Christopher Victor Todman seemed to lead a faithful life.
He taught piano at John McGlashan College, played music at a local Brethren church and ran the Sunday school out of the basement.
He also organised a ‘‘boys rally’’ from his home with children from the church, envisaged as a way to encourage children to continue to gain religious understanding outside of church.
Todman, a small, quiet man who devoted a lot of his attention to the children at the church, was seen by parents as a trusted and inspiring person to their sons.
One parent even described Todman as a ‘‘father figure’’ for some of the boys.
For years he used his trusted positions to betray families and accessed children for his twisted sexual desires.
Groups of young boys who stayed overnight at his North East Valley home were instructed to undress and bathe together while Todman watched.
Piano students were molested by him in the chapel at John McGlashan.
At least 10 boys fell victim to Todman’s sexual offending which began 50 years ago, with some sex crimes only recently coming to light.
Some victims took decades to come forward because the trauma was too much to talk about.
Last month, Todman was sentenced for offending from the 1990s which police only became aware of in 2024.
The abuse caused destruction in the lives of the boys, who still suffer today.
One of the former ‘‘boys rally’’ members and victim of Todman went on to fatally stab a man over a dispute at a party.
He spoke to the Otago Daily Times about the suffering he endured but did not want his comments published as the subject opened old wounds of being let down by the justice system and not being heard.
For legal reasons the man’s identity cannot be revealed.
One man who only recently complained to police about Todman is Darren*.
He kept what happened to himself for more than 30 years, but the trauma festered away inside him.
His life had spiralled out of control since he was abused — his tendencies to get angry and violent stemmed from his suffering as a child, he said.
‘‘It’s caused more devastation than you could think,’’ Darren said.
‘‘He’s destroyed families.’’
Todman’s past projects a horrifying picture of his future, Darren believes.
‘‘He knows how to lure the kids in.
‘‘He’ll only stop when he stops breathing.’’
‘‘They’re just little boys crying out for help,’’ she said.
Todman’s abuse changed her son for life, she said, with Darren lashing out at times and spending time in prison.
Darren met Todman at the church in Riselaw Rd when he was just 7 or 8, and became part of the boys-only Sunday school Todman ran from the basement there.
Not long later, Darren was staying over at his house with other boys from church as part of a sketchy ‘‘boys rally’’ Todman ran.
He recalled staying there most weekends, and all the boys would sleep on the floor in the living room apart from whoever Todman would ‘‘select’’ each time.
That boy would sleep in the spare room with Todman and was given two little white pills with a glass of water, he said.
Todman disputed this at a judge-alone trial in December, saying Darren only stayed at his house about three times and the boys all slept in the lounge together.
The 73-year-old Singapore-born defendant arrived at court each day of the trial dressed neatly in a collared shirt and tie, a sweater pulled over top.
Quietly, he sat hunched over next to his lawyer.
His unthreatening manner contrasted with his chilling evidence.
Todman denied all charges, but admitted having children stay at his house and watching them undress.
He confessed he had a sexual interest in boys when asked by the Crown prosecutor.
He suggested his fascination was ‘‘not just sexual ... I considered them to be my friends as well’’.
‘‘I guess they were just my world,’’ he said.
The trauma Darren endured manifested in a life of angry explosions.
‘‘Me and all the other boys ... we didn’t talk about it. We just took our anger out on anything and everything,’’ he said.
‘‘A lot of us have spent time inside.’’
Darren admitted he could become enraged quickly, but put it down to being wronged so early.
‘‘I don’t know what normal is,’’ he said.
‘‘I find it easier to keep the f ... away from people.’’
After reading an Otago Daily Times article in 2024 about Todman’s earlier sex offending, Darren decided to come forward.
He had ‘‘never seen eye-to-eye’’ with the cops, and said he had to be persistent to make a complaint, but eventually was put in touch with a detective who took him seriously.
After the December trial, Todman was convicted of three charges of indecent assault on two boys under 12.
He was found not guilty of another identical charge and a fifth was dismissed at trial after the Crown opted not to pursue it.
Last month, he was sentenced to 18 months’ intensive supervision for those charges, which included indecently assaulting Darren by groping him while applying ointment, in front of other rally boys at Todman’s home.
‘‘The court’s done no justice,’’ Darren said.
‘‘They’re basically setting him up so he can get his next prey.’’
While all of Todman’s offending occurred between 1976 and 1993, Darren believed there could be more victims who had not come forward and there would be more victims in the future.
‘‘That fella, he will weasel his way back in and it’s going to happen again, I can tell you that for a fact.’’
His mother agreed.
‘‘No child’s safe while he’s out in the community,’’ she said.
‘‘He’s only going to reoffend.’’
A second victim involved in the trial gave evidence about being molested during his piano lessons at John McGlashan.
At trial, he said the defendant told him to sit on his lap, then pulled his bottom into his crotch area despite his resistance.
‘‘Everything Chris did was so well-practised and so charismatic, there was no arguing with it, there was nothing I could do; I was completely helpless,’’ the witness said.
‘‘Having someone take advantage of you physically ... It took all my confidence. From that point I was damaged and couldn’t recover.’’
Todman denied the offending, claiming he could not remember ever meeting the victim and the incidents he had described were implausible.
