The man, who has interim name suppression, is facing historic abuse charges in relation to two boys, including several counts of indecency with a child and threatening to kill.
He denies the offending.
On Friday, a video interview between the defendant and investigating Detective Catherine Thompson was played to the jury at Auckland District Court.
At one point, she referenced the man’s description of himself as asexual and asked whether he found any women or people attractive.
He pointed to a women’s Phoenix player and a well-known female Kiwi golfer.
“They’re just great faces.”
The man then said if he were watching women’s sports, he would watch the high jumpers because of their body shape, and said many female rugby players were “too big”.
“You have the shape I like in women,” he then said to the police officer.
Later, he told her she also had a nice face shape.
“You know what I mean? There’s something about the angularness of it.”
The ex-teacher agreed that he saw children’s faces in the same way he saw the golfer he was attracted to.
He then said children could have gorgeous faces, “that’s the innocence I see”.
“Any child is attractive. You see a kid on the street and you think, ‘Wow, I wouldn’t mind that as my child’.”
After this exchange, he referenced Thompson’s appearance again.
“You, for example, have a very photogenic face. That’s the word, photogenic.”
He told her one of the complainants fabricated the allegations against him to obtain financial compensation.
“I was chosen [to make the claims about] because I hadn’t gone out and got married again.
“I’m not gay, I’m not gay in any way.”
On why the other complainant would have made a report against him, the man said he had no idea.
“It just seems strange.”
He told the interviewer: “There is no way I would do anything inappropriate to any kids.”
However, the teacher admitted on several occasions to having conducted photo sessions with one of the boys.
At the time, he said he viewed the photos he took of the boy as “artistic”, but later thought “people might view it the wrong way”.
One beach session involved the boy with the area of his lower waist to his thighs covered in sand, and the rest of his body exposed, the man explained.
“It didn’t come out as I thought it might. Maybe because he was wearing shorts.
“It was an artistic idea.”
On two or three occasions, he said he took portrait shots of the boy, one in which the boy was shirtless.
“I was mainly interested in headshots.”
He told the court he showered with the boy twice to treat his nits. He said on one occasion the boy wore shorts, on the other occasion, the man said he asked the child to hold a cloth over himself.
The ex-teacher also accepted having shared a bed with the boy but said it was because another bed was damaged and he claimed he created a squab barrier.
He said in the interview he slept in the bed with each boy only one time.
On whether he thought it was appropriate for him to stay in a bed with one of his students, he said, “It was on cold nights, and the bed was huge”.
Looking back on it, he said: “It was probably inappropriate, but nothing happened.”
“It doesn’t look good how you’ve shared a bed with a teenage boy,” the detective told the ex-teacher during the video.
Katie Harris is an Auckland-based journalist who covers issues such as sexual assault, workplace misconduct, media, crime and justice. She joined the Herald in 2020.
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