Child Sex Abuse Victim Speaks Out About Sickening Abuse

Child sex abuse victim speaks out about sickening abuse as her paedophile attacker jailed for seven years

BY RED WILLIAMS

Brave Sianne Mann, 36, has blasted sick Nicholas Tilley, who she says has destroyed her life after she took almost three decades to pluck up the courage to report him

Sianne Mann has spoken out

A courageous child sex abuse victim has spoken out about the abuse she suffered at the hands of an evil pervert as he is jailed for seven years.

Brave Sianne Mann, 36, has blasted sick paedophile Nicholas Tilley, 47, hoping that by speaking out she will inspire other sex abuse victims living in silence to come forward.

Defiant Sianne said she was haunted for years by vile Tilley's abuse and it took her almost three decades to pluck up enough courage to report her twisted tormentor to police.

It then emerged that the sick paedophile had also abused another young schoolgirl.

And a court heard Tilley had also been jailed in 2008 for child sex crimes.

Tilley assaulted Sianne, whose marriage has collapsed under the intense strain, when she was just seven while his then-girlfriend was child-minding her.

Almost 30 years on, Sianne, of Ipswich, Suffolk, last night said depraved Tilley had “destroyed her life” but declared: “Now, I’m relieved.

“I feel like I’m not scared of him any more because I stood up to him.

“If there are girls out there who are scared to come forward - don’t be scared, talk to someone. “You don’t have to go through it on your own.”


Tilley was jailed for seven years last week at Ipswich Crown Court for assaults on Sianne and another girl.

The evil brute targeted Sianne at her family home in Stowmarket, Suffolk, in the 1980s.

At the time Tilley also lived in the area.

Sianne, who had a baby son at 17, said: “It was something that haunted me every day. There wasn’t a day that went by that it wasn’t in my head at least once.

“It affected my relationships with friends and family. I hate him. “He’s destroyed my life. I had another life planned – my family had another life planned for me. “Because of what he did I went completely off the rails.”

She added: “I became a delinquent. I was running off. “It was like I couldn’t be in the house. My relationship with my mum went downhill. “At 11 years old I went to live with my grandmother because it became traumatic for my mum.

“I was a good little girl before it happened. I was that sweet little girl that everyone liked.Then by the age of nine or 10 I was horrible. “By 13 to 14 I was mixing with drugs and alcohol, and used them to let things out. At 17 I had my son and got my life back on track. I managed to bury what happened. “He was my saviour.”


Tilley was sentenced at Ipswich Crown Court

However, Sianne said as the years passed her health began to deteriorate again and she was referred for help.

She praised a mental health support group she was attending for playing its part in helping her to report Tilley to police. “Luckily I have had a lot of support from a lot of brilliant people," she said.

“The police officers and others who worked with me during the case were outstanding. “When I first went to the police I was at the point where I had had a lot of therapy and was quite well. By the time I went to court I was a mess.

“In the last two-and-a-half years my mental health went downhill, my marriage broke down. I became so ill. “It was like I was on a roller coaster and it started eating away at anything good in my life until all that was left was the court case.

These symptoms of child sex abuse - rebellion, toxic relationships, risky lifestyle, mental illness, marriage breakdowns - are far too common for survivors. Many will say that it destroyed their lives, and from the perspective of what they had planned or expected for themselves, that is often the case. Certainly, as Sianne says, it throws your life completely off-track. It also makes your life more difficult by an exponential factor - depression, difficulty with relationships, fears, inability to focus, etc. 

But it doesn't get better by keeping it inside. It has to come out or you are doomed to suffer from it all your life. When it does come out, things may become quite difficult for awhile. There's something about talking that makes a thing more real. But you have to get through that, and once you do, you have a chance to overcome much of the damage that has been done, and you may also have the opportunity to help others who, like yourself, are sorely in need of help.

“In the last 12 months I have not been able to move forward or think about the future because I didn’t know what the outcome was going to be. “I don’t know what the future has in store but I’m hopeful.”

By refusing to hide behind a cloak of anonymity Sianne hopes she will inspire other sex assault victims to find the courage to alert police.

“I think people are scared. I was scared for 29 years, but a friend of mine gave me the impetus to go to the police. I would say ‘don’t be scared, the police will help’.

“The police did their job so well he is now in prison and not going to harm anyone else.

“If there are girls out there who are scared to come forward - don’t be scared, talk to someone,” she said. “You don’t have to go through it on your own."

“If I can turn things – horrible, horrible things – that happened to me into a positive, then something good has come out of it in the end.”

Tilley was convicted of three offences of indecent assault on Sianne and another schoolgirl. He had denied the charges.

At Tilley’s sentencing, Judge David Goodin branded his offences “grubby and disgraceful”.

The court also heard that in 2008 he was convicted of two offences of sexual assault on a six-year-old girl and possessing and making indecent images of children.

Tilley was locked up for six years.

During his latest trial the jury was told he was 19 when he sexually assaulted the-then seven-year-old Sianne while he was with his babysitting girlfriend.

Tilley told Sianne she was his “special girl” and that what took place was “their secret”.

Sianne tipped off detectives in 2014.

During their enquiries the second victim came forward and said Tilley, now of Fulbourn, Cambridgeshire, had indecently touched her when she was 11 or 12.