Child sex survey finds 26% of abusers Asian, but warns data ‘poor quality’

Ceop director warns against jumping to wrong conclusions as findings did not support claims of Asian grooming gangs The first attempt at a nationwide assessment of patterns of child sexual exploitation reveals that 26% of those who engage in on-street grooming of young girls are Asian. But Peter Davies, the director of the Child Exploitation and Online Protection centre (Ceop), which carried out the research warned against jumping to any conclusions from the findings on the ethnicity of offenders because the data gathered by his investigators was incomplete, not nationwide and of poor quality. “I would send a note of caution about trying to extrapolate anything from this. Looking at this issue through the lens of ethnicity does not do the victims any favours,” he said. The figures (pdf) which published on Wednesday, afer a six-month thematic assessment involving talking to police, social services and charities revealed that of the 2,379 offenders identified by the research ethnicity had not been recorded in 32% of cases. Thhe data also showed 38% of offenders were white and a small number were black or Chinese. The Ceop assessment was commissioned after national debate over what some people had identified as a pattern of Asian men operating in gangs to groom young white girls and sexually abuse them. Davies said the findings did not support this suggestion. Davies initiated the assessment to identify any patterns of offending and victimisation to improve responses. What has emerged is that not enough is being done by the police, by social services and particularly by local children’s safeguarding boards to identify and investigate child sexual exploitation which goes on in local areas. “The key message for me is that this is a horrific crime and involves the systematic, premeditated rape of children. It needs to be understood, it needs to be brought out of the dark. There should be no hiding place anywhere for people Davies said he was “surprised and disappointed” that two thirds of local safeguarding children’s boards were failing to do their statutory duty on child sexual exploitation. He said they were required to assume that child sexual exploitation was going on in their area unless there was clear evidence otherwise. Only one third of LCSB was doing this.who take part in this kind of crime,” he said. Key findings of the research were that: • most local children’s safeguarding boards are failing to fulfil their statutory responsibility to identify child sexual exploitation and protect children, • the size and scale of the crime is not known • police forces across the country need to go out and look for the crime • there are strong links between runaway children and victims of child sexual exploitation • the Crown Prosecution Service should carry out a review of all prosecutions in the area to identify barriers to bringing perpetrators to justice and • more research was needed to provide a more comprehensive picture From the data, Ceop was able to say 2,379 offenders were identified between March 2008 and January 2011. There were 2,083 victims, 90% of whom were white girls, with strong links between children going missing from homes and the care system and becoming victims. Offenders were predominantly males aged between 18 – 24 who acted alone or in groups. Investigators from Ceop spent six months gathering intelligence and data from police forces across the country, social services, health authorities and charities working with victims in an attempt to quantify the scale of the problem. Enver Solomon, head of policy at the Children’s Society, which provided evidence to CEOP, said if patterns of perpetrators had emerged there needed to be further research but he warned against jumping to any conclusions. “This (ethnicity of perpetrators) is obviously disproportionate to the population, but the problem here is that the data is incomplete and poorly recorded so there are questions about the validity and accuracy of the data. “We need to be cautious about drawing conclusions but if patterns are beginning to be identified we need to begin to understand them more, with more research so we can draw evidence based conclusions rather than jump to any assumptions.” Solomon said the figures in the report represented “a scratching at the surface” of what was the hidden problem of vulnerable children being targeted, groomed, internally trafficked and subjected to extreme forms of sexual abuse and violence on British streets. The report identifies a strong link between children who run away, both from the family home and the care system, and those who are victims of men who target them on the streets, outside local takeaways, and at obvious local gathering points for young people, in order to groom and abuse them. The Ceop report Out of Mind, Out of Sight found that in 1,087 cases agencies have failed to identify the background of the child victim. And in many cases no one bothered to record even the gender of the victims. Last year alone, charities across the sector dealt with 2,900 children who had been sexually exploited, according to figures released a fortnight ago by Barnadoes. In 2010 alone, Barnadoes worked with 1,098 children who had been sexually exploited; a 4% increase on the year before. The new head of Ceop commissioned the assessment after a string of cases in the north of England which appeared to suggest a pattern of Asian men as perpetrators of on street grooming of white girls. After the jailing in January of two ring leaders of a group of Asian men to eight years in prison Ceop announced it was carrying out a review. Mohammed Liaqat, 28 and Abid Saddique, 27, were jailed for raping and sexually abusing young girls from the Derby area who were aged between 12 and 18. The case led to claims that a pattern had emerged in which Asian men appeared to be disproportionately the perpetrators of child sexual exploitation and their victims were white girls. In response, Davies said he needed to examine whether any patterns of offending, victimisation and vulnerability could be identified. Child protection Children Human trafficking Prostitution Crime Sandra Laville guardian.co.uk

Posted by on June 29, 2011. Filed under News, Politics, World News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.