Renowned Violinist Accused of Raping a Former Pupil Has Case Against Him Dropped After Years of Hell

The Daily Mail
Mar. 30, 2016

A renowned music professor has been sensationally cleared of raping a former pupil after a three-year legal battle that has cost him £35,000, destroyed his career and almost saw his children taken from him.

Violinist Wen Zhou Li, 61, was due to stand trial later this year accused of raping and indecently assaulting a teenage girl he taught at Chetham's School of Music in the 1990s.

The Chinese-born musician was the last teacher facing charges after a four-year police investigation into historical sex abuse at Chetham's and the Royal Northern College of Music (RNCM), both in Manchester.

But the case has now been dropped after his defence team is understood to have given evidence to a hearing that his accuser made similar allegations against another former teacher, who was never prosecuted.

It also emerged that the student asked Mr Li to teach her again years after he supposedly raped her. The prosecution offered no evidence in the hearing at Manchester Crown Court, with Judge Michael Henshall saying Mr Li left court 'without a stain on his character'.

Mr Li, who taught a string of prize-winning pupils, has now told of his anger over the case, which left him barred from teaching and from being alone with his sons John, 11, and Jack, eight.

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