When students noticed their teacher was following pornographic Instagram accounts they raised the alarm, encouraging a past student from 13 years ago to come forward and reveal what he had done to her. 

Around August 2020, multiple students viewed their teacher’s Instagram account, which had its settings open to the public, and were shocked to find the majority of accounts he followed were girls between 15 and 16 years old. 

The teacher was also following pornographic sites and sexually explicit material of images of teenage girls in swimwear and women in sexualised poses. 

He was called into a disciplinary meeting after the North Island secondary school students said they found the discovery made them feel “weird”, “uncomfortable” and “creepy”. 

On September 16, 2020, after a disciplinary meeting with the school, the teacher tendered his resignation and an email was sent out to parents advising he was no longer teaching. 

That email found its way to Ms P, a student of his between 2008 and 2009 who decided to come forward and report multiple incidents of inappropriate behaviour he had displayed towards her. 

The teacher got the ex-student's number without permission and texted her asking her to come for dinner. Photo / 123rf 

In a recent Teachers Disciplinary Tribunal decision, the complaints assessment committee found the teacher had favoured the student by providing her with chocolate and energy drinks and on her last day of school, gave her his phone number. 

He told the girl as he was no longer her teacher, she could call him and invited her over for dinner as he wanted to cook for her. 

Ms P declined. 

The teacher obtained the girl’s phone cellphone number without her permission and continued to put pressure on her for a dinner date by texting her and inviting her over under the guise his family would be there. 

Ms P decided to go to dinner at the teacher’s house and brought a friend with her. When they arrived his family wasn’t there and during the evening the teacher produced a photo album which had a photo of him naked in a bathtub. 

After the dinner, the teacher continued to text Ms P to meet up and on one occasion, said they should meet up to spend time together, “just the two of us”. 

Ms P said the man continued to try to contact her randomly for the next 10 years sending her messages on LinkedIn in 2015 and 2016. 

When the charges were put to him, the teacher said he did not know his Instagram account was public and said “My accusers have cherry-picked the worst images they could find”. He also said his reputation in the small town had been screwed by “manipulative, vindictive, spoilt brats”. 

In response to his conduct with Ms P, the teacher said he had only invited her over for dinner with him and his brother and denied trying to meet up with her alone. He also did not think the naked photo was explicit as there was bubble bath in the bath. 

The man was charged with misconduct for inappropriate use of social media and serious misconduct for engaging in inappropriate conduct towards an ex-student. 

As the teacher is currently deregistered and no longer teaching, he was censured. 

Shannon Pitman is a Whangārei based reporter for Open Justice covering courts in the Te Tai Tokerau region. She is of Ngāpuhi/ Ngāti Pūkenga descent and has worked in digital media for the past five years. She joined NZME in 2023.