The trial of the four people charged with offences in connection with the closure of the LL Camps children camp is expected to take place in May next year.

A preliminary hearing took place at St Albans Crown Court today.

The defendants are expected to enter their pleas at an initial hearing in January.

The children’s summer camp in Hertfordshire, which was popular with Jewish families, was shut down in August after its director Ben Lewis was charged with three counts relating to the possession of indecent images of children.

Mr Lewis – who was remanded in custody - has since been charged with additional offences.

They are two counts relating to perverting the course of justice, one count of child neglect, and one count of attempting to observe another person taking part in a private act without consent for sexual gratification. The alleged offence is said to have taken place in Hertfordshire in 2012.

Mr Lewis, who is Jewish, has also been charged with two alleged offences relating to taking an indecent photograph of a child – and one charge of making an indecent photograph of a child. These three offences are alleged to have taken place in Hertfordshire in May this year.

Mr Lewis’s father Larry Lewis, 55, has been charged with perverting the course of justice.

Mr Lewis’s former business partner Tal Landsman, a former JFS student, has been accused of child neglect and conspiracy to pervert the course of justice.

His mother Adrianne Landsman, 56, from Edgware, was charged with one count of child neglect.