Rebecca Joynes: The teacher who groomed two teenage boys
Can you trust a teacher? You would certainly hope so, especially considering how closely they supervise vulnerable, impressionable children. That’s why teachers are thoroughly vetted for the job. Sometimes, though, bad apples can slip through these cracks.
This point is illustrated by the case of Melissa Huckaby. In March 2009, the bipolar Sunday school teacher drugged and murdered the young girl Sandra Cantu. But even when children aren’t killed, they can still fall prey to paedophiles.
One high-profile instance of such sexual abuse in the UK occurred as recently as the early 2020s. That’s when maths teacher Rebecca Joynes surreptitiously groomed two schoolboys, as Crime+Investigation reports.
Rebecca Joynes’ life before scandal
For a while, Rebecca Joynes appeared to have the perfect life. Perceived as quiet and reserved by those who knew her, the seemingly amiable young woman was in a long-term relationship with her childhood sweetheart.
Born to parents from Wirral, Merseyside, she longed to become a teacher, which she later described as her ‘dream job’. After studying for a sports and exercise science degree at Liverpool John Moores University, she joined a Greater Manchester school as a teacher in 2018.
However, shortly before the COVID-19 pandemic, Joynes’ romance came to an end. Joynes reportedly suffered from mental turmoil during the COVID lockdowns, leading her to seek solace from an unlikely source in October 2021.
How Joynes ensnared her first victim
Joynes started grooming her first victim, one of her pupils, by posing him a unique maths challenge. The task was to ascertain the last digit of her phone number, which she otherwise freely provided to him almost in full.
One Friday, after picking him up from school in her white Audi, Joynes took the 15-year-old to the Trafford Centre in Greater Manchester. While shopping at Selfridges there, she bought him a Gucci belt of his choice.
After the boy lied to his mother by telling her he was staying at a friend’s house, he actually joined Joynes at her Salford Quays flat. There, the teacher and pupil had sex. Joynes warned him that ‘no-one had better find out’ about her sexual intercourse with a minor. Not that the illicit tryst stayed a secret for too long.
A second victim – and a devastating bombshell
The next day, the boy’s mother found a love-bite on her son’s neck. A call to Childline led Joynes to be arrested and bailed. She was also suspended from her teaching job. However, she soon fell short of one bail condition – that she avoid unsupervised contact with anyone under the age of 18.
The under-18 she did meet up with was another 15-year-old boy. This relationship, too, turned sexual, with Joynes assuring him that, due to a medical condition, she was incapable of falling pregnant. In this way, she coerced the boy into having full sex with her after he reached the age of 16.
Just a day before Joynes’ second arrest for grooming, she showed the teenager a baby grow. The implication was clear – seemingly against the odds, she was pregnant by him. The eventual birth of the child (taken away from Joynes by social services just hours later) meant this was one relationship she would never be able to hide.
Justice is served as Joynes faces prison
In May 2024, Rebecca Joynes was found guilty on six counts. Four were of sexual activity with a child, while two were of sexual activity with a child by a person in a position of trust.
Her two victims could not be identified for legal reasons. In the two-week trial at Manchester Crown Court, the two schoolboys were referred to only as ‘Boy A’ and ‘Boy B’.
Jane Wilson, senior crown prosecutor for CPS North West, stated: ‘Joynes was entrusted with the responsibility of teaching and safeguarding children. She abused her position to groom and ultimately sexually exploit schoolboys. Her behaviour has had a lasting impact on them.’
In July 2024, Joynes was jailed for six-and-a-half years. In a victim impact statement, boy B despaired: ‘I was coerced, controlled, manipulated, sexually abused, and mentally abused. Ultimately, I will forever be Rebecca’s victim and forever linked to her through our child.’
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