We were seduced by trendy teacher claim ex-pupils: Girls confront him on doorstep as stunned wife looks on

By Neil Sears
Last updated at 11:56 PM on 18th March 2011

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Two weeks ago, Mark Spendley was the coolest teacher in school – and an apparently happily married man.
Pupils loved his talk about the bands he played guitar for, and his boasts of rebelliousness.
But today the 35-year-old’s career and marriage are in jeopardy after two former pupils turned up on his doorstep and – in front of his wife Claire, 29 – claimed he had affairs with them.

Seduction: Sirisha Chhibber, 19, claims her affair with teacher Mark Spendley began on her last day of school

Police have now arrested Mr Spendley on suspicion of ‘abuse of position at a school’ and seized his and the teenage girls’ mobile phones and email records. He has also been suspended from work.
One of his two alleged lovers Sirisha Chhibber, 19, yesterday told the Mail about the relationship she claims began on her last day of school.
Miss Chhibber, who is of Indian descent, said: ‘Mr Spendley told me I was the Yoko Ono to his John Lennon – and ironically John Lennon was married, and left his wife for Yoko, like me an artistic Asian woman.
‘After we broke up I went on anti-depressants. He told me he’d divorce and run away to live in France with me, but I couldn’t stand the lies any more.’
The other girl, a 17-year-old who cannot be identified for legal reasons, told hundreds of friends on Facebook of her misery after alleging the media studies master had an affair with her last month – only for her to find out about previous lover Miss Chhibber. It was then the pair confronted him in a furious scene.
Mr Spendley, of Queenborough in Kent, works at the Hundred of Hoo comprehensive near Rochester in Kent. It teaches 1,500 boys and girls aged 11 to 18 and two years ago was placed in special measures and declared ‘inadequate’ by Ofsted.
But Mr Spendley, an amateur rock musician, wowed pupils with the toy ‘lightsaber’ he kept in his classroom as a symbol of his contempt for authority. Miss Chhibber, who then lived with her Hindu parents in Gillingham, went to Chatham Grammar girls’ school, before switching to the sixth form at Hundred of Hoo.

Claire Spendley, the wife of suspended teacher Mark Spendley leaving her home on the Isle of Sheppey

Stunned: Claire Spendley, left, overheard the two girls when confronted her husband Mark, above, over his affairs. Mr Spendley has been suspended from his job and arrested on suspicion of 'abuse of position at a school'

Speaking at Southampton Solent university, where she now studies fashion and culture, Miss Chhibber said: ‘Mark was my teacher, and I looked up to him. We talked a lot, and lent each other CDs and DVDs.

‘By the second year of sixth form I worked with him as a teaching assistant at weekend classes for junior school kids, when he’d drive me the half hour to school and back.’
She said their affair began on her last day of school in June 2009 when he whisked her off to a date in London. Miss Chhibber said: ‘He said people might see us locally – and we went for a drink in Soho. On the way back to the car he held my hand.
‘I’m from a strict Hindu background, so had to be back by midnight. But when he stopped a road down from my house, he pecked me on the lips. I was stunned.’ A few weeks later, she claims, their affair began in earnest, continuing all summer.
Miss Chhibber said: ‘We’d meet in the middle of the countryside where no one would see us, and go for walks, and go to Tate Modern in London. We spent the night together once at a hotel in London – and once at his house when his wife Claire was away.

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‘He told me he loved me, and that he was leaving Claire. But in the end I had to finish it, because I knew it would destroy my family. I couldn’t lie any more. Mark cried a lot, but we stayed in touch. He was still texting me this January.’
Earlier this month she was contacted by the second girl. Miss Chhibber said: ‘She was furious he’d been involved with another girl. So we went round to speak to him. Claire looked terrified. She shouted at me, but he sent her upstairs to their flat. He had been living a double life – and I feel awful about Claire.’
The second girl – who left school before Christmas – announced her fury on her Facebook page. She wrote: ‘I am going to drag the slimy ****ing smug git through a long process with the police on my side.’
Mr Spendley did not respond to a request for a comment. A police spokesman said: ‘We are investigating an incident of abuse of position at a school. A 35-year-old man has been arrested and is on police bail.’
Hoo’s head Gary Holden refused to comment.