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Zurich swim instructor jailed for child sex abuse

Malcolm Curtis
Malcolm Curtis - [email protected]
Zurich swim instructor jailed for child sex abuse
Photo: bad-info.ch

A Zurich court on Tuesday jailed a 36-year-old swim instructor for four and a half years for sexually abusing two boys, including one of them over a five-year period.

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The man from the Limmattal neighbourhood took advantage of his role as godfather to a girl to sexually abuse her brother starting in 2007, when the boy was seven years old, the 20 Minuten newspaper reported online.

Most of the acts took place in the man’s apartment, where he took numerous photos of the boy who was stripped of his clothes.

Sometimes he was bound hand and foot with handcuffs, 20 Minuten said.

The abuse occurred once a month over the five-year period.

The victim was too scared to say anything until he finally informed his mother and the Zurich man was arrested in February 2012.

In 2007, the swim instructor sexually assaulted one of his students, a 10-year-old boy, the court was told.

He persuaded the boy to undress by a pond and took photos of him.

He later took more nude photos of the child a month later, rewarding him with a chocolate bar and a bowl of soup, 20 Minuten said.

Police discovered 14 prohibited child pornography films on the instructor’s computer.

He had download 60,000 images and 104 files contained violent images of shackled children, 20 Minutes reported.

“You have violated the sexual integrity of your victims on a massive scale,” the judge in the case said.

The man was ordered to pay the two victims 25,000 francs in damages and ordered to receive psychotherapy, 20 Minuten said.

The case comes a month after Switzerland’s former Olympic swimming coach Flavio Bomio was jailed for sexually abused at least 15 boys over a nine-year period.

Bomio, who coached the Swiss team at the 2000 Olympics in Sydney, was arrested in 2011 after two victims reported him to police.

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