14yo girl serially raped by 40 men on Thai island
Phang Nga Bay, Thailand © Lucy Pemoni / Reuters
A teenage girl was reportedly gang-raped by as many as 40 men who came into her home while her parents were at work in Thailand.
According to the victim’s mother, the attacks began when a man broke into the family home in Ban Koh Raet in Phang Ng, near Phuket, last May and raped her then-14 year-old daughter.
“Because I and my husband work as rubber tappers, we must leave our children alone between midnight and dawn,” the girl’s mother explained.
A few days later, the man returned with another man and raped the girl. The attacks continued and the girl was reportedly taken to huts where she was drugged and gang raped. It’s estimated that about 40 men raped the girl.
The girl’s mother noticed a change in her daughter’s behavior and became suspicious when she realised the girl was afraid at night. She questioned her daughter and eventually she began to tell her what happened.
The mother then took her daughter to the police station to report the attacks in March. Three suspects had been arrested and later released on bail, the Bangkok Post reports.
The mother asked local police to re-open the case on Sunday after she learned how many men more raped her daughter.
Thai police have said they’ve identified 11 suspects on the small island of less than 200 people. The girl identified five of the men as her attackers when police showed her photographs, the Bangkok Post reported Friday. The men will be questioned by police before arrest warrants are issued.
Deputy National Police Spokesperson Colonel Krissana Pattanacharoen, told reporters they’re investigating the possibility that the case could be considered human trafficking, as the victim said she witnessed other girls being raped, the Nation reports.
The governor of Phang Nga has called for police to transfer the case to the police headquarters of the province, as locals are concerned that all the men have not yet been identified.
“Officials should identify all 40 suspects to clear any lingering doubts,” one resident said. “Or else, the reputation of our village will be ruined. Since this case was first reported, no tourists have come to our area.”
“Think about children who live in the village. They feel stress as such a claim means their fathers may be suspects," Yuttanakorn Juanjenkij, a governing official in Tambon Loryoong, said, the Strait Times reports.
Phuket Gazette reports the victim and her mother were brought to Takuapa Hospital for a physical and mental health check by the Ministry of Social Development and Human Security.
2 American students accuse Italian police of rape
FILE PHOTO Italian police officers © Filippo Monteforte / AFP
Two members of the Italian Carabinieri are being investigated for the alleged assault of two American students, after driving them home from a nightclub, Italian media report. The State Department said it was taking the allegations “very seriously.”
Italian authorities said they questioned the two students about their allegations for several hours “and found no inconsistencies in their stories,” after they reported the rape early Thursday morning.
One student said she was assaulted in the hallway, and another in the elevator of their apartment building, reported La Stampa. Both women were taken to hospital to be examined.
The two Carabinieri were reportedly waiting to be questioned by police.
The US consul general in Florence had meeting about the case with the city’s chief of police on Friday morning. The meeting lasted about an hour and the consul left without making a statement to reporters, according to the Italian news agency ANSA.
The two women, 19 and 21, spent the evening at a nightclub. At one point, six Carabinieri were called in to break up a fight. Four of the officers left shortly afterwards, and the remaining two offered the Americans a lift home. CCTV footage captured the women getting into the police car.
A State Department official told AP they were aware of media reports about the assault and that such allegations were taken seriously.
The two students arrived in Florence several months ago to study Italian.
Florence is known for having one of the highest rates of reported sexual assaults in Italy, according to government statistics. In the first six months of 2017, more than 2,000 people were charged with sexual assault in Italy.
In January 2016, an American woman living in Florence was found murdered in her apartment. Later that year, a court in Florence convicted a Senegalese man of murdering the 35-year-old Ashley Olsen and sentenced him to 30 years in prison. An autopsy had determined that Olsen had been strangled and suffered skull fractures. Witnesses had said the woman and her attacker had met at a Florence nightclub a few hours before she was killed.
Churchwarden who imported child sex doll is jailed
© National Crime Agency / Reuters
A former churchwarden has been jailed for importing an “obscene” life-sized child sex doll into Britain.
David Turner, of Ramsgate, Kent, who was also a school governor, was arrested in November last year after Border Force officers intercepted a 3ft 10in (117cm) anatomically detailed and correct doll he had ordered from China. It was labelled as a mannequin and came with a fishnet body stocking.
A search of the 72-year-old’s home found two more child sex dolls, outfits for the dolls, 34,000 illegal images of child abuse, as well as photos he had taken of pupils at the school he governed.
