The Power of the Paedos - another high profile case hits the 'never happened' wall?

[Jan Klimkowski]

Before it all disappears:

Birmingham council illegally sent children into care in Jersey, MP
report reveals
By EILEEN FAIRWEATHER
4th August 2008
MP John Hemming

At least five children were illegally placed in care on Jersey by
Birmingham social services, which then lost track of them.

Four of the youngsters - who are now adults - are still on the island
and have been traced by local police. But the whereabouts of the
fifth, a male born in the Fifties, remains unknown.

The revelation comes amid continuing police investigations into 100
charred bone fragments and 65 milk teeth found at Jersey's now
notorious Haut de la Garenne former children's home.

Liberal Democrat MP John Hemming, who discovered that his local city
council had sent children to Jersey, believes other children from the
UK 'were also placed in care there'.

The MP for Birmingham Yardley added: 'The Government has refused to
order councils to check properly because it does not want to open a
can of worms, on the links between abusers in England and Jersey.'

The Mail on Sunday has also learned that children from UK local
authorities, which have also been the subject of abuse allegations,
were taken on holiday to Haut de la Garenne, where the bone fragments
are said to belong to five children whom detectives believe were
killed.

The inquiry suffered a setback last week when forensic experts
revealed that the age of the remains cannot be dated, meaning a
murder inquiry is unlikely. But nearly 100 former care residents have
alleged gross physical and sexual abuse.

Birmingham council only discovered it had placed five children in
foster care on Jersey because, at Mr Hemming's request, it checked
old accounts. It found it made payments to Jersey for child care between
1960 and 1990. Yet a social work file survived on only one child.

Mr Hemming praised the council for 'doing what every council should
do now'. He added: 'It is not responsible for what happened under
earlier administrations, and I can't believe it was the only British
authority which used Jersey. The system nationally is not properly accountable.
Children are taken into care never to be seen again.'

Schools Minister Kevin Brennan has told the Commons that checks are
unnecessary because children from the UK cannot be placed in care in
Jersey without a court order. Yet the five Birmingham children were
sent to Jersey without such orders.

Although he has no information suggesting any crime took place, Mr
Hemming is concerned that the fifth man's history and whereabouts
remain unknown. 'How many other councils dumped kids there and forgot
about them?' he said.

Birmingham City Council said: 'We will co-operate fully if needed by
the Jersey authorities to investigate the whereabouts of adults from
any placements made historically by Birmingham City Council.'

Mr Hemming has asked English councils to check their records under
the Freedom of Information Act. He said: 'Most seem only to have done
cursory checks, just checking recent electronic files, or asking
around the office.'

Responses obtained by The Mail on Sunday confirm this. A handful of
councils refused to check at all.

They included Islington in North London, whose 12 children's homes
were infamously infiltrated between the Seventies and Nineties by a
child sex and pornography network, while Margaret Hodge was council
leader.

Key staff, The Mail on Sunday recently revealed, were from Jersey or
had strong Channel Islands connections. The council told Mr Hemming
that checking its records would cost too much.

Liz Davies, the former Islington senior social worker who bravely
blew the whistle on the scandal, said last night: 'It is becoming clear
that children at Haut de la Garenne were sent on holiday to
children's homes in England which were also notorious for abuse, while the
children in the English homes they went to were sent to Haut de la
Garenne. They literally swapped beds.'

She did not feel able yet to reveal which authorities were involved.

'But I am perturbed that police in Britain have not written to all
local authorities on the mainland to demand they check which children
they sent to Jersey,' she added.

'During the North Wales abuse scandal in the Nineties, when I was a
child protection manager in London, police asked all councils to
check had we sent any of our children to its care homes. Many had, then
just forgotten about them.

'Children in care are often shipped about, and paedophiles love
placing them far from home.'

Mr Hemming is furious the Government has refused to respond to the
call for councils to check records until after the summer break.

He said: 'They are stalling because they are embarrassed by the size
of the problem, and because it involves English authorities, too.'

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2008/aug/01...nd.ukcrime

Jersey abuse inquiry: Remains of five children found, police reveal -
but murder charges unlikely· Officers told of some victims dragged
from beds

· Investigation hampered by inability to date bones
Ian Cobain The Guardian, Friday August 1 2008
Article history

A forensics services manager at a second world war bunker near Haut de
la Garenne on Jersey. Photograph: Matthew Hotton/PA

The Jersey care home investigation into child abuse reached a pivotal
moment yesterday when police disclosed they had found the remains of
up to five children after a painstaking dig at the Haut de la Garenne
institution.

As officers revealed that 65 teeth and bone fragments came from
victims aged between four and 11, it emerged that police had first
begun to fear children had been murdered when people who had been
abused at the home told of other residents being dragged away at night
and never seen again.

