A FORMER Vicar of Sedlescombe, in East Sussex, Ifor Whittaker, 80, formerly known as Colin Ivor Pritchard, has been sentenced at Hove Crown Court to life in prison, with a minimum sentence of eight years, after admitting to raping a child in his parish during the 1990s.

He had pleaded guilty to the offence on 25 October.

Sussex Police said in a statement after the sentencing on Tuesday: “Whittaker gained the trust of his young victim and sexually abused him in the vestry of the church.”

The victim reported the abuse in February 2022, at which point Whittaker was already serving a 15-year sentence for repeatedly abusing a boy over a period of six years, starting when the boy was aged ten, in 1987, and for conspiring (in this abuse) with another former priest, Roy Cotton, who died in 2006 and was never prosecuted.

The case was examined in detail during hearings conducted by the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) in 2018.

Detective Constable Nicky Beard said on Tuesday: “Ifor Whittaker is a predator who used his position of trust in the community to rape and sexually abuse young children. That level of betrayal must not be underestimated. Whittaker christened the victim in this investigation as a baby; he had earned the trust of his family — but he went on to abuse him in the most appalling way.”