“It’s good to see you’re successful at work.” 

It was a seemingly innocuous message from a teacher to his former student on social media that prompted a flood of painful 40-year-old memories for the man. 

“I remember sitting at work and suddenly realised who it was…I was frozen,” the man told a hearing of the Teachers’ Disciplinary Tribunal today. 

“My colleague kept asking if I was okay.” 

Following the message sent by his former teacher on the social networking site LinkedIn the man deleted it and the accompanying friend request. 

He told the tribunal that they brought up a memory from when he was 12 years old of his teacher inviting him to his home before allegedly play fighting with him and then saying “I would like to have sex with you”. 

He recalls telling the older man “No” before being driven to the train station. He didn’t raise the incident with his parents for another six months and they never raised it with the school - one of the country’s most prestigious private education providers. 

In fact, the man told the tribunal today that he’d all but forgotten the incident until he saw that message on LinkedIn. 

“Since he contacted me a lot of the triggers have come back,” he said. 

“It did take a couple of years for me to really think this is not okay.” 

The man sought counselling for several years before eventually going to the police in 2023. The complaint was then referred to the tribunal. 

The teacher, his alleged victim and the school all have interim name suppression. 

The Complaints Assessment Committee, which is prosecuting the teacher through the tribunal, want his licence cancelled as they say he’s no longer fit to be a teacher. 

The man’s victim told the hearing today the incident happened in 1981 and started after his teacher gifted him a jock strap at school when he was in form two (year eight). 

He said that he didn’t know what to do with it and didn’t want his parents to find it so threw it into a bush on the way home. 

Following that gift he was given a ride home by his teacher following some after-school tutoring. He said that the teacher stopped at his home to retrieve some library books. 

At some point during the 15-minute visit to the older man’s house, the two began ”play fighting” and wrestling in the entranceway. 

“There was no inappropriate touching but in hindsight, I felt like it might have been building up to something inappropriate,” the former student said. 

Following the wrestling, which lasted only a minute or so, the pair sat on the floor and talked. 

It was during this conversation the man recalls his teacher saying “I would like to have sex with you”. 

When he declined he was driven to the train station. 

“If I’m brutally honest here there’s some things I can remember really clearly, and there’s some things that have been completely wiped out,” he said in evidence today. 

“For example, there was a distinct smell in his house that I can remember today, but I can’t remember the drive home to the railway station.” 

The teacher has denied the allegations against him but didn’t attend today’s hearing. 

The tribunal will issue its decision in writing at a later date. 

Jeremy Wilkinson is an Open Justice reporter based in Manawatū covering courts and justice issues with an interest in tribunals. He has been a journalist for nearly a decade and has worked for NZME since 2022. 

This article was originally published on the NZ Herald here.