A paedophile bus driver is “bound to die in prison” after being jailed for 25 years for a series of sexual abuse offences against teenage boys spanning a period of about 50 years.
John Foster, 78, was convicted of 27 “atrocious” sexual offences against four teenage boys and he had convictions for other sexual offences that were committed before and after the 30-year span of those offences. Even his own barrister admitted that ‘nothing could be said to try to mitigate these atrocious offences’.
Foster used his job as a bus driver to meet and win the confidence of young boys before gaining the trust of their families and then abusing the victims, using seemingly harmless days out as cover, Hull Crown Court heard.
Foster, of Main Street, Wawne, near Beverley, denied 28 sex offences, involving four boys, but he was convicted by a jury of 27 of them after a trial. The charges included indecent assault, indecency with a child, rape and attempted rape, between July 1973 and February 2002. He was cleared of one charge of indecent assault on the direction of the judge.
Judge Mark Bury told Foster: “You have been convicted of sexual offences against teenage boys over five decades. You are a lifelong paedophile.
The four boys involved in the offences that were heard during the trial had all been badly affected because of the abuse that they suffered. They had been “haunted” by their experiences at the hands of Foster and they all felt guilt and shame that they should not feel because the guilt was all Foster’s.
“They have been groomed, manipulated and taken advantage of,” said Judge Bury. “Substantial sentences are appropriate. All of this was for obvious sexual gratification on your part. Planning and grooming are obvious here.
“You used your position as a bus driver to meet and groom young teenage boys. There is an element of abuse of trust. You have a lifelong sexual interest in teenage boys.”
The court heard that the boys, now adults, had suffered self-confidence and low self-esteem problems and flashbacks caused by the abuse as well as feelings of guilt. “It never goes away,” one of them said.
Another boy said that the abuse had been buried “very, very deep” in his head and he “spent years trying to keep it there”. Foster had been convicted in 1961 of two offences of indecently assaulting a boy under 16, with seven offences of gross indecency taken into consideration.
In 2007, Foster was convicted of three offences of sexual activity with a boy under 16. He had a conviction from 2009 for possessing a single indecent photograph of a child.
Dale Brook, mitigating after the verdicts, said: “There is nothing that can be said to try to mitigate these atrocious offences. It’s obvious that these men’s lives have been blighted by their experiences.
“He is an elderly man, 78 years old. He is in poor health. He has poor mobility. It will make the inevitable lengthy prison sentence particularly hard to endure but endure it he must. He is bound to die in prison. It is an obviously harrowing case.”
