A former teacher convicted of child sexual abuse has sensationally applied for bail because he wants to see a doctor outside prison about his high blood pressure, incontinence and an eye problem.
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Judge Tim Gartelmann, SC, rejected the bail application from Edward Smith Hall – also known as Ted or Tony Hall – in Newcastle District Court on Thursday after the court heard sentencing submissions and victim impact statements.
Hall, 68, has been in custody since a judge-alone trial ended in October with him being convicted of 21 offences against eight students of St Pius X Adamstown, where the former army sergeant was a maths teacher, between 1973 and 1986.
The offences Hall committed against St Pius students took place before he taught at prestigious Sydney private schools Trinity College and Newington College.
He was living in Junee, in the NSW Riverina region, when he was arrested and charged in July, 2016.
Hall’s defence barrister Colin Heazlewood told the court on Thursday the former teacher instructed him that morning to apply for bail because of several health issues, including a slipped retina on his left eye, a cyst that had rendered him incontinent and high blood pressure.
The court heard Hall was unsatisfied with the length of time it was taking to get medical treatment at Cessnock Correctional Centre.
Judge Gartelmann said some of Hall’s convictions were for “show cause” offences, which meant he had to provide evidence as to why he should be granted bail.
He did not provide any.
“The eye surgery is eyesight-threatening,” Hall said from the dock as the matter was being discussed.
Mr Heazlewood said he told his client earlier that it would be “extraordinarily rare” for someone to be granted bail in Hall’s circumstances.
Read more: Maths teacher on fresh child sex charges
The late bid for a few more weeks of freedom came after several victim impact statements were read to the court – some personally by Hall’s victims.
The victims cannot be identified for legal reasons.
Anxiety, depression, embarrassment, feelings of isolation and addiction to alcohol and drugs as a result of Hall’s abuse were common themes of the statements.
One victim, who was abused in the 1970s, recounted the story of how the Catholic Education Office had told him in the 1990s that Hall was dead, after the man went to make a complaint about his former teacher.
The man discovered through a Newcastle Herald report that his abuser was still alive when Hall was charged in 2016.
“[The abuse] changed me,” he said.
“I drank a lot of alcohol and smoked a lot of marijuana to drown out what happened to me that day.”
The victim was so traumatised by what happened to him that he begged his mother to let him leave school, but he was too young.
The day after his 15th birthday, he began a bricklaying apprenticeship.
“I won’t be happy again until he is sentenced, until he grows old in a cell and feels what it’s like to be trapped.”
Another man, who was abused by Hall in the 1980s, said he had been “betrayed by the Catholic church”.
“I was mentally tortured,” he said.
“I tried to live a normal life but I didn’t know what was normal any more.”
He described how, for years, he did not tell his wife or parents what had happened to him.
His family had been committed to the church and went to mass each Sunday.
“My wife, mother and father were totally shocked by what I told them,” the man said.
Another victim, whose statement was read to the court by a representative, said the abuse resulted in uncontrolled behaviour and financial hardship.
The court heard the man drank large amounts of alcohol to “numb the feelings”.
Over the course of a decade he would get drunk and turn up outside Newcastle Police Station with the intention of reporting what Hall had done to him, but he never went inside.
“The huge amount of stress, guilt and shame … is inexplicable,” the man’s statement said.
Hall will be sentenced on February 15.
Judge Gartelmann has left the door open for a possible hearing earlier that week for further submissions after Mr Heazlewood indicated Hall wanted special consideration in his sentencing for age and health reasons.
