed Quest program, administered by Mr. Ellison.

The year after the summer sailing trip, Ms. Ross testified, she went to Mr. Ellison's boat almost every Friday night at a designated time.

Although they were unclothed and performed oral sex on each other, Ms. Ross said, her teacher insisted that they wait to have sexual intercourse until after she turned 18 on March 5, 1980.

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The timing of the sexual activities and the birth dates of the victims have become crucial factors in this trial, which is being heard before a judge alone.

Defence lawyer Bill Smart has said that while Mr. Ellison's conduct was unprofessional and wrong, the former teacher's action did not violate the criminal code of the day because the section on gross indecency was so vague that it must be considered unconstitutional.

Ms. Ross said that while she wanted to have a baby with him in 1992, she was also recognizing signs that there were other women in Mr. Ellison's life. She had found a box in his boat full of letters and postcards written by former students, mainly women. Ms. Ross testified that when she asked him why he kept the letters, he told her they were proof that the girls who wrote them were interested in him and not the other way around.

Earlier in the day, court heard testimony from one woman who said that in an incident in 1982, when she was 15, students and teachers were grabbing each other's underwear and pulling upward hard, giving each other "wedgies." She grabbed one teacher by the underwear and was then chased by all three teachers involved, including Mr. Ellison. He held her hands behind her as she squirmed and another pinned her down and ripped her underwear off.

"I kept saying no, no, no. Get away from me," said the witness, who said she was kind of laughing, but became frightened when the teachers refused to stop.

Humiliated, she cried in the bathroom, was comforted by a friend and when she finally emerged, she discovered that her underwear, which was stained with her menstrual blood, was pinned to the bulletin board.