That was a year ago this weekend, cos i remember spending the friday before mothers day on the beach with the kids because they were off school because of it. Never did hear what happened to the guy, or the girls family for that matter. Very sad, but as you say can happen anywhere.

Lynn

We were talking about it the other day at Karens and someone had told her that he did not get charged with murder as it was a sex act gone wrong. I have no idea if this is just chinese whispers or what.

I just thought I'd add my thoughts to this thread from a teacher's perspective. I am lucky in that I teach in a very good school, however, myself and my colleagues are increasingly finding that even the nicest of kids are having to have this shitty 'don't give a f**k' attitude just to survive. On a daily basis when we have to do our break duties we simply have to look kids in the eye and they come marching up to you and say things like 'come on then...', 'who are you talking to?', 'are you accusing me?' etc etc. This isn't only restricted to female teachers - I've seen a couple of hardcore nasties standing right up to huge hulks of male teachers. Sometimes they just march straight past you as though you're the nastiest most stinkiest piece of shit they've just scraped off the bottom of their shoe. There is absolutely no fear of authority at all. Many of them worry about nothing other than who they're going to 'shag' tonight or hang around the park drinking with etc.
I'm not saying all kids are like this but sometimes even the nicest of kids will be talking to a teacher and suddenly 'hard boy' comes along the corridor with his cronies and you see the kid actually step back and adopt a kind of 'leave me alone' body language - its really weird to watch actually.
It’s sad. Very sad. As was previously mentioned, unfortunately this group who appear to think that society owes them something and doesn’t care how they get it seem to be breeding more than any other group in society.
It’s a world wide problem and I for one certainly don't have any answers.