Law chief: Sex gangs are racist

JUDGES must give longer sentences to Asian Muslim grooming gangs who target white teenage girls, the Government’s senior legal adviser has said.

Robert Buckland, the Solicitor General, told The Daily Telegraph that racism “cuts all ways” and should be “front and centre” when it is part of sexual abuse cases. He said that “the law does not discriminate” between different forms of racism and that the courts should apply a “sentencing uplift” where there is evidence of “racial hostility or motivation”.

Tory MPS are calling on the Attorney General and Mr Buckland to review the sentences of 17 men and a woman in Newcastle upon Tyne convicted of grooming and raping hundreds of underage white girls. During one of the trials the jury heard how a gang member referred to women as “white trash” who were “only good for one thing”.

Mike Penning, a former justice and

policing minister, has raised concerns that the apparently racially aggravated nature of their offences was not reflected in their punishment.

Mr Buckland said: “The law does not discriminate. When it talks about sentencing increases for racial aggravation it doesn’t cut one way, it cuts all ways.

“Where there is a racial element in sexual abuse cases the law is clear that courts can apply a sentencing uplift.

“Racial aggravation should be front and centre in cases where there is evidence of racial hostility or motivation.”

He raised concerns that political correctness may have stopped gangs of Asian Muslim men from being properly pursued and punished.

“There has been an institutional reticence when it comes to Asian gangs that groom and abuse white girls. Some people have been more concerned about being labelled racist than dealing with child safeguarding,” he added.

‘Some people have been more concerned about being labelled racist than dealing with child safeguarding’

Under sentencing guidelines, crimes that were motivated by the victim’s race or religion are considered more serious and the court has a duty to take it into account when sentencing. But nowhere in the judge’s sentencing remarks in the latest case has the victims’ race been raised as an aggravating factor. Lord Macdonald of River Glaven, a former director of public prosecutions, said it was clear that the crimes committed by the gang were “profoundly racist” and that the issue needed to be confronted head on.

In 2015 Jamal Muhammed Raheem Ul Nasir, a child molester, was given a longer sentence after the judge ruled that the fact his victims were Asian and from the same community was an “aggravating factor”.

Nigel Farage, the former Ukip leader, said: “These are racist crimes and it’s been hidden for far too long in too many Northern cities and a lot of elected political figures throughout the North of England in my view bear a very heavy responsibility.”