LONDON (ENGLAND)
Metropolitan Police
December 21, 2017
A Roman Catholic priest has been jailed for 18 years after he was found guilty of 19 counts of non-recent abuse against boys at a school in Ealing.
Andrew Soper, known as Father Laurence, 74 (17.09.43) of no fixed abode, was sentenced on Thursday, 21 December, after a ten-week-long trial at the Old Bailey.
He was also handed down a Sexual Harm Prevention Order with no time limit.
Soper was found guilty on Wednesday, 6 December of 19 counts of indecent assault against ten boys who attended St Benedict’s Middle School in Ealing between 1975 and 1982.
In his summing up, the judge told Soper “Your disgrace is complete.”
The court heard Soper was a former abbot at Ealing Abbey and a headmaster of the middle school between 1972 and 1991. He taught boys aged between 11 and 14 and, as headmaster, he was in charge of discipline.
The first allegation was made in 2004 by a former pupil who said he was sexually assaulted by Soper in his office whilst he was being punished.
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