Shoebury Sex ring

[Magda Hassan]

EXCLUSIVE: Shoebury 'sex ring' paedophile had a history of abusing children

Thursday, 14 April 2016 By Charles Thomson in Crime
Brian Tanner, left, and Dennis King, right, outside Chelmsford Crown Court in April 1990. Picture: Anglia Press Agency. A MAN convicted of abusing boys as part of a Shoebury 'sex ring' in the late 1980s had several prior convictions, the Yellow Advertiser can reveal.
Dennis King, then aged 55 and living in Cunningham Close, Shoebury, received a four-year jail term in 1990 after admitting four counts of gross indecency and three counts of attempted buggery.
He was convicted with Brian Tanner, then 57 and living in Beedell Avenue, Westcliff, who got three years for three counts of gross indecency and three counts of attempted buggery.
Tanner has since died and King no longer lives in Essex.
Both men were jailed for their part in what Essex Council described in official papers as a 'sex ring' targeting 'adolescent boys'.
Essex Police last month announced a review of its investigation into the King and Tanner case, after three whistleblowers alleged a catalogue of failings.
A fourth whistleblower, tracked down by the YA, has now agreed to cooperate with the review.
The YA has now obtained court records showing King was jailed for seven years in 1966 for sexually abusing two boys he met in a public toilet on Southend seafront.
An appeal document states: "According to their evidence, they were hanging around a public lavatory on the front and they got into a conversation with the appellant, who asked them if they wanted to play about with him and offered them 10 shillings each.
"According to them, he took each one of them in turn into a cubicle inside the lavatory where certain of these offences were committed.
"According to them, an arrangement was then made for the appellant to meet them at the same place at about 10.30 that evening and go back to his flat.
"They did meet that evening. The appellant took them back to his flat. One of them slept on the floor and one of them in the bed with him, and it was there that the other offences were committed."
King denied the allegations but was convicted of two counts of attempting to procure acts of gross indecency, three counts of indecent assault and one count of attempted buggery.
The appeal record shows that before his 1966 trial, King already had several prior convictions for child sex offences.
The record states: "This appellant of 31 has already been sent to prison for six months for attempting to procure gross indecency with a youth of 15, and two offences were then taken into consideration, one of which was with a boy of nine.
"He has been fined for importuning immoral purposes and finally, in September 1964, he was given 12 months imprisonment for attempting to procure gross indecency."

Essex Police urged any victims or anybody with information to call them on 101.
Alternatively, call one of these specialist victims' helplines:
National Association for People Abused in Childhood 0808 801 0331
SERICC (south and west Essex) 01375 380609
CARA (mid and north Essex) 01206 667590
SoSRC (Southend) 01702 667590
National Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse 0808 800 5000.



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