Overwhelming Sexual Jealousy' Led Teacher to Attack Colleague with Wrench, and the Violence Was Caught on Video

A head teacher from Wales was sentenced to two years and four months in jail for the brutal attack on his colleague that was caught on video.

At a sentencing hearing on Friday, April 25, Judge Paul Thomas said Anthony Felton, 54, assaulted the colleague with an 18-inch wrench after succumbing to “overwhelming sexual jealousy,” the BBC reported.

The attack, which was caught on CCTV footage, showed Felton pulling out a wrench from his jacket and hitting 51-year-old Richard Pyke in the back of the head while Pyke was sitting at his computer. Pyke fell to the ground and attempted to fend off more blows until a colleague stepped in.  

The March 5 assault at St. Joseph’s Roman Catholic Comprehensive in Port Talbot, south Wales allegedly occurred after Felton discovered that he fathered a colleague’s child and suspected that Pyke was in a relationship with her, per the BBC.

“The evidence of his wife and the admissions he made to her suggested Mr. Felton had been in a relationship with another member of staff and had recently discovered he was the father of her child,” prosecutor Ieuan Rees said, per The Guardian.

“Furthermore, he believed that Mr. Pyke had now begun his own relationship with that lady.”

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After the attack, Felton allegedly sent an email to staff members which read: “Dear staff, the greatest mistake I made was appointing [the female teacher] in various roles. I’m sorry for the distress the rest of the day will bring. I am sorry. You are good people and do an amazing job for our community. Goodbye, John,” per the Times.

At the hearing, Thomas told Felton that “You are more than intelligent enough to realize when you plotted this bizarre attack that the impact and ramifications would be immense and far-reaching.

“Ultimately, the trigger for your act of extreme violence was of your own doing, the overwhelming sexual jealousy arising from an adulterous affair and the uncontrollable rage it created in you,” per the Guardian.

In a victim impact statement, Pyke, a married father of two, told Felton, who pleaded guilty earlier this month,  that he “had my complete trust in every way and you used that to maneuver me into a position of utter vulnerability with my back turned and facing a computer screen, and then you attacked me from behind with a metal wrench you had brought into my office,” he said, according to the Times.  “That has had the greatest impact on me. I am still in free fall from such an unforeseeable act. You should have been the one to protect me and instead you carried out a brutal and incomprehensible attack on my life.”