John Smyth (barrister)

John Jackson Smyth QC (/smaɪð/; 27 June 1941 – 11 August 2018) was a Canadian-born British barrister and serial child abuser who was actively involved in Christian ministry for children as chairman of the Iwerne Trust which raised funds for, and in practice ran, the influential conservative evangelical Iwerne camps. He acted as lawyer for Mary Whitehouse, a Christian morality campaigner.

In 1982, the Iwerne Trust was informed that Smyth had performed sadistic beatings on schoolboys and young men associated with the Iwerne Camps and with a Christian group at Winchester College. Smyth moved to Zimbabwe in 1984, where he continued to run children's camps. The police were not informed of the 1982 report until 2013, and it became public in 2017. Church of England bishop Andrew Watson disclosed that, as a young man, he was a victim. Smyth died while under investigation and was not charged.

An independent review published in 2024 concluded that he subjected more than 100 boys and young men to "traumatic physical, sexual, psychological and spiritual attacks"^: 1 over a period of four decades. The review found that his abuse was an open secret, which was covered up by "powerful evangelical clergy", and that the beliefs and values of conservative evangelicalism were critical to his evasion of justice, and to how he manipulated his victims.

On 12 November 2024, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, announced he would resign due to the part he played in the church's failure to acknowledge Smyth's child abuse.