"Among the victims were a few who said that children had been dragged
from their beds at night screaming and had then disappeared,"
according to a police summary of the investigation. "Two others said
they had knowledge of human remains at the location but were not
specific. A local advocate also came to police and said he had a
client who knew there were human remains buried at the home."

The summary says that burnt clothing, toys and bed sheets have also
been recovered. According to pathologists, most of the 65 teeth found
in the cellars beneath Haut de la Garenne were not milk teeth, but had
come from corpses of up to five children. Police searchers also found
bone from a child's ear and a child's tibia.

Both pieces had been cut and burned before being concealed; they had
then been moved, at a date no later than the early 1970s.

Lenny Harper, Jersey's deputy police chief, concedes it is unlikely
that a formal murder investigation will be opened in parallel with the
child sex abuse inquiry running for the past 28 months.

Not only have police been unable to identify any named child from the
remains, but extensive carbon dating has failed to pinpoint their age.
First tests gave a bracket for some of the bone fragments as broad as
1650 to 1950.

However, the pathologists' opinion that the teeth were not from living
children, combined with cuts and scorch marks on the bones, the
attempt to conceal them, and the subsequent move, all lead detectives
to conclude that several children may have been murdered at Haut de la
Garenne.

Harper will not completely rule out a murder investigation, however.
"If the dating remains as inconclusive as what we have had so far, a
homicide inquiry is unlikely," he said yesterday. "If the dating is
more specific, a homicide inquiry is a possibility.

"We cannot get away from the fact that we have found the remains of at
least five children there."

Yesterday's announcement is thought to intend to silence critics,
among the island's political elite and among some London-based
journalists, who have questioned the failure of the police to produce
any bodies. Harper indicated several months ago that he was convinced
children's remains had been concealed at the home.

It is thought the announcement was also intended to ease any local
political pressure on the man who takes over the investigation next
month. Harper retires at the end of this month and is to be replaced
by David Warcup, currently deputy chief constable of Northumbria.

Haut de la Garenne ceased to house a children's home in 1986 and was a
youth hostel when the historic child sex abuse investigation began in
April 2006, initially as an inquiry into the island's sea cadets.

According to the case summary: "The attitude of the Sea Cadet
authorities of that time caused great concern. Accordingly, police
began to examine a number of previous cases, and during this review
were continually referred to abuse which had allegedly taken place at
Haut de La Garenne."

Police at first concealed the inquiry, for fear suspects might
intimidate witnesses or destroy evidence, and went public last
November. Scores of people came forward claiming to have been raped
and beaten at the home, leading police to excavate four cellars,
referred to as "punishment rooms" by some victims, where they found a
large bloodstained bath as well as the teeth and bones.

While nobody may be charged in connection with the deaths, police are
looking into 97 allegations of abuse in Jersey dating back to the
early 1960s. They have more than 100 suspects, and have indicated that
some could be described as members of the island's political and
social elite.

Six people have been arrested; three, including a former warden at
Haut de la Garenne, have been charged with child abuse offences and
have appeared in court. Three others have been released on bail
pending further inquiries.

Harper said yesterday that a new victim had come forward in recent
days to make allegations against one of the 18 priority suspects.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2008/feb/26...rotection1

Jersey care homes 'covered up abuses'Haroon Siddique and agencies
guardian.co.uk, Tuesday February 26 2008
Article history

Former Jersey health minister Stuart Syvret. Photograph: Christian
Keenan/Getty Images

A former government minister, who last year raised concerns about the
treatment of children in Jersey's care homes, today claimed there was
a "disgraceful and disgusting failure" to deal with abuse on the
island.

Stuart Syvret, health and social services minister until last
September, described the continuing search for six more bodies at the
Haut de la Garenne care home, where a child's remains were found on
Saturday, as the latest example of "a culture of cover-up and
concealment".

His comments came as it emerged that Edward Paisnel, a notorious
paedophile dubbed the Beast of Jersey, used to visit Haut de la
Garenne dressed as Father Christmas.

Paisnel was jailed for 30 years in 1971 after being convicted of 13
counts of assault, rape and sodomy.

Syvret claimed he was "sacked for whistleblowing" when he was
dismissed as health and social services minister shortly after
highlighting the "torture" of 11 to 16-year-olds in the island's care
homes.

Brandishing an independent report into abuse at a boys' school on the
island, Syvret claimed it detailed a "disgraceful and disgusting
failure" to deal with abuse which was "carried for years".

