Imagine if this had been a male teacher

'Ms Gehring may have been found not guilty. But only a fool would imagine that the decision might attest to her innocence'

Amy Gehring, the former supply teacher, has been found not guilty of four charges of indecent assault against two pupils. The verdict, however, far from towering with the unarguable finality of justice seen to be done, is of little to no account.

The solemn decision of a jury should never take on the aspect of a decision that damns with faint praise. But in this case it most certainly has. Ms Gehring may have been found not guilty. But only a foolish soul would imagine that the decision might attest to her innocence.

There are a good many reasons for this. But none of them offsets the fact that the course of this trial undermines the most basic of principles on which the notion of justice is based. Far from being innocent until proven guilty, Ms Gehring demonstrably cannot claim innocence after being found not guilty.

Shouldn't there be worry about this? Can a judicial system be said to function efficiently and fairly when the result of a trial by jury is transparently of such slight consequence?

It is accepted, albeit reluctantly and uncomfortably, that the belief that there is "no smoke without fire" can dog a person even when they are acquitted of a crime. That's particularly true in the case of a sexual crime. It is a serious difficulty, and one which already does damage to the lofty ideals of the pursuit of justice.

But the case of Amy Gehring appears, monstrously, to confirm that such a mindset is not only understandable, but prudent, not only canny, but correct. In fact, the initial reaction to the case gives every indication that the irrelevance of a jury's verdict is not just accepted but routinely compensated for by civil rather than judicial bodies.

Ms Gehring is not going unpunished. Police, social services and Surrey education officials, have convened to discuss whether she should be allowed to teach again. Their expert opinion is that she should not.

Indeed, the opinion of the police since they first came across her has been that Ms Gehring should not be teaching. They had investigated another instance of inappropriate sexual behaviour Ms Gehring had initiated with a 16-year-old pupil at a different school. On that occasion, the boy exploited by Ms Gehring did not wish to press charges, although he now says he regrets his decision.

The police still took what action they could though. They informed the supply teaching agency, TimePlan, of Ms Gehring's unsuitability, along with (they maintain) the Department of Education (which denies it). TimePlan disregarded the advice of the police, and placed Ms Gehring again.

And still the buck does not stop. TimePlan has admitted guilt, unlike Ms Gehring. But in this case, the wider system, with some credibility, can be blamed. Ms Gehring was recruited in Canada by TimePlan, which was looking abroad to fill the huge, debilitating gaps in British classrooms. This, of course, was a consequence of vandalism over a long period by the state of its education system. And so on.

Except that all this – although it is discussed as if it is the lesson we can learn from this case – is beside the point. Sure, bad things happen in a bad system. Ms Gehring is an illustration of that. But it is a different bad system which has found her not guilty of these offences. We all accept that the education system has been found wanting. But acceptance that aspects of the legal system also have to change, and urgently, is still far away.

No doubt this analysis will have lawyers and civil rights activists leaping up and down with apoplexy. My concern, though, is with protecting the innocent without at the same time encouraging the guilty to believe that one of their civil rights is the right to get away with their crimes.

People do that all the time, but not frequently in a blaze of publicity. In other cases, this exposure of the failings of the legal system might not have been undertaken so blithely by any of those concerned. The situation has no doubt arisen in the first place because it is already known that sex trials involving women and boys are never taken seriously.

This trial should prompt us not just to look again at the complacency with which we accept the fact that trial by jury is routinely abused. It would also usefully prompt us to look again at the prevailing attitude to sex crimes more particularly. The change of genders in this trial may help us a little to think "outside the box".

The idea that a male teacher accused of having raped a male or female pair of 14- and 15-year-old siblings would be allowed to walk free from court, and yet still be reported in the press as quite obviously guilty of other similar offences, and not considered an outrageous risk to the public, is risible. Rape is a dreadful smear, and the very accusation leaves an indelible stain. But Ms Gehring wasn't even charged with rape, because there is no charge of statutory rape against boys of 14 to16 years old by women.

No wonder it was widely argued that Jonathan King should not have been so harshly condemned for picking up and having sex with consenting underage boys. That argument is merely an extension of the law of the land, which already dictates that boys do not deserve the same protections from predatory adults that girls do.

But boys do need those same protections, perhaps – since they reach sexual maturity later – more urgently than girls do. The law should afford all minors the same protections, regardless of their gender, and likewise demand the same responsibilities of all adults, regardless of theirs.

Instead, what the law says right now is that a woman enticing a 14-year-old boy into intercourse is neither a rapist nor a paedophile, while a man doing the same is both. It would help us better to frame the law as it relates to these crimes if we seriously thought about the fact that women can be rapists and paedophiles too.

It may, for example, help us to see that rapists and paedophiles are not always evil monsters. Sometimes, like Ms Gehring, they are lonely and pathetic, looking to boost their confidence and get attention.This is not an excuse for their behaviour, any more than Ms Gehring's gender should have been an excuse for hers.

This in turn may lead us to question the sacred orthodoxy that rape is rape is rape, all of it driven by the same motivations, all of it equally heinous. The idea that the charge of rape should be divided into degrees denoting less and more serious rape has thus far been rejected. But maybe that should be looked at again.

And interestingly, a couple of the other recurring issues that have been debated when the reform of the rape laws is considered, have had a bearing on this case too.

One is that the jury was not told of Ms Gehring's previous assault on a pupil until after the verdict. Yet this has become such a problem when it comes to convicting serial male rapists or paedophiles that there is a precedent for the rule being waived. Again, this should be looked at closely.

The other is the matter of protecting the identity of the victim, and not that of the accused. Sexual crimes, Ms Gehring's being far from an exception, tend to attract a great deal of publicity, and a lot of mud that sticks whatever the verdict. Again, there is little point in establishing innocence, if the outside world feels free to draw different conclusions.

d.orr@independent.co.uk