A FORMER Suffolk music teacher and concert band leader accused of a string of sex assaults on boys has successfully applied to have his case heard outside the county.

A FORMER Suffolk music teacher and concert band leader accused of a string of sex assaults on boys has successfully applied to have his case heard outside the county.

Derek Cable, a teacher at Stowmarket Middle School at the time of the alleged offences, applied for the transfer at the High Court in London.

His case was decided by Mrs Justice Rafferty during an administrative hearing on Wednesday .

The original trial date, set for May at a Suffolk crown court, has now been vacated.

Cable, 62, faces a total of 23 charges of indecency and gross indecency during the 1970s and 1980s on children aged under 16.

He will now be tried at Norwich Crown Court. No date has been set for the hearing.

The former vice president of the Suffolk Concert Band is accused of 13 allegations of indecent assault on boys aged between 11 and 16, and 10 charges of gross indecency on boys aged between 10 and 16.

He pleaded not guilty to all 23 charges at a hearing in Bury St Edmunds last December.

On that occasion, the court was told the alleged offences, on a total of seven boys, all took place in the Stowmarket area.

Cable, who has been living in Singapore and working as a music consultant, was arrested in April last year when he returned to Suffolk for a band reunion.

The former teacher, of Edgecomb Road, Stowmarket, is currently on unconditional bail.