A ST John Ambulance volunteer indecently assaulted a boy he met through the organisation.

Toby Moncaster got to know the 12-year-old while running a training course for junior St John members outside the county, Chelmsford Crown Court heard.

Moncaster, 33, a past president of Essex University’s St John Ambulance group, assaulted the boy on several occasions, the court was told.

Moncaster, of Dukes Farm, Layer Marney, admitted five charges of indecent assault and one of possessing indecent photographs of children.

He was given a three-year community order under the supervision of the probation service. He will also be sent on a sex offenders’ treatment course, was put on the sex offenders’ register and banned from working with children for five years.

After the case, St John Ambulance spokesman Richard Bloomfield said Moncaster had resigned from the organisation, but would have been dismissed if he had not done so.

FULL REPORT IN THURSDAY’S GAZETTE