Former judge looks into church sex abuse allegations

The two men involved in the allegations are Colin Pritchard, vicar of St Barnabas, Bexhill, until 2007 and Roy Cotton, who worked as a priest in Rye in the 1990s.

Baroness Butler-Sloss has been appointed by the Diocese of Chichester to conduct the review.

In 2008 Pritchard received a five-year prison sentence after he pleaded guilty to sexually abusing two boys in the 1970s and 1980s.

The offences took place when he served as parish priest at St Andrew’s church, Wellingborough, Northamptonshire.

Cotton – who had prior convictions for sexual offences in 1954 - had been involved in these offences but died two weeks before Pritchard was arrested in 2006.

The Baroness was the first female Lord Justice of Appeal and the UK’s highest-ranking female judge until 2004. A church-going Anglican, she chaired the inquests into the deaths of Diana, Princess of Wales, and Dodi Al Fayed, until June 2007 when she stood down.

A spokeswoman for the Diocese of Chichester said: “The review aims to ensure that the Diocese addresses the need to secure the highest standards of safeguarding within the scope of the Diocesan policy, including the role of the recently re-consulted Safeguarding Group.”

PICTURED: Colin Pritchard, former vicar of St Barnabas Church, who was jailed in 2008