Sex abuse of teenage girls can happen anywhere

WHATEVER the truth of the allegations contained in newly unsealed documents, they do nothing to mitigate the Jeffrey Epstein scandal and the disgusting exploitation of teenage girls as sex slaves for an elite circle of powerful men. Johanna Sjoberg’s testimony adds to that of Virginia Giuffre to show how girls from dysfunctional homes and poverty are susceptible to grooming and sex trafficking.

Yet back when Epstein was hosting his underage orgies there was less awareness about sex abuse, while underage sex, especially between celebrities and their groupies, was also viewed differently.

It’s no defence today, but it’s quite possible that Prince Andrew, above, and his fellow playboys assumed that the young girls who surrounded them like moths around a flame were paid-up party girls or prostitutes, and were there of their own free will.

But the question now is if, today, with society’s knowledge of grooming and exploitation, men ask more questions of teenage girls than Andrew and his mates did. Reports that the number of suspected cases of children being sexually exploited has doubled in 2023 suggest that they don’t.

Latest figures from the Department of Children show that 61 children, mostly in State care, are suspected by Tusla of being exploited, often by co-ordinated ‘gangs’ of predatory men. The girls are taken by taxi from residential care homes to hotels, where they are sexually exploited and abused, often after being plied with drugs or given gifts.

Not quite the private jets and exclusive island retreat supplied by Epstein, but it’s the same sordid principle in action – perhaps in a care home near you.