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Lawrence Hall has been burdened with a dark secret for decades since he attended Tucker Road Primary School in Moorabbin in the late 1960s.

Hall says he was one of several students who were sexually abused by convicted paedophile Darrell Ray, a sports teacher and librarian who worked at several schools in Melbourne’s bayside suburbs that are now the subject of a state government inquiry.

Lawrence Hall was a victim of paedophile teacher Darrell Ray, who died last week.Credit: Jason South

The inquiry is examining historical child sexual abuse at 24 state schools, including Beaumaris Primary School, where Ray also taught.

Hall decided to speak publicly about the abuse he suffered more than 50 years ago after Ray died last week, at the age of 82, before he could face court again over further allegations of historical child sex abuse.

He hopes his story will embolden other survivors of sexual abuse in the state school system to come forward and help ease their shame and trauma.

Hall also wants the Education Department to be held accountable over its admitted failure to protect students and properly investigate abuse allegations against several teachers.

“Ray offended at Tucker Road state school and then offended again when he went to Beaumaris state school. I think the Education Department and the state government back then knew what was going on. Complaints were definitely made, but kids weren’t believed back in the ’60s and ’70s,” Hall said.

“Obviously, this stuff is not easy to talk about, but I know there are other victims out there, who probably have the same doubts and anxiety and shame I have. I’d like to help them if I can,” he said.

Now 64, Hall said he still has vivid memories of being abused by Ray in the library of Tucker Road Primary School, which has since been renamed.

He said the abuse, which began when he was nine years old, usually involved groups of up to four boys at a time and occurred more than a dozen times.

“He was a paedophile, so he knew how to identify kids who were a soft target. He’d say, ‘OK Lawrence, come here and I’ll tuck your shirt in’, and then we’d be abused,” Hall said.

Darrell Ray, who worked at various bayside schools before being convicted of sexually abusing children.Credit: Penny Stephens, supplied

Ray, who later changed his name to Ray Cosgriff, first pleaded guilty to indecent assault and gross indecency against two boys in the late 1970s. More students alleging Ray had abused them came forward in the 1990s.

In 2001, Ray pleaded guilty to offences against 18 students over a 10-year period, the youngest being six or seven years old. He was sentenced to 44 months in prison.

He pleaded guilty to a further two counts of indecently assaulting students in 2002 and was sentenced to another six months’ jail.

During a court appearance in August on new charges of indecent assault relating to alleged abuse in the 1970s, Ray appeared via videolink from his bed at an aged care home in Ipswich, Queensland.

In August last year, Hall launched Supreme Court action against the Victorian government, which includes a claim for exemplary damages over the Education Department’s alleged failure to prevent Ray from abusing students.

He will also seek damages for loss of income after his life was blighted by alcoholism and post-traumatic stress disorder.

The abuse of Hall was not among the offences Ray was convicted or charged over.

Hall’s solicitor, Cameron Doig from Arnold Thomas & Becker Lawyers, said his client was one of at least nine former students of Tucker Road Primary School to have been assaulted by Ray.

Doig noted that the Education Department has admitted to failings and inadequate responses to allegations of Ray and other teachers abusing children across multiple schools.

“We want to know what the department knew about Ray and when,” he said.

Doig believed the Beaumaris inquiry, which was announced in September, was inadequate to deal with the significant number of victims of abuse at state schools across Victoria and called for a broader investigation.

Last Thursday, at the beginning of a public hearing in the inquiry, chair Kathleen Foley said she had been advised of Ray’s death.

“We understand that his death will be significant to a number of people who have been involved with this board of inquiry and that this may be a distressing development for them,” she said.

Support is available from the National Sexual Assault, Domestic Family Violence Counselling Service at 1800RESPECT (1800 737 732).

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