A FORMER Celtic Boys’ Club chairman convicted of sexually abusing four boys and a girl while he was employed as a teacher has been spared jail.

Gerald King, 66, taught and coached football at a primary school in the north of Glasgow during the 1980s.

One man, now 43, told how King exposed himself to him when he was getting changed before a football game and told prosecutor Adele Macdonald: “I was really embarrassed and uncomfortable”.

He told the jury: “I felt as though it was something I couldn’t escape from.”

King’s conviction last month came only weeks after Celtic Boys’ Club founder Jim Torbett was jailed for a second time for abusing three boys.

A former manager of the boys’ club, Frank Cairney, 83, was found guilty the following week at Hamilton Sheriff Court of abusing teenagers between 1965 and 1986.

After his trial at Glasgow Sheriff Court, King was convicted of five charges of using lewd and libidinous practises towards the five victims between August 1984 and April 1989.

He was also found guilty of taking indecent pictures of children in February 1987.

Today, shamed King - who was also a coach at Celtic Boys’ Club - was given a three-year probation order.

He will be supervised throughout his time on the order and must carry out 240 hours unpaid work. King will also be on the sex offenders’ register for five years.

King’s victims were between nine and 13-years-old at the time.

In evidence, he admitted taking two pictures, one of four boys in a shower with no clothes on which was later printed in the school magazine with ‘censored’ over their private parts.

He also said he took a second picture of one of the boys with no clothes on, but claimed both were entirely innocent.

Sick King denied all of the charges he faced.