‘‘I’d never risk doing anything suspicious where people could come in unannounced at any time and see me,’’ Todman said.
‘‘I was always aware of the privilege of teaching at John McGlashan and I wasn’t going to abuse that privilege.’’
But he did, and he had before.
‘Compulsion’
In 1994, Todman was more forthcoming and admitted indecently assaulting six boys who came to him for piano lessons or stayed overnight at his house.
His then-counsel, Anne Stevens KC, said Todman’s offending was like an ‘‘addiction or compulsion’’ of which he was not conscious.
The Crown urged the judge to impose preventive detention, an indefinite prison term, with a minimum of 10 years inside before he could see the Parole Board.
But the judge thought that was far too ‘‘draconian’’ in the circumstances and instead jailed him for two and a-half years.
In 2024, Todman was jailed for 11 months after a jury found him guilty of six charges of indecent assault relating to a piano student from the 1990s.
It started with him touching the pupil’s leg, which progressed to pressing his face against his and later licking and nibbling the boy’s ear.
On the final occasion he groped the young boy, causing him to turn around, strike Todman and tell him not to do it again.
In 1976, Todman was fined and put on probation (a community-based sentence during which a defendant was regularly monitored by a probation officer) in the North Shore District Court for indecently assaulting a boy and in 1980 the same court sentenced him to probation and fined him again for two more counts of the same charge.
For all of his crimes, Todman has been sentenced to less than three and a-half years behind bars combined.
At his sentencing this month, the defendant apologised through his lawyer for betraying Darren and his mother.
Outside court, Todman had nothing to say about his sentencing and marched away from the Otago Daily Times with his head down.
Asked if he regretted his offending, he offered no comment.
A pre-sentence report said Todman’s risk was ‘‘difficult to assess’’ but Judge Hermann Retzlaff gave the man credit for being ‘‘straight up’’ about his attraction to boys.
Todman had spent eight extra months in custody after serving his sentence from 2024 and had been on electronically-monitored bail for seven months while on remand.
The judge considered that was a proportionate punishment for his crimes, so the outcome was purely rehabilitative.
‘‘I think without support he is at risk of reoffending,’’ the judge said.
‘‘Further rehabilitation won’t hurt.’’
Trusted
Darren’s mother Susan said there were no red flags when she first met Todman through church.
‘‘I trusted him,’’ she said.
‘‘I trusted that he was doing the good for the boys.’’
Her son was a happy young child before he was abused.
‘‘My son changed,’’ she said.
‘‘I couldn’t work out what was wrong with him, why he wouldn’t listen to me, why he was getting angry all the time.’’
He kicked walls, was defiant and got himself into trouble at school.
It wasn’t until she read about Todman’s court case in the 1990s that she realised what might be going on.
‘‘Then it made sense to me,’’ she said.
She saw how her son was still affected by what Todman did to him today, and talking about it made her tear up.
‘‘We haven’t got that connection like we used to have.’’
Falling out with son
Ralph* knows the feeling.
His son took piano lessons with Todman at his house and was also part of the boys rally and was abused by Todman in the 1990s.
He and his son had a number of fallouts over the years.
‘‘He was a nice kid; all of a sudden he just started doing silly things,’’ he recalled.
Ralph was ‘‘flabbergasted’’ when he found out what the ‘‘very churchy’’ Todman had done.
He had no idea about the scale of Todman’s abuse until he went to court where there were five other victims.
Ralph blames Todman for his divorce and the time he spent in prison after he shot a gun in response to being called a paedophile.
He found the court process to be ‘‘a let-down’’ and thought Todman should have been locked up ‘‘forever’’ and ‘‘he shouldn’t be allowed near any kids’’.
‘‘All the victims have had a life sentence,’’ he said.
‘‘All of this is a flow-on effect of his abuse.
‘‘He deserves to be turned inside out.’’
Ralph believed it was in Todman’s nature to continue offending and there was likely to be more victims of Todman who had not come forward.
He wanted a sincere apology from the defendant.
Darren did not.
‘‘I know he won’t mean it,’’ he said.
‘‘I can see why people take justice into their own hands.’’
His mother had a message for Todman too.
‘‘I hope you enjoy hell, because that’s where you’re going,’’ she said.
‘‘And I’d like you to feel all the pain and anguish and how you hurt these men as boys.’’
An old photo of Riselaw Road Gospel Hall. PHOTO: SUPPLIED
Timeline
1976: Todman is fined $100 and put on probation for two years at the North Shore District Court for a charge of indecently assaulting a boy under 16.
1980: At the North Shore District Court, Todman is fined $500 and put on probation after he is convicted of two charges of indecently assaulting a boy under 16.
1994: He is jailed for two and a-half years after admitting indecently assaulting six boys who came to him for piano lessons or stayed overnight at his house between 1986 and 1993. He was also ordered to pay $500 to each victim.
2024: At the Dunedin District Court, Todman is jailed for 11 months for indecency offending against a piano student.
December 2025: Todman defends five charges of indecency with a boy under 12 at a judge-alone trial at the Dunedin District Court. One charge is dismissed during the trial after the Crown opts not to pursue it.
February 2026: The defendant is found guilty of three charges of indecency with a boy under 12, and not guilty of one count of the same.
May 2026: Todman is sentenced to 18 months’ intensive supervision and returns home to Auckland.
