Tag: child sexual abuse

SCOTLAND – EDINBURGH

SCOTLAND

EDINBURGH

The Daily Record, 28 July 1995

Man denies attack

A former care worker yesterday denied sex attacks on young girls.

John Wood, 48, preyed on two girls who had already been victims of abuse in the past, it was claimed.

The girls involved in the charges were 12 and 13 at the time of the alleged offences.

But at Edinburgh Sheriff Court yesterday, Wood, who previously worked in a childrens’ home, told a jury: “I never touched those lassies.” He denies two charges of lewd, indecent and libidinous behaviour.

The girls, now 13 and 14, rejected suggestions from Wood’s advocate, Joyce Powrie, that they were telling “a pack of lies”.

Wood, of 12/6 Wester Hailes Park, Edinburgh, and his wife Morag, have three children.

He told the jury they had been foster parents for five to six years and had cared for 75-80 children.

The trial continues.

KENT – MEADOWS SCHOOL

KENT

MEADOWS SCHOOL

Daily Mirror, 6th May 1994

Child abuser jailed

A social worker at a Barnardo’s childrens home who sexually abused boys in his care was jailed for eight years yesterday.

Ivor Crowhurst, 48, of Battle, East Sussex, admitted abusing emotionally disturbed boys in his care while he was a residential care worker at the Meadows School in Southborough in the 1980s.

NORTH WALES – BRYN ESTYN

NORTH WALES

BRYN ESTYN

STEPHEN RODERICK NORRIS

The Independent, 12th November 1993

Man jailed for sex attacks on boys

A FORMER social worker who sexually assaulted a string of boys while they were in council care was jailed for seven years yesterday at Knutsford Crown Court, Cheshire.

Sentencing Stephen Roderick Norris, 57, Judge Gareth Edwards told him: ‘In your life you have done an indescribable amount of evil and no excuse is adequate and no penalty commensurate with the harm done to your victims. Indeed, you may have left behind you, after your life is over, a foul legacy that will live on for generations.’

Judge Edwards said there could be no criticism of the authorities for employing him; someone with his predelictions would always slip through the net. ‘What I find disturbing is how you were able to get away with it for so long and were advanced to positions of seniority which put them in your power.’

The offences were committed against boys aged between 10 and 14, a decade ago, when he was senior house master at Bryn Estyn Childrens Home, in Wrexham, Clwyd, which closed in 1984. They came to light during an internal investigation by Clwyd County Council after Norris had been sentenced to three- and-a-half years in prison, in June 1990, for similar offences against boys in Cartrefle Children’s Home, at Broughton, where he was house master. He was released from prison in January.

The court was told Norris assaulted the boys in the children’s home, at his family home at Afonwen, near Mold, in a staff flat and a friend’s house. Often he took the boys to the Sportsman’s Arms, Afonwen, where he bought them beer or shandy. Other boys were rewarded with tobacco and extra privileges, such as being given their own room where some of the offences were later committed.

Norris pleaded guilty to four specimen charges of buggery and three indecent assaults.

Maurice Kay QC, for the defence, said Norris had lost everything including his home, and his marriage had broken down.

Three other cases are pending as the result of a police investigation following the internal inquiry by Clwyd council.

John Jevons, the council’s director of social services since 1991, said after the case that procedures to recruit staff, and to detect abuse, had been improved.

IRELAND: KINCORA

IRELAND

KINCORA BOYS HOME

POLITICS

Northern Ireland Office Meeting, 19th March 1982

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Cabinet Office Meeting, 10th November 1983

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Prime Minister’s Questions, 12th January 1988

Mr. Livingstone

Will the Prime Minister take time in what remains of today to consider whether her Ministers may have inadvertently misled Parliament in 1982 when they reported to the House that the inquiry by Sir George Terry in relation to the Kincora boys’ home would be fair and impartial? In order to do so, will she ask to see the confidential Sussex police files concerning investigated allegations linking Anthony Blunt with several promiment figures in Northern Ireland, who escaped prosecution for their crimes because, had a prosecution been brought, it would have revealed the immunity granted to Anthony Blunt? Were her Ministers aware when they appointed Sir George Terry, who was chief constable of Sussex, that his officers had been involved in this cover-up?

The Prime Minister

Prosecution is not a matter for me. It is a matter for the prosecuting authorities. If the hon. Gentleman has any new evidence, he should present it to them.

Prime Minister’s Questions, 8th March 1988

Mr. Livingstone

Will the Prime Minister take time in her busy day to reconsider the statement that she made to the House last year about Sir Maurice Oldfield? Will she consider the inconsistency of the withdrawal of his positive vetting while no action was taken against Mr. Peter England, a deputy secretary in the Northern Ireland Office, and Mr. J. L. Imrie, an assistant secretary at the Northern Ireland Office, following investigations into the buggery of young children at the Kincora boys’ home? Is she not disturbed that Mr. Imrie has taken no action against the newspaper that named him and his activities four weeks ago, although he continues to work for the Government in the Ministry of Defence? Can she assure the House that she is convinced of Mr. Imrie ‘s innocence? [column 188]

If not, will she now finally concede a genuinely independent inquiry into what went on in the homes in Kincora, irrespective of the damage that that may do to MI5 when its role is exposed?

