In 2017, the BBC aired the drama "Three Girls" which featured the story of . Charity Victim Support's chief executive Javed Khan said: "It is utterly unacceptable that, instead of protecting these vulnerable young victims from sexual exploitation, the authorities judged, blamed and disbelieved them and their families and, in doing so, exposed these victims to further abuse. During that period, Amber by now pregnant and living in a one-room flat continued to be targeted by the grooming gangs. [20], Four of the convicted, Shabir Ahmed, Adil Khan, Abdul Rauf and Abdul Aziz, who had dual British and Pakistani citizenships, were denaturalized (stripped of their British citizenship) by then Home Secretary Theresa May in order for them to be deported to Pakistan. The exposure of the grooming, sexual assault and trafficking of young girls in Rochdale was made public in 2012. Following the case in Rochdale similar cases of grooming and sexual abuse/exploitation of young girls came to light in various towns and cities across the UK. "This is something I feel very strongly about," she says. The convictions she received as a teen continue to hold her back to this day. . [1][8] Most of the men were married and well-respected within their community. Police and social workers failed the girls who were "passed around for sex" by a gang of men, it said. He said there was no doubt she was a victim of horrendous abuse and exploitation and he accepted that the police response "could and should have been better". She later went on to positively identify a number of offenders, which enabled charges to be brought against them all. [citation needed], Twelve men were initially charged with sex trafficking and other offences including: rape, trafficking girls for sex and conspiracy to engage in sexual activity with a child. There were therefore many still walking free that had evaded detection. etween 2008 and 2010, a child abuse ring that came to be known as part of the grooming gang phenomenon operated in Rochdale. She was vilified and nicknamed in the press as the Honey Monster. "I wouldn't go out of the house for nine months on my own without my mum or dad, because I was frightened," she said. [8] The victims, plied with drugs and alcohol, were passed around friends and family,[18] and taken to various locations in the north of England, including Rochdale, Oldham, Nelson, Bradford and Leeds. The review recommended the Greater Manchester Police establish a monitoring system and commit to maintaining a child sexual exploitation team. What about them? [28], Ann Cryer, Labour MP for Keighley, recalled in a BBC documentary filmed in 2012 that she had worked with the families of the victims involved, and had been "round at the police station virtually every week" and was "begging" both the police and social services to do something. It formed a large part of the police investigation that became known as Operation Span. The National Association for People Abused in Childhood (Napac) offers support for adult survivors on 0808 801 0331. The dramatisation tells the story of three children who were victims in the scandal and stars Maxine Peake as sexual health worker Sara, who recorded and reported cases of child abuse for years. Nazir Afzal, the newly-appointed chief crown prosecutor for the north west, reversed the decision not to prosecute the two who had been arrested and eventually authorised the charging of ten men in June 2011. She told me: It wasnt like a forced thing. These involved the grooming and sexual exploitation of several girls, aged in their early teens. After a troubled upbringing, Amber had been placed on the child protection register as being at risk of sexual and emotional abuse and neglect. Greater Manchester Police has been accused of 'blanking' three Rochdale grooming victims who have been trying to progress legal action against the force for over 18 months. "I got picked up so many times by the police and it was always when I was out with adult men," she says. The testimony of one of the five victims of the Rochdale grooming ring revealed the depth of the exploitation she suffered. To date, the CPS has not accepted any failure on its part and instead continues to herald this case as the first successful prosecution of a grooming gang. When police were called to a report of a 15-year-old girl smashing up the Balti House takeaway in Heywood, they had no idea that the crime they had. "[45], In May 2017, the BBC broadcast Three Girls, a miniseries about the case. She specifically spoke of her abuse at the hands of two members of the gang who would later be jailed four years. [47] However this report was "fiercely" criticised for its unscientific nature and poor methodology by child sexual exploitation experts Ella Cockbain and Waqas Tufail, in their paper "Failing Victims, Fuelling Hate: Challenging the Harms of the 'Muslim grooming gangs' Narrative" which was published in January 2020. Shabir Ahmed, who abused dozens of vulnerable teenagers, was known as "Dadd "We would get free alcohol and cigarettes, food, free taxis," she said. I think it's wrong that she be held back in this way.". Their treatment encompasses a range of catastrophic errors in one of the countrys most harrowing child sexual abuse scandals. In 2009, when Amber was 16, uniformed officers arrived at her mothers house, arrested her and took her to the police station. Stephen Watson says force had lacked professional curiosity when it came to young victims of grooming gangs 19 Apr 2022 Rochdale victim: 'I was groomed at 14, then the courts came for my. I felt sick, got upset nothing never no one from police came to me to explain why I was no longer going to court. In some cases those girls were raped, callously, viciously and violently. Read about our approach to external linking. "Even though I was kicking and screaming in the back [of the police van] saying 'he's hit me or he's raped me', I was always the one that got arrested. Three women who were groomed, raped and abused by gangs of men in Rochdale have received "substantial" damages and an apology from Greater Manchester Police. "The report paints a shocking picture of the inability of these agencies to protect these young people successfully," said Jane Booth, chair of the safeguarding board. A. The trial of nine of the grooming gang was pending, and in the meantime, despite never having been informed, arrested or cautioned, Amber was added to the indictment by the CPS as a co-conspirator. Speaking at the conclusion of a 10-week trial at Liverpool Crown Court, the woman, who cannot be identified, said she was forced to have sex with up to five different men in a day, at least four times a week. That night it was Daisy who was arrested - and later convicted - of a public order offence. The woman now wants her story to be told to help people spot the signs of grooming, which she describes as "a common thing that not enough people know about". While this is true, Amber believes that she was used as a scapegoat. "We have got a number of girls in Rochdale that we believe are being abused and many of them will not talk to us and, even if they did, will not tell us about what is happening and certainly don't want to make a complaint because that means they go into the criminal justice system.". She walked out, refusing to go along with this decision, and was forbidden from speaking to Amber. The review recommended a "speedy resolution" to leadership failures. But not all. Furious, Maggie vowed never to be part of such an investigation in future. The patchy training of frontline staff was to blame for the way childrens social care responded to the victims, the Rochdale Borough Safeguarding Children Board (RBSCB) said in its review into child sexual exploitation after the trial. This eventually led to the successful prosecution of nine men for offences included rape, trafficking girls for sex and conspiracy to engage in sexual activity with a child. In relation to historical failures, he apologised to Daisy. Or by navigating to the user icon in the top right. It is worth remembering though that none of it would be happening without a frightened, angry girl who had been raped venting her rage in a takeaway in Heywood and then being courageous enough to speak about what had happened. [2] One gang member convicted of sex trafficking was a religious studies teacher at a mosque and a married father of five. But she changed her mind when Operation Span came knocking and she was given cast iron assurances the victims would be supported. And then, in July 2009, an experienced CPS lawyer ruled the victim was not credible and decided that the two men who raped her should be released without charge. 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