A HOUSEMASTER at Sedbergh School accused of sexually touching the feet of two pupils has been acquitted.

A jury at Carlisle Crown Court unanimously found Mr Griffin not guilty on five counts of sexual assault after less than an hour of deliberation.

Christopher Griffin, 58, of New Road, Ingleton, was alleged to have sexually touched the feet of two boys at the school while he thought they were asleep in bed.

He denied all counts of sexual assault, which were alleged to have taken place between June 2015 and March 2016.

The first complainant alleged that ‘at least once a week’, over a six month period, Mr Griffin had come into his room during the night and held and stroked his feet and lower legs for ‘five to ten’ minutes each time.

A second boy then revealed that in June of that year the defendant had gone into a his room, closed the door, turned off his torch and touched and held each of his feet.

In interview with police shortly after he was arrested, Griffin said that the boys were ‘jumping onto the band wagon’ in accusing him.

Police asked him if he had a foot fetish, and if touching feet was anything he had any sexual interest in.

Griffin told the interviewer: “Absolutely not.”

He said he would often go into the boys’ rooms at night with a torch to check if they were asleep, and if their duvets had fallen off the beds, he would put them back on.

As the rooms are small, this would be done from a position at the bottom of the bed, near their feet.