UK Teacher Gets 4-Year Prison Term for Filming Girls in School Toilets

The Gloucester Crown Court sentenced a science teacher to four years in prison after he pleaded guilty to placing cameras in toilets of three schools where he worked in southwest UK. Judge Ian Lawrie described Rahul Odedra as “not wholly bad, and not wholly good,” and sentenced him on Feb. 14 for “persistently” carrying out his perverse behavior.

Rahul Odedra, 46, had positioned the cameras in cubicles and toilet roll holders to film dozens of women and girls using the facilities. This is not the first time the Indian-origin teacher was rapped by the court. He had pleaded guilty to an attempt to possess an indecent image of a child, two offences for possession of indecent images of a child and 20 offences of voyeurism during 2009 and 2017, in three different schools.

“He would set it up in the lunch period and then take it down later,” prosecutor Anjali Gohil was as saying by PTI report. “No one goes to a toilet, locks the door and expects to be filmed for third parties to see.”

The judge said to Odedra: “You are facing the consequences of what is long held voyeuristic compulsion to look at females. A toxic secret with the consequence you are going to prison.”

Saying it was a “gross breach of trust” and a “brazen” violation, the judge further said: “People’s dignity should be respected. This was a carefully calculated intrusion into people’s privacy. This is some of the worst examples of this type of offending. You caused immeasurable emotional harm to your victims.”

The teacher was caught when one of the students noticed that he was trying to film up her skirt, and reported him. The police later found 200 videos of women or girls on the toilet or videos that were filmed up their skirts. On further analysis of the images, the officers observed that Odedra had cropped and clipped the films he captured in the toilet so he could get back-to-back images of women “in the act of wiping.” The prosecution told the court that while the bulk of the videos featured adults, there were children as well.

Odedra’s lawyer Joseph Keating admitted to court that he is aware of the gravity of his offences, which he committed out of an “interest in voyeurism.” Odedra had said in his second police interview that he received no sexual gratification from watching the content.

“At the time of doing this, he had little comprehension of the impact on the victims as they were not physically harmed, but he now fully understands the lasting impact that will be hard to bear. He would like to apologize. He is deeply sorry for what he did,” Keating said.

Keating also noted that Odedra’s career was ruined as he would never be able to teach again, which was “very much a calling” and “something he was good at.” He said that Odedra wanted to serve his sentence so he could start to build his life again.

Odedra also got a sexual harm prevention order and was directed to sign the sex offenders’ register for life.