FA ignored warning signs over Bennell

THE Football Association failed to respond to a letter from American prosecutors in August 1995 warning them about convicted child abuser Barry Bennell, Sportsmail can reveal. The head of Florida’s special assaults unit, Libby Senterfitt, wrote to the FA to warn Charles Hughes, the director of coaching, about Bennell after the paedophile had admitted six counts of child abuse. Senterfitt received a 42-word reply from Hughes’s PA promising to ‘bring your correspondence to Mr Hughes’s attention’, but records suggest Hughes never responded.

Sportsmail’s enquiries have also failed to uncover any evidence of a reply to Senterfitt’s warning that Bennell was a paedophile who ‘molests children’. Senterfitt’s letter said: ‘Barry Bennell has been a highly respected soccer coach in England for many years. He has almost exclusively taught teenage boys between the ages of 11 and 14. Very sadly, Mr Bennell had a hidden reason for teaching this age group. He molests them. I hope this information will serve you and serve to protect other children from abuse at the hands of Barry Bennell.’ Hughes, who is now 88, could not be reached, the FA said. The governing body did assure Cheshire Police that Bennell’s preliminary coaching award, which allowed him to work as a coach in England, would be rescinded. But only upon conviction and if the Florida authorities sent them a request. The police then alerted FIFA, who asked for a letter ‘setting out the facts of the case’ in 1995. The FA recently said they have instructed QC Clive Sheldon to oversee an inquiry — the independent investigation into historical child sex abuse in football — in which he will scrutinise the role of clubs and English football’s governing body.