A maths teacher who was caught with hundreds of stolen bank card details has been barred from the classroom.

Louis Ssekabira admitted he was “planning to commit fraud” after police raided his home in 2020 and found 262 sets of card details and 69 stolen online banking logins on his laptop, as well as more on two separate iPhones, a professional misconduct panel heard.

Mr Ssekabira had been teaching at Droitwich Spa High School in Worcestershire at the time, but had moved to Bishop Challoner Catholic School in London by the time he was cautioned in 2021.

A report of the misconduct hearing from the Teaching Regulation Agency (TRA) said the then-maths teacher accepted a police caution for an offence of possession of articles used to commit fraud, but did not tell the school.

But his misconduct was later revealed after a police officer contacted the school. When he was urged to explain the caution to colleagues he claimed he had bought the laptop off Gumtree and found the details on it, according to one witness.

He told teachers that he became quite “sort of excited by this” and showed it to people, but didn’t do anything with the details, the panel heard.

Mr Ssekabira reportedly told colleagues he knew he should have deleted the details but didn’t before telling them he “grew up in bad company and was trying to get away from it all.”

The witness also said Mr Ssekabira’s failed to tell the school about his caution because “he was hoping it would all go away and nobody would find out.”

But the panel found him guilty of “misconduct of a serious nature” and questioned the account he had given to colleagues, saying it failed to explain why stolen details were found on multiple devices.

Several supporting statements gave glowing accounts of Mr Ssekabira’s “great leadership and pastoral skills”, crediting him with being “instrumental” in one school’s maths department going from being dysfunctional to Good with Outstanding features.

But the panel said his actions had “fundamentally undermined” trust in him and that “dishonesty of this severity is not compatible with acting as a role model to pupils.”

“For these reasons, the panel was satisfied that the conduct of Mr Ssekabira amounted to misconduct of a serious nature which fell significantly short of the standards expected of the profession,” they added.

He was also barred from teaching for at least five years, when the decision will be reviewed.

“Whilst there was evidence that Mr Ssekabira has the ability to make a valuable contribution to the teaching profession in the future, the panel remained concerned regarding the extent to which Mr Ssekabira had demonstrated insight into his actions, as indicated by his failure to be fully transparent with his employer,” the report said. (Independent)

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