He said one paedophile had been convicted in relation to abuse at the
school but that there was a deliberate attempt by certain members of
staff and governors to "humiliate and intimidate and force those boys
[who had made allegations] into withdrawing their complaints -
fortunately they didn't".

Earlier, he told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "People mustn't
necessarily - as bad as it is - be distracted by the Haut de la
Garenne story because the real issue here is we are looking at
multiple examples of abuse at multiple institutions over a period of
decades and decades.

"It's a continuum that we see. It's a culture of cover-up and
concealment and tragically the recent evidence is just the latest
manifestation of that."

Jersey's chief minister, Frank Walker, who has denied allegations of a
cover-up, is to make a statement to the island's parliament today and
will face questions about the investigation.

The education minister, Mike Vibert, said he had reviewed the case at
the school identified by Syvret and the abuse "was taken seriously".

"The man responsible was successfully prosecuted and subsequently
imprisoned," he said.

Vibert said an independent report was commissioned after the court
case that "made a number of recommendations and all have since been
implemented".

He said the report had not been published because it could lead to the
identification of the children involved.

A sniffer dog has identified six possible burial sites in and around
the Haut de la Garenne building, which closed as a care home in 1986.

Deputy police chief Lenny Harper said yesterday the cellar was a
"point of interest", but it had been blocked up and officers have been
trying to smash their way in.

They suspended the search this afternoon to seek advice from a
structural engineer on "gaining access to a section of the home".

Paisnel lived in St Martin, close to Haut de la Garenne. After his
trial, his wife, Joan, wrote a book claiming Paisnel used to visit the
care home to take gifts to the children, who he asked to call him
"Uncle Ted".

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2008/feb/29...protection

Police discover shackles in Jersey abuse case home· Sources say find
tallies with victims' accounts
· Second underground 'punishment room' sought
Helen Pidd in Jersey The Guardian, Friday February 29 2008
Article history
Shackles were found yesterday in one of the underground chambers found
hidden under two concrete floors at the Jersey care home where a skull
was found on Saturday.

Police sources said the find was significant, and that it matched
accounts given by many of the victims, who said they had been sexually
and physically abused while in solitary confinement in "punishment
rooms" underneath Haut de la Garenne home.

A bath has already been found in the room, which was also mentioned by
many of the 160-plus victims who have reported abuse to the
authorities. Police believe there is a second, adjoining, underground
room that they have yet to break into.

"They are items that witnesses have said were in there when offences
were committed against them," said Lenny Harper, the officer in charge
of the case. "They certainly help corroborate accounts given by
victims."

A search dog trained to find human remains started barking when it
entered the room earlier this week. The dog's "extremely strong
reaction" was the same as when it helped find a child's remains buried
under inches of concrete at the house last weekend.

Harper said the room had unrendered walls and would take weeks to
search because of the amount of dust and rubble that would need to be
carefully moved and sifted through.

Police yesterday also began excavating a third site in a field to the
right of Haut de la Garenne. Harper said the dig began because of
"unspecific information which related to items that somebody has said
might be out there".

When asked if that meant more remains, he said yes. The area measured
approximately 15-20 yards by 10 yards, he said. The sniffer dog which
led police to the skull over the weekend had shown a strong reaction
when led to the area.

It also emerged yesterday that a number of employees of the States of
Jersey parliament had worked at Haut de la Garenne.

One was named by the States press office yesterday as Mario Lundy, the
current director of education on the island. There is no suggestion
that he is among the 40 suspects in the abuse inquiry.

The island's chief minister, Senator Frank Walker, said yesterday:
"There are no States of Jersey employees that have been subject to any
police investigation. Had there been anything significant that they
were involved in, anything the police found suspicious, that would not
be the case."

He added: "You should not conclude that [the States employees who
worked at Haut de la Garenne] were involved in any sort of abuse."

At a press conference yesterday Walker rejected the suggestion that
the States of Jersey owed an apology to the victims of child abuse on
the island.

It has emerged that bones found in the building when it was being
converted into a youth hostel five years ago were not all classified
as animal bones.

"There were some that were unidentified by the pathologist that
examined them," said Harper. None of the bones can currently be
located.

Detectives launched an inquiry into Haut de la Garenne after
accusations of violent and sexual abuse dating back to the 1960s.

The main focus of the investigation centres on allegations about
events in the 1970s and 1980s.

Since the discovery of a skull on Saturday officers have not ruled out
finding more bodies.

Harper said he was confident there would be arrests and prosecutions
in due course.

He did not believe the abuse at the home was carried out by an
organised "ring".

He said: "The abuse was spread over so many years and there are a
succession of people coming through there in positions of
responsibility ... but it was not a totally organised ring as the
years went on."

http://groups.google.com/group/alt.suppo...e4bb97b69b