County Times
June 14, 2010
http://www.countytimes.co.uk/news/89612/14-months-in-prison-for-powys-vicar-charged-with-assaulting-girl.aspx
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A FORMER vicar from Beguildy has been jailed for 14 months at Merthyr Crown Court for a two-year reign of sex abuse on a schoolgirl.
Former Reverend Richard Hart, 60, pleaded guilty to eight charges of indecent attacks on the girl between the ages of nine and eleven.
Shamed Hart was already in prison for have more than 56,000 images of child pornography - but was due to be released this month.
Prosecutor Ieuan Morris said: "What made these offences worse was his position as an ordained priest and vicar of the Church in Wales.
"This case respresents another aspects of his previous offending in relation to children. He has already pleaded guilty to possessing indecent images of children. He collected and stockpiled an abundance of indecent photographs for his own gratification."
Mr Morris told Merthyr Tydfil Crown Court how the 56,000 images "frankly defies comprehension."
He said: "He had a deep-seated and prurient interest in children and a fixation with stories of fantasies."
Hart admitted one charge of gross indecency by encouraging the girl to touch him.
Prosecutor Ieuan Morris told how he denied five other charges against the girl but he would not face a trial.
John Ryan, mitigating, said Mr Hart had two autistic sons which required a lot of attention.
Judge Peter Haywood said: "These offences came to light after an extremely frank admission from you."
Rev Hart and his wife were respectable pillars of the community in the village of Beguildy, where he was also chairman of the governors of the local primary school.
But Hart admitted collecting the paedophile pictures "like a magpie" over more than 17 years in the village vicarage.
A court heard his wife knew he collected paedophile pictures of children and she told police the pair looked at them in their bedroom.
Mother-of-five Julie, 41, told police: "We occasionally looked at images of teenage girls, sometimes leading to sexual intercourse."
He had been a vicar in the area for more than 20 years but was stripped of his duties in the Church in Wales after his sex crimes were discovered.
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