Retired Eastbourne Priest Pleads Not Guilty over Sex Offence Charges

Chichester Observer
December 13, 2012

http://www.eastbourneherald.co.uk/news/local-news/retired-eastbourne-priest-pleads-not-guilty-over-sex-offence-charges-1-4591051

A retired Church of England priest from Eastbourne has been committed for Crown Court trial charged with sexual offences against three teenage boys.

Robert Coles, 71, of Upperton Road, Eastbourne, appeared at Chichester Crown Court today charged with sexual offences against the boys in West Sussex and elsewhere during the late 1970s and early 1990s.

He pleaded not guilty to three offences of buggery on one of the boys then aged between 15 and 16 at a location in Chichester between 1982 and 1984, and was committed for trial at a Crown Court in Sussex yet to be notified on June 10, 2013. He continues to be on court bail.

The prosecution will consider by the end of January whether to seek trial on four alleged offences of indecent assault - two against the victim of buggery and one each against two other victims.

Coles has pleaded not gulty to all these offences as well.

Coles was arrested on March 6 and has been on conditional police bail since then. He was charged in August after a year-long enquiry by Sussex Police detectives.

Sussex Police have said that none of the charges relate to any allegations of recent or current offending. They have emphasised that there is nothing to suggest that any children are currently at risk.