Former BA pilot denies child sex offences
A former British Airways pilot accused of 25 sex offences against underage boys in India and the UK has denied being a paedophile.
Bartle Frere, 50, is said to have used his job with the airline to befriend boys in India and buy them clothes and gifts.
He told Bournemouth Crown Court that for the cost of eating in the crew hotel, he could feed about a dozen children in a local restaurant.
The court heard that Frere worked for BA for 25 years, rising to the rank of captain before leaving in February this year.
The bachelor, from Shipton Gorge, Dorset, but now living in Oxfordshire, said he was fascinated with India and would regularly take BA flights to Chennai, spending his rest days visiting the nearby fishing village of Nochi Kuppam.
The court heard that he had become friends with families in the village and had taken pictures of both children and adults because of his ‘passion’ for photography.
Giving evidence for the first time in his trial, Frere described himself as ‘asexual’ with a low sex drive and denied that he has any sexual interest in young boys.
Frere denies a total of 25 sex charges, two of them against boys in the UK, who it is alleged he abused after paying them to do odd jobs around his house.
He was arrested last November after police raided his former home and found pornographic videos, indecent pictures on his computer and children’s clothing in a bedroom drawer.
Bev
Editor in chief Bev Fearis has been a travel journalist for 25 years. She started her career at Travel Weekly, where she became deputy news editor, before joining Business Traveller as deputy editor and launching the magazine’s website. She has also written travel features, news and expert comment for the Guardian, Observer, Times, Telegraph, Boundless and other consumer titles and was named one of the top 50 UK travel journalists by the Press Gazette.
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