The BBC has reported this week that at least 12 new victims have come forward since the Jay Report uncovered disturbing evidence of significant local government and police failings that allowed an estimated 1,400 children to be abused over a period of 16 years.
The conclusions in the report made clear that the number given was only an estimate and there remains the very real concern that this could be just the tip of the iceberg.
Independent inquiries have already been commissioned to investigate how and why the abuse of children as young as 11, which involved grooming, trafficking, abduction, violence, intimidation, and rape, was allowed to go unpunished. People in authoritative positions knew about the abuse and knew about the nature of the allegations made, yet the victim’s cries for help fell upon deaf and ignorant ears as the problem was allegedly swept under the carpet.
More and more details of the horrifying nature of the neglect is coming to light as this scandal unfolds, with perhaps some of the most shocking stories being that of an 11 year old victim who was arrested, and an officer describing the rape of a 12 years old girl by several males as “entirely consensual” according to the BBC.
Other victims have spoken out since the Jay Report revealed the extent of the mishandling of child protection services. Some of the cases reported by BBC News are truly disturbing. One victim was groomed at the age of 12 and raped at the age of 13 and continually raped once a week for two years. She was introduced to the group of men by boys of her school age where a friendship was struck up.
They introduced her to alcohol and drugs and she was eventually raped continually by different men. She was forced to engage in sexual activity with whomever the group wanted her to, and her cries for them to stop were simply laughed off.
The victim reported the abuse to the police after three months and she presented them with clothing that could have been used as vital evidence; but the police allegedly lost the clothing leaving her with no evidence to support her allegations. She was told her chances of success with the charges were small given it was her word against theirs, and her family were continually threatened and intimated by the men whom she described as dangerous.
The abusers even threatened to rape her mother. She told BBC reporters…
“in my mind, as a 13 or 14-year-old, it was ‘Well if I didn’t go out and see them they are going to get my mum and are going to rape her.’ They gang raped me, so what stops them from doing that to my mum?”
Although her family approached all the services that should have been there to help them, they were eventually left with no choice but to send her out of the country. The police were unwilling to offer any help or protection and she later had no choice but to drop the charges. Shockingly her abusers are still free to this day.
MP Barry Sheerman who chaired the Commons Children, Schools and Families Committee between 2007 – 2010 described that he felt “guilty” over the scandal. MP’s were aware that children were being exploited all over the country…
“We knew about that, we didn’t do enough about it. Members of this house, many of us, knew what was going on.”