June 2022 Pervert Glasgow teacher who had sexual relationship with schoolgirl has jail sentence cut A female teacher at a top private school who had groomed a pupil for sex has had her prison sentence reduced by 11 months. Nicola Park, 42, was jailed for 27 months in April after grooming the 15-year-old girl who had confided in her about a personal issue. Nicola Park pled guilty in 2020 for engaging in sexual activity with the pupil They soon went on secret trysts – including staying at Park’s home – with the teacher calling the girl “my angel”. Their contact ended in 2020 after the pupil moved to university but she later told her doctor about the sexual contact and a police investigation was launched. When officers searched Park’s home, they made a number of discoveries linking the pair, including photos of a “sexual nature”. She pleaded guilty at Glasgow Sheriff Court to engaging in sexual activity with the pupil while in a position of trust between December 9, 2016, and April 14, 2019. Her prison term has now been cut to 16 months after her legal team successfully argued that the original sentence was “excessive”. However, following a hearing at the Court of Criminal Appeal, judges Lord Matthews and Lord Doherty rejected a plea for Park to be given a non-custodial sentence. In a written judgement, Lord Matthews said: “There was a significant degree of planning and a high level of grooming resulting in an improper intimate relationship, which lasted for a considerable time. “The appellant engineered situations where she was alone with the complainer in her car, her home, and elsewhere. Park was assistant housemistress at the school while also teaching maths and social education. In December 2016 the court heard the girl became upset and spoke to Park after complaining of feeling “alone”. Prosecutor Jennifer McKee told the court: “She said Park would not understand how she felt. “She replied that she did understand having recently separated from her husband. “Park offered the girl support which helped her cope with how she was feeling.” The teacher said the teenager could contact her outside school hours. Regular emails were then exchanged, including correspondences on Christmas Day and New Year’s Day. Park went on to call herself “Auntie Nic” and would sign off with a number of kisses. Park, of Bearsden, near Glasgow, was also put on the sex offenders’ register for ten years. Her details were also passed to the authorities stating that she is “unsuitable to work with children”. Sheriff John McCormick told her: “This was not a momentary lapse in an otherwise unblemished career in teaching. “This was abuse of trust by a teacher in her late 30s with an adolescent young female that included kissing, touching and engaging in sexual acts “You were a teacher and it was you who was in a position of responsibility and trust. “Such is the gravity of the offence, the time it occurred and the professional role as a teacher at the school, in my opinion there is no alternative to a custodial sentence.”