According to five women who were assaulted by grooming gangs consisting of primarily Pakistani Muslim males, police officers also violated them during their childhood, in Rotherham of United Kingdom. Notably, one victim reported that two South Yorkshire Police (SYP) officers abused her and named PC Hassan Ali as one of them, reported BBC.
Ali passed away after being struck by an automobile in January 2015. Due to an inquiry into his suspected role in the abuse scandal, he was placed on restricted duty on the day of the crash. He was never taken into custody. Additionally, both policemen supplied narcotics, based on the victim’s statement.
According to a SYP, the police had received complaints against Hassan Ali that were about “allegations of persistently asking a victim on a date, sharing information, and failure to safeguard victims” rather than drug-related offences.
Garry Harper worked for two years on “Operation Linden” for the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC), which examined how SYP handled reports of child sexual abuse in Rotherham from 1997 to 2013. “There were several complaints that he had supplied and taken drugs, as well as sexually abused some of the survivors,” he noted.
He added that SYP had permitted the other cop to retire at the time, despite the fact that the IOPC and SYP were aware of his actions. “At best it was a reputational covering exercise. That’s me being incredibly generous to them. At worst, it was out and out corruption to let him go,” Harper stated.
Grave allegations, no accountability
According to the witnesses, they were exploited and even physically assaulted by active police officers for years between the mid-1990s and the beginning of the 2000s alongside the Rotherham grooming gangs. Majority of them were teenagers but some were as little as eleven.
One woman voiced that a youth worker called social services and the police after she was forced into an illegal abortion by the grooming ring after she was repeatedly raped by hundreds of men as well as two cops for many years when she was only 11.
Later, she was interviewed by one of the officers who had been sexualy assaulting her. She added that no further action was taken as the same officer tore up her statement in front of her a few days later and tossed it in the trash.
Another stated that a SYP officer in a marked police vehicle sexually assaulted her when she was 12 years old. She highlighted that if she failed to comply he would threaten to return her to the rapists.
Only 17 of the 30 women who provided statements consented to the police utilising their testimony. Some of the last witnesses have pulled out of the SYP probe, declaring they no longer believe in the police or the legal system.
Another woman who was in foster care in the late 1990s and frequently escaped from children’s homes recounted that a police officer would rape her in a squat after discovering her. He preyed on the children in care and took advantage of their fear because he knew they were vulnerable.
“He knew we wouldn’t be missed, he knew we wouldn’t be reported. He knew we wouldn’t be able to say anything. He knew that he had the upper hand,” she expressed. Garry Harper acuused that SYP “managed to evade almost any accountability,” calling the eight-year probe “an abject failure from beginning to end.”
43 allegations against specific officers were upheld by the watchdog. Eight of them were charged with misconduct and six with gross misconduct. However, no officers were charged with a crime or lost their employment.
An IOPC representative disclosed that 91 investigations were part of the operation. “We concluded in 2022 that SYP fundamentally failed in its duty to protect vulnerable children and young people during that time.”
Due to suspicion of prior sexual offences such as attempted rape, indecent assault and misconduct in a public office, three former cops have been arrested since December 2024. The offences occurred between 1995 and 2004 while the officers were on duty as police constables (PCs) but they are not charged.
A new criminal inquiry into the participation of police personnel in the Rotherham grooming crisis is now being launched by SYP’s major crime section, under the purview of the police watchdog.
In 2014, Professor Alexis Jay’s investigation showed that between 1997 and 2013, at least 1,400 children in Rotherham suffered abuse by men. “From the evidence we read and heard, the majority of victims identified their perpetrators as being of Pakistani heritage,” she mentioned.
The United Kingdom has been rocked by several cases of Pakistani grooming gangs that targeted young British girls, even those who were underage, inflicting physical abuse, rape and torture for decades. The government, authorities and media have also been accused of attempting to underplay the severity of these offenses to avoid being branded as racists.