UK: Math teacher trying to seek 'sympathy' and painting herself as the 'victim' because she is a woman, court hears

Article here. Excerpt:

'Mr Allman said Joynes hoped she would be 'treated very differently' and they would see the evidence 'differently' because she is a woman and not a man in the same situation.

'We have to ask in the cold light of day would Miss Joynes and those acting on her behalf appealed to your sympathy in that way if she'd been a 30-year-old man called Robert Joynes?' he asked.

He also asked whether the two boys would have 'been disparaged in the same way in attempt to discredit them' if they had been two girls of a similar age.

'Would the defence on Miss Joynes' behalf - in our theoretical scenario on Mr Joynes' behalf - have suggested to you that the girls the were the ones that wanted it to happen?' he asked.

'It could just not have taken the same lines in questions because it would have been quite obscene.'

He said it was easy to forget that Joynes was a mature, adult teacher, he said, and they were two teenage children and 'that's how she would like you to see this case.'

'So, she almost becomes the victim and the boys become the perpetrators,' he said.'