'Coward' paedophile who fled country convicted

A paedophile who stole a terminally ill man's identity and spent almost three decades on the run has been convicted of 54 child sex abuse charges.

Richard Burrows "acted like a coward and fled the country" leaving his victims to suffer, police said after he was convicted at Chester Crown Court.

During his trial this year, the court was told he had abused boys as young as nine while a housemaster at a Cheshire boarding school and as a scout master in the West Midlands between the late 1960s and mid-1990s.

He had previously admitted 43 out of 105 charges. The prosecution did not offer evidence for eight counts and he had denied the remaining 54 but was found guilty of all of them.

Burrows, 80, formerly of Birmingham, will be sentenced on 7 April.

He was arrested at Heathrow Airport last year after almost three decades on the run, having failed to appear at his originally scheduled trial over alleged child sex offences at the same court in 1997.

The court heard how between 1968 and 1995, Burrows systematically abused 24 young boys across the Cheshire, West Midlands and West Mercia areas.

Allegations against Burrows partly related to his time as a housemaster at Danesford School in Congleton, Cheshire, between 1969 and 1971. The school has since closed.

Police said the abuse would often take place in toilets at night when he would wake boys on the pretence that he wanted to stop them wetting the bed.

The jury heard one of his accusers told police he "hated" the abuse, which would happen as much as two to three times per week, but said he "could do nothing about it", adding "I was frightened and young".

The court was told the boy, who cannot be named for legal reasons, "did not think he would be believed" if he reported the abuse.

During his trial, Burrows told the court he had fled to Thailand because he wanted to go sailing and had not carried out the offences.

He said he wanted to return to the UK after 27 years as he had run out of money.

The abuse during his time with scout groups was said to have taken place in Sutton Coldfield and Streetly and on trips to Wales, Ross-on-Wye, the Cotswolds and London.

One of his victims, James Harvey, who waived his anonymity, told the BBC that Burrows was an "appalling, manipulative abuser".

He spoke about how Burrows had tried to sexually assault him when he was a member of the sea scouts in Walsall, which he joined in his teens.

He said he had woken to find Burrows "trying to get down into my sleeping bag".

"I think I just grabbed hold of his hand or shrugged or flipped back with my head or did something until it stopped," he added.

Mr Harvey said the fact Burrows had been able to get a British passport to leave the country and live for several decades in Thailand was "utterly disgusting".

"I can still feel that man's hands on my skin, on my shoulder, and on my chest," he said.

Detectives had spent 27 years trying to find Burrows, a Cheshire Police spokesperson said.

But officers were unable to trace him, despite a number of appeals on the BBC's Crimewatch programme, which led to more accusers coming forward.

There was no trace of him until 2023 when officers used specialist software to search for any possible images of him online and found a man using the name Peter Smith, in Phuket, Thailand.

Officers discovered Burrows had stolen the name of a terminally ill acquaintance and illegally got a passport in 1997.

Before they began the extradition process, they found he had planned to return to the UK.

After the verdicts, Det Insp Eleanor Atkinson said Burrows systematically abused his victims.

"Rather than face the consequences of his actions, he acted like a coward and fled the country using a stolen identity taken from an unwell man," she said.

Burrows spent three decades "living in paradise" - the 80-year-old's own description of Thailand - while his victims were "left to suffer as they struggled to try and rebuild their lives", she added.

Det Insp Atkinson said four victims had died before they could see him brought to justice.

An NSPCC spokesman said: "Burrows repeatedly exploited positions of trust he had gained in the community including as a scout leader and a school housemaster."

He said he had caused "even more pain to those who suffered at his hands" by evading justice for almost 30 years.

The charity said it was never too late for survivors of sexual abuse to speak out and get help.

If you have been affected by any of the issues raised in this story, information and support can be found at the BBC's Action Line.

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