THE wife of a teacher accused of having sex with a male pupil has insisted she still loves him.

Joanne Smith described to a court the moment she discovered her husband Peter was “exploring his homosexuality”.

Mrs Smith was giving evidence at Leeds Crown Court, where her husband denies seven counts of sexual activity with a child by a person in a position of trust and three counts of causing a child to engage in sexual activity by a person in a position of trust.

But under cross-examination by prosecuting barrister Rob Mairs, Mrs Smith insisted she had never let her husband go.

“I don’t know where our marriage will go. I know that I love Pete, I know that he loves me, I know that he is very sorry about his affair.

“We have been married nearly 15 years and I would hope because of all the great things we have always shared, we are great friends, best friends.

“We get on very well together, have a lot of common interests, common values and we have two great kids and a good family. I wouldn’t want to see all of that destroyed and unpicked because my husband had an affair.”

And she dismissed as “crazy” suggestions that her husband could have had sex with a boy while babysitting in their Scissett home.

Smith, 38, of Pilling Lane, denies having a sexual relationship with a teenage pupil he taught at a West Yorkshire school.

The pupil claimed that he and Smith had sex on school premises and while he babysat for the teacher’s children.

Mr Peter Pimm, defending, asked Mrs Smith: “There have been suggestions made that while the complainant was babysitting he had sex with Peter in your bedroom, the children were there but you were not there in the early evening. What do you make of that?”

Mrs Smith replied: “It is a crazy suggestion. In terms of being able to do that – I am quite certain that Pete and I wouldn't have sex in our bedroom at that time in the evening with the children in.

“There are no locks on the doors, they are sliding doors.

“Somebody could come up at any point.

“I can’t imagine anybody having sex with kids awake in the house.

“When somebody was there they were lively and giddy and they would jump all over them, they wouldn’t have let him out of their sight.”

Mrs Smith also claimed that an allegation that Mr Smith used to drive the pupil home was “crazy” as the children would have told her.

She revealed to the jury that after Smith was arrested, that was the first time she discovered he was bisexual.

She said that between 2009 and 2010, she had “no inkling” about her husband’s relationship with the pupil at all nor that he was “exploring the homosexual side of himself”.

However she admitted there had been “issues” in their marriage from a “sexual perspective” and suggestions that he performed a sexual act via a web cam were not crazy but “shocking”.

The judge will sum up the case today and the jury are expected to begin considering their verdicts tomorrow.