Police failings let rock star’s child abuse go on for 4 years

PAEDOPHILE rock star Ian Watkins could have been caught nearly four years earlier if police had properly investigated reports from informants, the Independent Police Complaints Commission has said.

The IPCC said South Wales Police failed to adequately act on reports from six people, allowing the Lostprophets singer to continue abusing children. Watkins was jailed for 35 years in December 2013 after admitting 13 sex offences including the attempted rape of a fan’s baby.

Officers were found to have made ‘errors and omissions’ and in some instances failed to ‘carry out even rudimentary investigation’ into reports of Watkins’s wrongdoing made by his ex- girlfriend Joanne Mjadzelics and five other witnesses between 2008 and 2012.

South Wales Police accepted the findings of the IPCC report, which included criticisms of record keeping and rigour in investigations. Miss Mjadzelics first reported Watkins in 2008 over a message he sent about sexual abuse of children but police did not examine the phone because they said her report was ‘malicious’.