A TEACHER living in a village near Wellington has been banned for life from teaching after a disciplinary panel found historically he had indulged in ‘schoolgirl fantasies’ for his ‘sexual gratification’

Daniel Usher-Clark, aged 46, had denied all but one of a string of allegations made by girl pupils against him from his time teaching in Bishop Fox’s and Castle Schools, Taunton, and the King Alfred School, Burnham on Sea, over a period dating to 2006, four years after he qualified as a teacher.

He can apply to have the ban reviewed after a minimum of five years, but a spokesman for Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson said it was ‘not an automatic right to have the prohibition order removed’ and any application would go to a further panel hearing.

Mr Usher-Clark was between 2012 and 2014 a director of the Castle Partnership Trust, which went on to run Court Fields School and Wellesley Park Primary School, in Wellington.

The ban came after a Teaching Regulation Agency panel found he had engaged in sexualised messaging with ‘Pupil A’, a sample of the texts reading:

He also pressured her to video chat with him, which she resisted.

The panel also found proven five allegations that he had engaged in Skype conversations of a sexual nature while employed in Castle School which included:

It ruled the allegations were ‘of a sexual nature and sexually motivated’.

Evidence was given of a police investigation which discovered more than 40 illegal and/or extreme images and videos on electronic devices he owned, some of which were classed as ‘category A’.

However, the panel decided it could not conclude that Mr Usher-Clark ‘possessed’ the images because it could not be satisfied he knew about them or was able to access them.

But, it did find that while he was working at Bishop Fox’s School he was ‘in possession’ of 672 ‘indicative images of females in school uniforms’, including some where they were showing their underwear and some marked ‘jailbait’.

Two other allegations included sexual activities with two pupils which the Wellington Weekly has chosen not to summarise because of their graphic nature.

Both were found not proven, one because it was only the pupil’s word against Mr Usher-Clark’s with no other corroborating evidence, and one because the girl had a ‘complicated’ background.

The panel found it was ‘satisfied the conduct of Mr Usher-Clark amounted to misconduct of a serious nature which fell significantly short of the standards expected of the profession’.

Mr Usher-Clark, who unsuccessfully applied for the hearing to be held in private, denied being the author of the messages and maintained his innocence on all counts other than giving out his personal email address.