Fifty years since Neil Douglas was sexually molested by a South African teacher at a UK school, he struggles with anxiety and loathes physical touch due to the incident.
This is a scar he has carried since he was nine years old.
Dubbed the most prolific paedophile in British criminal history, Iain Wares, 83, is, however, living a comfortable life in a retirement home in Cape Town.
The former teacher is wanted by the British government for the sexual crimes he allegedly committed on boys aged between nine and 10 back in the 1960s and 1970s.
He has been fighting extradition to the UK since August 2019 to face more than 80 charges laid by 40 former pupils who attended Edinburgh Academy and Fettes College in Scotland.
One of these pupils is Douglas, 60, a flying instructor who attended Edinburgh Academy. Between September 1972 and June 1973, he says he was in Wares’s class when he was allegedly sexually abused by the teacher frequently.
“You got to the front of the class, you would put your book down [on his desk]. He would mark your [work] and he would take his left arm and put it around your leg, pull you close and sexually abuse you, right there in front of the class,” said Douglas.
He said he had to learn to not be good at mathematics to avoid being sexually abused as Wares was known for doing this to those he liked — who usually fared well in maths.
But those he wasn’t fond of allegedly faced severe beatings and assault from Wares, said well-known Scottish BBC broadcast journalist Nicky Campbell.
The two were speaking at a briefing hosted by Women and Men Against Child Abuse (WMACA) on efforts to ensure Wares is extradited.
Campbell said the abuse happened in plain sight, which he witnessed happen to a friend when they were in the changing rooms after a rugby game.
“When I witnessed my friend being abused, he was standing close to me, in the changing rooms. I remember it was a cold January afternoon and he put his hands around that boy and his hands went down,” Campbell said.
WMACA have appealed to minister of justice Ronald Lamola to ensure the extradition takes place, which Wares is now appealing.
This is because Wares already admitted to the crimes in his answering affidavits to the British request for extradition. In his first affidavit, he apparently admitted to having inappropriate urges to touch young boys, said WMACA advocacy manager Luke Lamprecht.
But it was not just UK boys who were affected, as Wares also taught in two schools in the Western Cape in the 1960s.
Lamprecht said once the names of the schools were revealed, Western Province Preparatory School and St George’s Grammar School, more local men came forward.
“South African men have made contact with me and some have immigrated and are in the UK and Canada,” he said.
Lamola’s spokesperson, Chrispin Phiri, explained that SA and the UK were part of the European Convention on Extradition. But since Brexit, extradition is based on reciprocity between the two states.
“The extradition hearing [for Wares] was completed, but Mr Wares brought various applications and is now challenging the constitutionality of section 10 of the Extradition Act.”
Wares also faces two counts of indecent assault which are before the Wynberg magistrate’s court. The charges stem from an incident in 1988 at Western Province Preparatory School, whereupon he was released on bail in 2018.
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