Editor’s note: This article contains descriptions of sexual abuse that some readers might find disturbing.
An abuse survivor who was sexually assaulted by hundreds of Pakistani men from the age of 14 onwards recounted how British authorities blamed her for her own exploitation instead of arresting and prosecuting those who raped her.
The grooming gang survivor identified as “Jade” detailed her experiences alongside former detective constable-turned-whistleblower and advocate, Maggie Oliver, during a Sunday episode of the “Triggernometry” podcast hosted by Konstantin Kisin and Francis Foster.
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Oliver had resigned from the Greater Manchester Police in late 2012, citing the department’s mishandling of the Rochdale child sex abuse ring and prejudice toward victims like Jade.
Now in her 30s, Jade opened up about the abuse she endured at the hands of grooming gangs in the Buckinghamshire area, primarily by Pakistani men. The men would usually assault her at what they termed “house parties” after getting her drunk, according to Jade.
During the interview, Jade recounted how hundreds of men abused her after she left her mother’s home to live with her father, who was a drug addict. Jade initially wanted to live with her dad because her mother was in a relationship with a man she didn’t like.
When she was 14, Jade’s father took her along with him to a drug deal, and that’s where she met her abuser.
“And then it just went from there,” the survivor recounted. “He would pick me up; it’d be all fun and games at first. ‘I’ll buy cigarettes; I’ll take you to school, I’ll pick you up from school. I will buy you alcohol. So, let’s go to a house party.’”
At the time, Jade craved affection, especially after she stopped living with her father. Still only 14, she called social services and said she no longer wanted to live with her father and was subsequently placed into a “care home” in 2008.
Oliver explained that children living in a care home cannot be hugged or consoled when they’re crying or upset to ensure that the workers avoid any accusations of abuse.
Although she was in a care home, Jade continued to be abused by the men in the grooming gang who would threaten to kill her father if she didn’t provide them with sex.
During a house party in 2008, Jade and one of her friends were sexually assaulted. One of the predators bullied Jade’s friend into dropping the charges, according to the survivor. Jade’s charges were also dropped due to “insufficient evidence,” and the friend later went to jail for reportedly lying to the court about having been abused.
That same year that the assault occurred, a social worker took Jade to a McDonald’s and asked her if she was prostituting herself for drugs and alcohol. The social worker’s question, combined with the police’s skepticism, made Jade reluctant to seek help.
“When you go to the police and they don’t believe you, and then social services blame you for being a prostitute, you start believing that yourself,” she said. “So, even though you’re out there being abused and you know what you’re going through ain’t right, when nobody believes you, you don’t cry out for help that much anymore.”
“You just hold,” she said. “I’ve held it.”
For years, Jade has had to silently endure the trauma of the memory of several men taking turns assaulting her while she was intoxicated. She felt no one would believe her, so she decided not to tell anyone about the assault.
“There was a time I woke up in McDonald’s, not in my clothes, knickers inside out, upside down, and in my friend’s clothes,” Jade recalled. “I found my friend in a house in a bath wearing my clothes.”
The abuse victim has no idea how she ended up at McDonald’s and in someone else’s clothes.
“So, it makes you think, who dressed me? Who undressed me? That’s how drunk they get you,” Jade said.
When law enforcement did get involved, it wasn’t to charge the men who had abused Jade. At 16, Jade was charged with inciting sexual activity with four adult men after authorities found her at one of the grooming gang’s house parties.
Jade was sentenced to two years in prison. She was imprisoned for 14 months and placed on the sex offenders register. The abuse victim spent her 18th birthday in prison and missed her aunt’s funeral. Due to her classification as a sex offender, Jade cannot even go on school trips with her children.
“I lost a whole lot of my life,” she said, crying. “I lost my childhood, obviously, due to the abuse and then being in jail.”
Oliver, who founded the Maggie Oliver Foundation in 2019, a charity dedicated to helping survivors of sexual abuse find healing, explained that child rapists and predators target “vulnerable” people like Jade.
“You know, my journey of the past 20 years, I’ve lost count of the number of children like Jade who I have spoken to and that we in the foundation have tried to support,” Oliver said. “And what it shows is that this was not a mistake.”
“This is systemic neglect of vulnerable children who have nobody fighting their corner.”
Jade signed up for the foundation two years ago, where she participated in trauma-focused workshops and received emotional support through weekly phone calls. In addition to uplifting survivors like Jade, Oliver is working to ensure other victims don’t experience what she did.
Oliver also touched on the role that the abusers’ ethnic background appears to play in the reluctance of the government and authorities to address the problem of grooming gangs.
“When I first started speaking out, it’s true that the vast majority of the abusers in these gangs are Pakistani Muslim men,” the former detective said. “Those who are not are still Muslim, but they can be Afghanistani or Iranian or from Iraq.”
These abusers are considered to be part of an “underclass” within their own countries, according to Oliver, and these men feel as if they’re “entitled” to sexually assault children.
“So, we have to open up those conversations,” Oliver asserted. “But if people come to this country, the laws of this country are what we live by, and we cannot avoid the difficult conversations.”
Samantha Kamman is a reporter for The Christian Post. She can be reached at: samantha.kamman@christianpost.com. Follow her on Twitter: @Samantha_Kamman
