Reckless ‘Robinson’ owes girls an apology Women praised for courage after coming forward
VICTIMS WERE praised by Judge Geoffrey Marson, QC, for their courage in going through an “agonising court process” in order to finally bring their abusers to justice.
Jurors heard live evidence and watched video recordings in which the young women described the trauma they had suffered.
They heard “chilling” details of how the girls were passed around gang members and subjected to degrading abuse after being drugged and violently attacked.
Victims were often trafficked to isolated moorland areas or to parties where their drinks would be spiked so they would be “rendered senseless”.
Girls would wake up naked or partially clothed, not knowing what had happened to them.
Truth or dare games were played and girls were ordered to perform sexual acts with others.
The sexual acts would often take place in the presence of other Asian men and other young girls.
If they did not comply they were either threatened or beaten.
Describing the “disgusting and degrading” abuse, Judge Marson said: “The details were chilling. HUDDERSFIELD WILL now be known alongside towns like Rotherham, Rochdale and Keighley as a place with one of the largest street grooming gangs uncovered in the UK so far.
The gang is the second largest to be convicted, with 16 men now behind bars for more than 200 years and a further four found guilty and awaiting sentence.
Once again, abuse was perpetrated by mainly Pakistani men against mainly white girls, although It was persistent and prolonged. Having been plied with alcohol and drugs, girls were raped, they were trafficked to isolated areas or to houses for the purpose of sexual abuse by those who took them or by others.
“When taken to isolated places such as the moors or a reservoir, if they didn’t comply they were, on occasions, beaten.
“They were told they would be left to make their own way back, children on their own, children late at night in isolated areas.
“They were taken to so-called parties at houses where there would be older Asian men.
“Again they were plied with alcohol and drugs, on occasion drinks were spiked and many times these girls were rendered senseless.
“They would be taken to a room where, one by one, men would go and abuse these girls sexually.”
During interviews with the police the girls were asked why they hadn’t complained or why they kept going back.
Girls spoke of being scared by threats and violence to them and their families. So corrupted were some of the girls by the abuse that they regarded the behaviour as normal.
The judge continued: “They some – including ringleader Amere Singh Dhaliwal – were of Sikh rather than Muslim faith.
Four of the 10 largest grooming gangs to have been sentenced across the country were operating within Yorkshire.
The most extensive was in Rotherham, where 1,500 potential victims have been identified to date, according to the National Crime Agency.
The organisation is running the biggest ever investigation into historic child sexual exploitation, were raped and sexually abused in cars, car parks, houses, a snooker centre, a takeaway, in a park and other places.”
Girls regularly went missing from home, causing great distress to their families. Operation Stovewood, in the town.
It was called in by South Yorkshire Police after a damning report by Professor Alexis Jay found the abuse had taken place partly as a result of failings by South Yorkshire Police and Rotherham Council.
So far, 147 suspects have been identified. Thirty-one men and two women have been convicted for their part in the abuse.
In Halifax, 18 men were convicted in 2016 for their part in the abuse of a vulnerable schoolgirl
They became secretive and aggressive and they came home often drunk or under the influence of drugs.
Parents had to call police because their children became so aggressive when they tried to prevent them from leaving the house.
One parent received a threatening phone call asking for their daughter and was told: ‘I’m coming for you.’
That same mother received a phone call from one of the other girls asking her to pick her daughter who is believed to have been preyed on by up to 100 men.
In Keighley, 12 men were jailed for their part in another abuse gang, but the suspected ringleader has fled abroad. A review found a catalogue of missed opportunities by the police and social services to protect the main victim, who was aged 13 and 14 when she was repeatedly raped.
While the majority of sex offenders are white, the prevalence of British Pakistani men within on-street grooming gangs has been a cause of controversy. up. She was found on Crosland Moor propped up against a wall, unable to stand and disorientated. Families became very fearful because the men knew where they lived.
They were followed home and received constant phone calls to their homes and mobile phones.
At least one girl attempted suicide.
One of the girls was seen being thrown out of a moving car outside her home. She had bruises all over her face and was under the influence of alcohol.
Authorities have faced repeated accusations of having failed to act sooner for fear of appearing racist and many Muslim commentators have urged communities to face up to the issue.
In 2012, Baroness Sayeeda Warsi warned “a small minority of Pakistani men believe that white girls are fair game” after abuse gangs were exposed in Rochdale and elsewhere.
Two years ago, Mohammed Shafiq, chief executive of the Ramadhan Foundation, warned British Pakistanis against “burying
The brother of one of the girls saw a car with Asian men and they said they were looking for “white girls”. House windows were smashed and threats were made to cause physical harm to members of the girls’ families.
Threats were made to bomb a house, damage was done to cars and wheel nuts loosened, causing serious danger.
When one girl was taken into care she was abducted from the home and supplied with drugs and sexually abused.
One of the girls said: “I suppose when you’re young and you get bullied at school and stuff like that you do sort of like the attention, and things getting bought for you and stuff, but then once you were in with them, you couldn’t get out of it.
“They got your trust and then stuff would start happening to you and it’s just one of those things that you couldn’t get out of, it just happened.
“My mum and dad’s houses got trashed, their cars got trashed.
“I was constantly getting raped, beaten up.”
Another victim said: “You would see people with knives or fighting so you do feel scared and you do feel intimidated.
“But on the other side you feel like you want to be a rebel because you’re that age.
“But really it’s a downright dangerous situation you are in and you are playing with fire, getting driven to Scammonden Dam at 13 years old at two o’clock in the morning and if you don’t do this you’re not going to come back.
“For years and years I blamed myself that it was my fault I went back.” our head in the sand” about the problem of grooming gangs operating in their communities.
He said: “This is not a white conspiracy dreamt up by the far right, or victimisation of the Pakistani community, as some claim.
“This is a concerted effort by a minority of Pakistani men who have groomed, abused and raped young white girls. This is a form of racism and we shouldn’t hesitate to condemn it. Blaming or deflecting attention away from the evil men who carry out such actions is despicable.” THE GANG of sexual predators that raped and abused children as young as 11 years old might still be walking the streets of Yorkshire following the recklessness of far-right activist Stephen Yaxley-Lennon.
The former leader of the English Defence League took it upon himself during proceedings to disregard reporting restrictions put in place to protect the justice process.
As the accused faced their days in court, Yaxley-Lennon, who goes by the name Tommy Robinson, took to Facebook to broadcast live content which could have caused the trial to collapse.
He did so under the auspices of being a champion of the people, effectively duping those who follow him into believing that editors like me were covering up these repugnant crimes.
His narrative was that newspapers like were too scared to tell the truth because the perpetrators are all Asian men.
Now, as reporting restrictions are lifted, the truth stands there for all to see: Yaxley-Lennon put his own notoriety ahead of any thought for the only people that matter in this; the victims.
In flouting the reporting restrictions he absolutely jeopardised their right to see punished the men who abused them in the most inhumane way imaginable.
This newspaper has committed a journalist to proceedings every step of the way, capturing every submission with a shorthand note, knowing that the right time would eventually come to responsibly break the news.
The right time was – and is – when, and only when, those guilty of such heinous acts against some of the most vulnerable children in the county have received that which is coming to them.
Now these men are jailed, the time is right to publish. It is also the right time for Yaxley-Lennon to apologise to the victims.