He told police his preference was to view indecent images of children aged four to 10 and to “secretly” take photographs of girls in public places.
Turner said he bought the lifelike doll as a “companion” to join him and his wife. He said he had bought a number of dolls over the past eight years because he “loved children so much” and missed his own when they left home.
The 72-year-old admitted to having sex with the dolls on a few occasions.
Analysis of Turner’s computers showed he viewed websites selling items advertised as “flat chest love doll” and “mini silicone sex doll 65cm little breasts,” according to the National Crime Agency (NCA).
Officers also found 29 fictional stories written by Turner describing the sexual abuse of children, but these fell outside the Obscene Publications Act and were not the subject of a charge.
Following his arrest, Turner resigned as governor of St Ethelbert’s Primary School in Ramsgate, and from St Ethelbert’s and Gertrude Church, where he was a warden.
Turner has been jailed for 16 months – eight months for owning the doll and eight months for possessing images of child sex abuse.
In July, a court ruled the child sex doll was an “obscene” item after Turner’s lawyers had argued it was not covered by a law banning their importation. Other men have been convicted for importing child sex dolls, but this was the first case where the question of whether a doll is indecent or obscene has been tested by the courts.
Border officials are reporting seeing more lifelike silicone sex aids, which weigh around 55lb (25kg), imported into the country. They can cost thousands of pounds, and are sold on sites such as Amazon and eBay, the NCA said. The dolls are often manufactured in China and Hong Kong.
Authorities have seized 123 dolls from 120 individuals since March 2016.
What a pathetic person one must be to need things like this. And yet, I suspect they will be legalized in the next year or two.
Man arrested for alleged sexual offences against young relatives
Jonny Wakefield
Police have arrested an Edmonton man for alleged sexual offences committed against family members, including four children.
Alberta’s Internet Child Exploitation (ICE) Unit said Friday that officers arrested the 50-year-old man after a six-month investigation that identified four child victims in Alberta, Manitoba and Nova Scotia.
Police are not releasing the accused’s name to protect the identities of the victims. ICE is working with the Zebra Centre for Child Protection to provide support and resources to the victims.
Law enforcement became aware of the suspect in March after a man uploaded what appeared to be homemade child pornography online. The case was referred to ICE by the RCMP’s National Child Exploitation Coordination Centre.
The man was arrested on March 21 and charged with one count of possession of child pornography and two counts of distribution of child pornography.
Additional investigation turned up the historical sexual offences allegedly committed over several years against victims who were young children and family members of the man.
Police say the offences took place in Edmonton, Manitoba and Nova Scotia. While in custody, the man was charged with sexual assault, invitation to sexual touching and sexual interference for the alleged Edmonton crimes.
Late last month, the man was arrested on warrants issued in Manitoba and Nova Scotia for other alleged sexual offences, including sexual assault, sexual interference, touching for a sexual purpose, bestiality and child porn offences.
The accused is being transported under police supervision to Manitoba for court dates. He is set to appear in court in Thompson, Man., on Monday.
ALERT spokesman Mike Tucker said there is “a very real likelihood” that additional victims could be identified as the investigation progresses.
Det. Ian McFatridge said the alleged crimes happened over a period of eight years.
He would not say the ages or genders of the victims — including whether they are still minors — but said all four are related to the accused.
“This was a very troubling and challenging investigation,” he said, adding it “unfolded across multiple provinces, with multiple victims, and it entailed a number of sickening sexual offences.
“These victims were subject to varying degrees of sexual abuse when they were young children,” he said. “Some of these offences are historical, while some (were) committed more recently.”
Anyone with information is asked to contact local police or http://www.cybertip.ca.
ICE is a unit of the Alberta Law Enforcement Response Teams, an integrated unit that includes members of the Edmonton Police Service, RCMP and other municipal police forces.
Inquiry into sexual abuse of children calls for victims in South West to come forward
BY CARL EVEA wide-ranging inquiry into the sexual abuse of children in the South West of England needs victims and survivors to come forward and tell of their experiences.
A number of organisations attended a workshop earlier this week where staff from the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) urged them to reach out to their clients and urge them to take park in the inquiry's Truth Project.
Groups like the Devon Rape Crisis and Sexual Abuse Services, Intercom Trust and North Devon Against Domestic Abuse were asked to help inform survivors who stories and experiences will hopefully inform recommendations to government in an effort to improve upon past failures by the authorities.