The Prime Minister

I have nothing further to add to the statement that I made on Sir Maurice Oldfield in the House. I note that the hon. Gentleman uses the privileges of the House to name people who are unable to answer back.

Prime Minister’s Questions, 1st February 1990

Mr. Kinnock

The Prime Minister has made it clear this week that she was given seriously inaccurate information about the case of Mr. Colin Wallace and that that incorrect information caused her to mislead the House. Will she therefore, as head of the Security Services, make a full statement to the House? Will she also commission a form of inquiry that has the power to ensure that the full truth is told about the alleged efforts to discredit public figures and Members of Parliament of several parties, including her party, and to subvert elected Governments?

The Prime Minister

First, my statement to the House on 6 May 1987 stands. It is not affected by the new information. Secondly, Mr. Wallace was a civil servant employed by the Ministry of Defence at the Army headquarters in Northern Ireland as an information officer. It seems right, therefore, that a statement was made by Archibald Hamilton, Minister at the Ministry of Defence on Tuesday and will be made by my right hon. Friend Tom King the Secretary of State for Defence today. The statement made by my hon. Friend the Minister of State for the Armed Forces indicated that there is an inquiry into Mr. Wallace ‘s case before the Civil Service appeal board, to be conducted by Mr. Calcutt QC and there is also an inquiry in the Ministry of Defence on how certain documents came to be overlooked.

Mr. Kinnock

I am sorry, but that answer does not begin to address the very basic questions. I put it to the Prime Minister that the information which, in her words, has “now come to light” somewhat offsets the credibility of her statement in May 1987 that there was “no evidence” of misuse of information by any members of the security services. Surely, that fact alone justifies a full inquiry.

As the Wallace case raises serious issues of civil liberties and serious allegations of efforts to discredit Members of Parliament and to undermine elected Governments, it would be intolerable if the Prime Minister proposed to do absolutely nothing other than to hide behind anonymous civil servants.

The Prime Minister

I do not think that the right hon. Gentleman’s assertions are correct. In so far as new information came forth, and in so far as that has affected earlier statements, the details were given by my hon. Friend Archibald Hamilton the Minister of State for the Armed Forces and set out in very considerable detail in his statement to the House. My own statement on 6 May 1987 was not affected by the new information and the new information provides no evidence of attempts to undermine or discredit Ministers. This is a matter of the presentation of Mr. Wallace ‘s case to the Civil Service appeal board. That has been put correct. In so far as the new information affected anything that Ministers have said during this Administration, we came straight to the House, a statement was made and letters were written to people who might otherwise have had incorrect information. The[column 431] statement was, in accordance with tradition, shown to the former Ministers with responsibility for defence and for Northern Ireland in the previous Labour Administration and their comments were invited.

Mr. Kinnock

Is not the Prime Minister aware that throughout the House and among wider interested parties, there is a strong opinion that neither the Calcutt inquiry, for all its worth, nor the internal inquiry by the Ministry of Defence is broad enough or open enough to satisfy the public interest? Can she explain how she made a statement in May 1987, based honestly on the evidence that then existed, and how, by her own reckoning, new evidence, new details and new facts have “now come to light” ? How can she claim, in the light of all those circumstances, that her statement then still stands and should not be liable to any form of reconsideration or revision?

The Prime Minister

Because, for the third time of asking, the new information does not provide any evidence to undermine my statement to the House on 6 May 1987. It is of a much narrower kind than that, as was set out by my hon. Friend Archibald Hamilton the Minister of State for the Armed Forces in his very detailed statement, which I commend to the right hon. Gentleman for detailed reading.

Mr. Heseltine

Will my right hon. Friend recognise the seriousness of the description of the Leader of the Opposition about the events that are alleged to have taken place? Which Government were in power when those events took place?

The Prime Minister

The documents that have been mentioned refer to events in 1974–75, a very long time ago, which is why the statement made by my hon. Friend the Minister of State for the Armed Forces was, of course, shown to the right hon. Member for Morley and Leeds, South (Mr. Rees), and to Lord Mason, Lord Carrington and Lord Whitelaw. Comments were invited. These are matters which occurred in 1975 or earlier.

Mr. Rees

The fact that Lord Carrington and Lord Whitelaw were brought into the consultations—and most of the documents—proves that what happened against many of us took place in 1971, 1972 and 1973. It is no good saying that it was just under a Labour Government. The right hon. Lady was a loyal member of the Cabinet at that time. Surely it is not just a matter of a Labour Government. It went on under both Governments. Indeed, there is evidence that the Prime Minister of the day was maligned as well. Surely what the right hon. Lady said about the dirty tricks of Wright cannot possibly cover what has now been revealed.

The Prime Minister

Once again I refer the right hon. Gentleman to the statement which he saw and which was made in very full detail. These events took place about 15 years ago. There is nothing in the new information which was the cause of the statement to the House which casts doubt on my own statement of 6 May 1987, which was about very much wider matters