Vulnerable girls and teenagers, some not older than 13, became a victim of grooming (online predation), molestation and rape by groups of older men from a predominantly British-Pakistani background. Some became pregnant, others got addicted to the drugs they were given. After more than ten years, there is still no justice for many of these victims.
In Great Britain it is called the "grooming gang scandal" and it includes thousands of victims, according to some even tens of thousands. The scope keeps growing as more victims are reporting to the police and more evidence comes out that there were criminal grooming gangs active in multiple English cities.
Within in the realm of politics the scandal has been seized by the radical right wing, as legitimization for an anti-islam agenda. Tommy Robinson, a radical right wing activist with milions of subscribes, calles it a "muslim rape gang" and he uses the grooming scandal for his anti-immigration rethoric.
The American tech billionaire Elon musk also put the subject on the radar of the political right, with a series of tweets to his 200 million followers on X. According the Musk, the British authorities have turned a blind eye, including British prime minister Keir Starmer, formerly responsible for the public prosecutor's office.
Fiona Goddard from the north-English city Bradford was one of the victims. From when she was 13 she was molested and raped for five years by a group of predominantly Pakistani men, part of a criminal gang that also traded in weapons and drugs. "I was raped by between fifty and one-hundred men", she tells Nieuwsuur. "They came from across the country".
Goddard grew up in a troubled family and was taken to a shelter at a young age. Many of the victims had no stable household, they were in shelters and or had a mental disability. "It started with a single man", says Goddard. The "loverboy" pretended to be her boyfriend, gave her gifts, took her in and gave her alcohol and drugs. After that she was passed around from man to man and violently raped. "This went on for years."
From investigations and reports it turned that that child protective services, police and justice often did not intervene. "The victims were blamed", says solicitor Amy Clowrey. With her team she represents 200 victims. They were seen as "problem children" or as "child prostitutes". "On top of that there are cases which show that the British police were complicit in the abuse".
Ex-investigator Maggie Oliver, working in the Manchester region, was put on one of the first investigations into the gangs in 2004: Operation Augusta. She describes how she would ask victims on the streets point out where they were raped. She recorded the addresses and wrote down the names of the suspects. She identified almost one-hundred rapists with a Pakistani background that were operating in her region in a network.
But, after a few months, her research disappeared. "It was as if the investigation never existed. None of these child rapists were arrested. The entire police dossier was closed", she recounted.
Oliver offers two reasons. "The children were seen as the lowest class: problem children that chose this "lifestyle" for themselves. But a child that is 12 or 13 years old cannot consent to sex with a 60 year old man", says Oliver. "And the rapists were mostly Pakistani muslim men. People wanted to avoid multicultural tensions".
From another investigation a few years later in another north-English city, Rotherham, lead by professor Alexis Jay, it turned out that in a the period from 1997 to 2014 an estimated 1400 children were raped. The perpetrators: Mainly men with a British-pakistani background, but according to the rapport the ethnicity was insufficiently recorded by the authorities out of fear of being called racist.
In the meantime there have been countless local investigations in grooming gangs in various British cities. There have been a lot of apologies from police and youth care and promises made by politicians. Over a hundred perputrators have been found guilty in cities such as Rotherham, Bradford and Telford. According to Clowrey this is just the tip of the iceberg. "The vast majority of victims have not stepped forth. It is simply too traumatic".
A countrywide investigation into the scandal, announced by prime minister Starmer, has not started yet. There is disagreement regarding the terminology surrounding the perpetrators and the scale of the investigation. A number of victims that were willing to cooperate, have now declined, including Fiona Goddard: "I don't trust the police or authorities anymore. I feel abandoned by everyone."
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(this is a translated background article from foreign news)
In Great Britain it is called the "grooming gang scandal" and it includes thousands of victims, according to some even tens of thousands. The scope keeps growing as more victims are reporting to the police and more evidence comes out that there were criminal grooming gangs active in multiple English cities.
Within in the realm of politics the scandal has been seized by the radical right wing, as legitimization for an anti-islam agenda. Tommy Robinson, a radical right wing activist with milions of subscribes, calles it a "muslim rape gang" and he uses the grooming scandal for his anti-immigration rethoric.
The American tech billionaire Elon musk also put the subject on the radar of the political right, with a series of tweets to his 200 million followers on X. According the Musk, the British authorities have turned a blind eye, including British prime minister Keir Starmer, formerly responsible for the public prosecutor's office.
Fiona Goddard from the north-English city Bradford was one of the victims. From when she was 13 she was molested and raped for five years by a group of predominantly Pakistani men, part of a criminal gang that also traded in weapons and drugs. "I was raped by between fifty and one-hundred men", she tells Nieuwsuur. "They came from across the country".
Goddard grew up in a troubled family and was taken to a shelter at a young age. Many of the victims had no stable household, they were in shelters and or had a mental disability. "It started with a single man", says Goddard. The "loverboy" pretended to be her boyfriend, gave her gifts, took her in and gave her alcohol and drugs. After that she was passed around from man to man and violently raped. "This went on for years."
From investigations and reports it turned that that child protective services, police and justice often did not intervene. "The victims were blamed", says solicitor Amy Clowrey. With her team she represents 200 victims. They were seen as "problem children" or as "child prostitutes". "On top of that there are cases which show that the British police were complicit in the abuse".
Ex-investigator Maggie Oliver, working in the Manchester region, was put on one of the first investigations into the gangs in 2004: Operation Augusta. She describes how she would ask victims on the streets point out where they were raped. She recorded the addresses and wrote down the names of the suspects. She identified almost one-hundred rapists with a Pakistani background that were operating in her region in a network.
But, after a few months, her research disappeared. "It was as if the investigation never existed. None of these child rapists were arrested. The entire police dossier was closed", she recounted.
Oliver offers two reasons. "The children were seen as the lowest class: problem children that chose this "lifestyle" for themselves. But a child that is 12 or 13 years old cannot consent to sex with a 60 year old man", says Oliver. "And the rapists were mostly Pakistani muslim men. People wanted to avoid multicultural tensions".
From another investigation a few years later in another north-English city, Rotherham, lead by professor Alexis Jay, it turned out that in a the period from 1997 to 2014 an estimated 1400 children were raped. The perpetrators: Mainly men with a British-pakistani background, but according to the rapport the ethnicity was insufficiently recorded by the authorities out of fear of being called racist.
In the meantime there have been countless local investigations in grooming gangs in various British cities. There have been a lot of apologies from police and youth care and promises made by politicians. Over a hundred perputrators have been found guilty in cities such as Rotherham, Bradford and Telford. According to Clowrey this is just the tip of the iceberg. "The vast majority of victims have not stepped forth. It is simply too traumatic".
A countrywide investigation into the scandal, announced by prime minister Starmer, has not started yet. There is disagreement regarding the terminology surrounding the perpetrators and the scale of the investigation. A number of victims that were willing to cooperate, have now declined, including Fiona Goddard: "I don't trust the police or authorities anymore. I feel abandoned by everyone."
article link
archive
(this is a translated background article from foreign news)
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