[size=8]Rotherham abuse scandal: Five jailed for systematic sexual exploitation [/size]

London: Five people have been jailed for multiple sex crimes against young girls in Rotherham, the northern English town that hit the headlines two years ago when it was revealed that [size=8]as many as 1400 children had been abused by gangs[/size].
The group, which included three British Asian brothers, their uncle and two white women, systematically carried out the sexual exploitation of 15 victims, aged between 11 and 21, over a period of 16 years from 1987, prosecutors said.
They groomed vulnerable girls and women for abuse, often subjecting them to degrading and violent acts.
"The impact of your offending upon the victims, their families and indeed the wider community has been devastating," judge Sarah Wright said during sentencing at Sheffield Crown Court.
"Their childhood and adolescence can never be reclaimed. Each has suffered immense psychological harm."
Brothers Basharat, Arshid and Bannaras Hussain were handed jail sentences of 25 years, 35 years and 19 years respectively. Their uncle Qurban Ali was jailed for 10 years.
Karen MacGregor, who offered young women accommodation at her home and then expected them to have sex with men, was jailed for 13 years.
A sixth defendant, Shelley Davies, will serve an 18-month suspended jail term.
In 2014, an inquiry revealed huge numbers of children, mainly girls in social care homes, had been abducted, raped and beaten by gangs of predominantly Asian men in Rotherham.
Police, social workers and council leaders were all severely criticised for failing to prevent the abuse and the inquiry said officials had not acted on evidence of abuse partly out of fear of being labelled racist.
Britain has been rocked by a series of child abuse scandals in recent years, although the Rotherham case was the most shocking.
It helped prompt the government to order a major inquiry into historical abuse cases and whether politicians or those in powerful public roles had failed to act against or deliberately covered up abuse.
Reuters


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[size=8]Rotherham child sexual exploitation scandal[/size]
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Rotherham child sexual exploitation scandal
Date   1997-2013
Location   Rotherham, South Yorkshire, England
Widespread organised child sexual abuse took place in Rotherham, South Yorkshire, England, between 1997 and 2013. Local investigations into the abuse began in 1999, although some reports were never finalised or made public by the authorities.[1] In 2010, five men of Pakistani heritage were found guilty of a series of sexual offences against girls as young as twelve.[2] [size=8]A subsequent investigation by The Times reported that the child sex exploitation was much more widespread, and the Home Affairs Select Committee criticised the South Yorkshire Police force and Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council for their handling of the abuse.[/size]

An independent inquiry into child sexual abuse in the town, led by Professor Alexis Jay, was established in 2013 for Rotherham Council.[3] The inquiry's initial report, published on 26 August 2014, condemned the failure of the authorities in Rotherham to act effectively against the abuse and even, in some cases, to acknowledge that it was taking place.[4][5][6] [size=8]It conservatively estimated that 1,400 children had been sexually abused in the town between 1997 and 2013, predominantly by gangs of British-Pakistani men[/size].[7] Abuses described by the report included abduction, rape, torture and sex trafficking of children.[6]

Members of the British-Pakistani community condemned both the sexual abuse and the fact that it had been [size=8]covered up for fear of "giving oxygen" to racism[/size].[8] The leader of Rotherham Borough Council, Roger Stone, resigned, as did the council's Chief Executive, Martin Kimber, and the director of children's services, Joyce Thacker. Shaun Wright, the Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC) for South Yorkshire who had been a Labour councillor in charge of child safety at the council, stood down on 16 September, after initially refusing demands that he should do so.[9] The Home Secretary, Theresa May, blamed the failure of the authorities in Rotherham on "institutionalised political correctness",[10] and Denis MacShane, the former MP for Rotherham during the period covered by the report, admitted that he had been "guilty of doing too little" to investigate the extent of the sex crimes being committed in his constituency.[11]

Independent inquiries were set up into the actions of both South Yorkshire Police and Rotherham Borough Council, to examine their roles in investigating the allegations and their procedures and practices.[12][13] Further allegations of a cover-up, including the theft of documents from a council researcher's office, were made in a Home Affairs Select Committee report in October 2014.[14] In February 2015, the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, Eric Pickles, announced that an independent report prepared by Louise Casey considered the council to be "not fit for purpose", and elected councillors would be replaced by a team of five commissioners, including one tasked specifically with looking at children's services.[15]