A Catholic priest has been jailed for the ‘cruel and sadistic’ abuse of a teenage boy.
Father Michael Higginbottom was sentenced to 17 years behind bars at Liverpool Crown Court after being found guilty of four counts of sexual offences.
The crimes took place during the late 1970s at St Joseph’s College in Upholland.
Higginbottom sexually repeatedly assaulted the boy over a period of six months and would hit him with a strap if he did not go to the teacher’s living quarters.
In a statement read in court, the victim recounted the abuse he had endured, saying ‘I cried so often I believe I could have drowned in my own tears’.
It also emerged that Higginbottom, who had denied all the charges against him, would administer electric shocks to pupils as punishment.
The court also heard previous allegations had been made against the 74-year-old in 2007 by another former pupil but the Catholic Church had settled out of court.
Sentencing, Judge Andrew Menary QC said: “For a period of six months in the late 1970s you made a young boy’s life a living hell.
“What you did to him there effectively destroyed the remainder of his childhood and did a good job of destroying any faith he ever had.”
“You employed methods which today, if not then, would be recognised for what they were – cruel and sadistic bullying.”