by Sarah Colley
Sarah recently completed her PhD at the University of Hull. Her thesis examined the investigation and representation of multi-perpetrator child sexual exploitation (CSE) in England and Wales from a policing perspective. She has worked with young people for many years, including victim-survivors of CSE, and continues to volunteer for a national children’s charity delivering safeguarding workshops in schools. She is now working as a Research Fellow at the Policing Institute for the Eastern Region at Anglia Ruskin University.
I’ve been angry for 9 years.
I started my PhD research on multi-perpetrator child sexual exploitation (CSE) already shocked and saddened at what CSE victim-survivors had to endure having worked in this field for a national children’s charity. I now find myself furious at our criminal justice system, which retraumatises children who have already been through the worst of nightmarish experiences.
My research looked at the challenges of investigating multi-perpetrator CSE cases. Some of the issues which my police participants raised, ranged from issues such as lack of support, knowledge and skills within the police, the problematic relationships some officers were experiencing with CPS, which they believe had hindered investigations (it must be said that others reported great relationships) to the difficulty of managing so many digital devices in some cases featuring a large number of offenders and victims.
However, what I did not imagine that I was going to be writing about were issues in the criminal justice system which my police participants told me that for some of the children was almost as bad as the abuse they endured. One of the officers I interviewed described our criminal justice system as “almost medieval.” Another commented that “the judicial system’s not set up to protect our young people.” As one of the world’s richest countries in the 21st century, we are letting our children down and we are allowing perpetrators to remain at large to offend again.
One theme which emerged from my research was the length of time that these cases can take to reach court with one senior investigating officer explaining that “we've had jobs running for years, two years, but even then, you've still got the issues then of finding the court time and getting to court, which can be another year, two years.” Officers described how the length of time some of the cases can take to get to court, if they ever actually do, can mean that some of the victim-survivors are now adults and might decide not to testify in these cases, having needed to move on with their lives.
In addition, for the limited cases which get to court, there was the trauma associated with testifying. My research highlighted how the experiences of those who gave evidence was hugely traumatic. There were examples given of victim-survivors who self-harmed, urinated themselves whilst on the stand, and had been in danger of taking their own lives due to the stress of having to relive their abuse. This is in addition to an example of being at risk of being charged with being in contempt of court. One Senior Investigating Officer (SIO) explained that the evidence given by the victims in one case was so upsetting that it had an impact on the whole court:
“We had, the Jury was in tears, some of the barristers were in tears, yeah, I mean it was shocking and if you ever see the transcripts, it’s just unreal.”
(Retired Police SIO, unpublished)
Thankfully, there were examples of good practice by the police during some court cases, where the officers organised accommodation for the victim-survivors close to the court, where they could be well supported but this does not reflect the experience of many young people.
I believe the criminal justice system needs an overhaul. The rate of prosecutions for CSA/E-related offending is already very low. The NSPCC reported that the “[p]rosecutions for CSA in England and Wales have more than halved from 6,394 in 2016/17 to 3,025 in 2020/21, while convictions dropped by 45% from 4,751 to 2,595 over the same period” (NSPCC, 2022[i]) and I am aware from my research that many CSE crimes are never disclosed.
It is clear to me that the criminal justice system not only necessitates a complete overhaul, but we need a move to the Barnahus (children’s house) model (Generalova, 2016; Children’s Commissioner, 2017), where child victims of sexual abuse can be supported by a variety of agencies in a child-centred environment, without the obligation to describe their abuse more than once. It is not acceptable that victims are being traumatised by the very systems which are meant to protect them and prosecute their abusers.
Evidence on the Barnahus model of working in Iceland has highlighted that:
"From the onset of Barnahus twice as many cases of suspected sexual abuse have been investigated, the number of cases prosecuted has tripled and the same applies to the number of sentences passed on a yearly basis. This I believe is largely due to the fact that the evidential quality of children’s disclosure has significantly improved".
(Guðbrandsson, General Director, Barnaverndarstofa/ The Government Agency for Child Protection, Iceland, cited in Children’s Commissioner report, 2016: 2[ii])
There is only one children’s house in England (see The Lighthouse, London) currently with another opening in Scotland, but in my opinion, these services need to be rolled out across the UK, in order to support the victims of child sexual abuse. Due to the lack of funding in some NGO specialist services and the current situation in Children’s Social Care, with the government reporting 7,900 full-time equivalent vacancies, as of September 2022[iii], it is apparent that some of the much needed support for the victims is expected to come from the police. However, it is recognised that they have been overwhelmed with disclosures and whether this support is delivered, or is actually even possible is dependent on officers having the time, skills and suitability to undertake this sort of work.
It is clear that I may continue being angry for some time yet.
[i] NSPCC, 2022. Child sexual abuse prosecutions and convictions roughly halve in 4 years. Available here
[ii] Children’s Commissioner, 2016. Barnahus: Improving the response to child sexual abuse in England. Available here
[iii] HM Government, 2023. Children’s Social Care Workforce. Available here