David Poole, head of the South West Inquiry office said the meeting included more than a dozen different organisations where they discussed how to work together to encourage victims and survivors to speak out and have their voices heard.
While the Truth Project had been hearing from victims around the country for more than 18 months, the South West inquiry only opened its Exeter office in February and Mr Poole said he was keen to see it reach out to all parts of Devon and Cornwall.
He revealed that while 700 people had expressed an interest in the scheme, 315 had actually participated in the private sessions where their experiences were recorded.
Of those, only 26 in the South West had so far recorded their own horrific childhood tales of sexual abuse and how they were then treated by the authorities of the time.
Mr Poole accepted that many people still did not know of the existence of the inquiry and the Truth Project.
In response to questions from The Herald he also recognised the inquiry was lacking in knowledge about specific high profile cases in the South West – such as the appalling large scale abuse carried out by businessman William Goad over four decades and the wide-scale sexual abuse which was perpetrated at institutions like Forde Park, a Home Office-run approved school in Newton Abbot, which closed in 1985.
William Goad
The three-year police investigation into a number of Devon and Cornwall institutions including Forde Park – known as Operation Lentisk – cost £3 million.
In 2013 the force answered a Freedom of Information request which noted that the operation covered allegations made against 190 persons by 302 victims at 41 institutions throughout Devon and Cornwall. Of those, eight had been convicted with sentences ranging from six months to 18 years. Three had been found not guilty and one cautioned.
The document noted that "offences charge include, rape, buggery, indecent assault, grievous bodily harm and gross indecency."
The IICSA is described as offering an "unprecedented opportunity to examine the extent to which institutions and organisations in England and Wales have taken seriously their responsibility to protect children."
A wide range of institutions are being examined including "local authorities, the police, the Crown Prosecution Service, the Immigration Service, the BBC, the armed forces, schools, hospitals, children's homes, churches, mosques and other religious organisations, charities and voluntary organisations, regulators and other public and private institutions."
Mr Poole said: "This is not part of the criminal justice process. What we're looking for is people to share their experiences with us. They won't be subject to cross-examination or judged in any way.
"They can say in their own words what has happened to them and their accounts will inform our recommendations."
He said the aim was to examine institutional failings to protect children and failures to respond to those incidents.
He said: "Some [victims] may know about the project but feel uncomfortable in coming forward at this stage of their life to share their experiences.
"For a long time people have not been listened to and their views were brushed under the carpet.
"The Truth Project offers the opportunity to come and share that experience.
"We know that people will find it difficult, very very difficult.
"We have emotional and psychological support to help them through that and have an environment at the Exeter office that is conducive to sharing their experiences."
He urged survivors to get in contact and say where they would prefer to share their story at a mutually agreed time.
Recognising that some of those who take part may have never before shared their painful experiences with any authority or even their own families, he said the IICSA had contracts with organisations who offer support which would immediately kick in after they were contacted.
In addition, the inquiry would, if necessary, make travel and accommodation arrangements for those who may need to come a long way to speak.
Survivors' stories would be digitally recorded on an audio system and then saved to be used as anonymised case studies.
Mr Poole said: "It will be in their own words, at their own pace, the effect this had on them and their families.
"We do ask people if they have any specific recommendations that they would like us to take into account, an observation on institutions and the impact of the abuse; the failings of those institutions; the roles of the organisations which have a physical presence and those that do not; what enabled the abuse to take place; what happened they didn't prevent it; what happened that perpetuated the abuse and why didn't those institutions do anything; how they were not heard and had to remain in those institutions; not being believed and then subjected to further abuse – we want to know about all of that.
"This inquiry is not here by accident. There have been patterns of abuse over decades and it's been a taboo subject for too long. But it had now started to be talked about in a way that society hasn't in the past and we have to act upon that."
He said: "Legislation may need to be changed."
Mr Poole stressed the inquiry was "independent of government" and will make "recommendations that it believes are the best to effect change for children."
He added: "It would be unwise for any future government to ignore any recommendations the inquiry makes."
If you would like to share your experience with the Truth Project, more information is available at the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse's website: https://www.iicsa.org.uk/victims-and-survivors or you can call the Information line on 0800 917 1000.
The Information line is open weekdays 8am-8pm and Saturdays 10am-12pm.
You can also find out more on Facebook: @IICSATruthProject and on Twitter @InquiryCSA
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