Police left children at mercy of grooming gangs in Rochdale
At least 100 paedophiles are still at large, report reveals
GANGS of paedophiles were left free to groom a new generation of victims because police and council bosses ignored the abuse of scores of young girls, a report concluded yesterday.
In a vindication of two whistleblowers, it said girls in Rochdale were ‘left at the mercy’ of grooming rings for over decade despite ‘compelling evidence’ of abuse.
For years, former detective Maggie Oliver has spoken of the ‘shameful denial’ by police and council teams of the scale of the scourge. Writing in the Daily Mail last year, she accused agencies meant to protect youngsters of a ‘conspiracy of silence’.
This was fuelled by prejudice against the victims, who were mainly white workingclass girls, plus cultural sensitivities about the perpetrators, who were mainly British-Pakistani men, Mrs Oliver said.
She and sexual health worker Sara Rowbotham – who revealed how her team had flagged ‘dozens’ of underage grooming victims – were belittled and vilified.
But yesterday a report commissioned by Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham agreed that 100 or more paedophiles are still walking Rochdale’s streets due a shameful decade of inaction. In response, police promised ‘a reckoning’ was coming
However, despite welcoming her vindication, Mrs Oliver, who now runs a charity helping abuse victims, dismissed the reassurances, saying detectives trying to tackle grooming gangs today were ‘in despair’ at a lack of resources. She said grooming was ‘categorically’ still happening in Rochdale.
The report, which covers 2004 to 2013, revealed how:
An abuse victim who bravely spoke to detectives was named as a ‘co- conspirator’ for ‘tactical’ reasons in the original 2012 grooming ring trial.
Another girl who had an abortion after being sexually abused at the age of 13 had her foetus stored in a freezer for two years without her knowledge in a bid to establish the father’s identity.
A third girl said she was locked in cages and made to bark like a dog or dress like a baby, with no action against the perpetrators.
At least 96 potential abusers had been identified, probably ‘only a proportion’ of those involved in grooming at the time. Police started investigating in 2007 after girls reported abuse linked to takeaway shops.
But the CPS recommended no action after branding the main accuser ‘unreliable’, a decision reversed two years later.
In 2012 ringleader Shabir Ahmed and eight other men, including Abdul Aziz, were jailed for a total of 77 years for raping and abusing up to 47 girls aged as young as 13.
Yesterday’s 176-page review is the third of four – and the first to focus on Rochdale – commissioned by Mr Burnham after a hard-hitting BBC documentary about the scandal in 2017. It con
‘Conspiracy of silence’
cluded there were ‘failures by statutory agencies to respond appropriately’ to ‘widespread sexual exploitation of children’.
Lead author Malcolm Newsam said the ‘serious allegations’ made by their whistleblowers’ ‘ lone voices’ had been ‘substantiated’.
He found there was a ‘significant probability’ that 74 children whose files were examined ‘ were being sexually exploited at that time’, and that in 48 of those cases there were ‘serious protection failures’.
Greater Manchester Chief Constable Stephen Watson described the findings as ‘shameful’, and issued ‘a heartfelt apology’. Rochdale Council’s Neil Emmott said the authority was ‘deeply sorry’.
READING the findings of the latest review into the Rochdale child sex abuse scandal evokes two intense emotions – pity and rage.
Pity for the poor, vulnerable girls as young as 12 who were preyed upon, horrifically abused, and passed around by vile paedophile gangs.
And rage that those charged with keeping them safe, principally the police and social services, failed so lamentably to protect them over almost a decade.
Despite countless opportunities to end their ordeal and bring their rapists to book, the police either lacked the will or simply looked the other way.
It was almost as if these girls, predominantly white and many from broken homes, were somehow culpable in their own suffering. As if they didn’t really count as victims.
Political correctness also played its part. As the perpetrators were overwhelmingly of Pakistani origin, the police and council feared accusations of racism if they came down hard on the grooming gangs.
Some of the detail in yesterday’s report is beyond distressing. Girls plied with drink and drugs, kept in cages and made to bark like dogs, or dress as babies.
Police secretly taking the aborted foetus of a 13-year-old grooming victim to test for DNA yet failing even to charge the man who impregnated her.
It’s true that thanks largely to two brave whistleblowers, some of these sorry excuses for men have thankfully been tried and convicted.
But the report identifies 96 who could remain a risk to children and says even this is ‘only a proportion’ of the total numbers involved in the abuse. It is a tale of incompetence, neglect and betrayal.
Greater Manchester mayor Andy Burnham has rightly called for a culture change in the police to prevent such outrages happening again. It must begin with an understanding that all victims deserve the same compassion and respect.
Never again can young girls be treated as lesser beings because they are poor or in care. Equally, child sex abusers must be subjected to the full force of the law, regardless of race, colour or creed.
And if these wronged girls are to have any real justice, every one of their attackers still at large must be identified and caught. Having failed so badly in the past, the police must now make amends.