Former youth worker jailed for child sex offences
A former senior youth worker who committed a string of sex offences against teenage girls has been jailed for five and a half years.
Jacob Agnew, 30, from Hull, was convicted of six charges following a 13-day trial at Hull Crown Court last month. He had previously admitted a further four similar charges and one count of fraud.
Humberside Police said the offences involved seven girls aged between 14 and 17 and took place between 2012 and 2022.
The prosecution said his offending against vulnerable victims was an "abuse of trust".
Agnew was found guilty of four counts of sexual activity with a child, one count of sexual assault and one count of causing a child to engage in sexual activity.
At a previous hearing in March, he had pleaded guilty to four counts of sexual activity with a child and one count of fraud.
One of the victims told the court the offences had left her suffering from panic attacks.
"Deep down, it was eating me alive. I trusted him," she said.
"How could somebody who was supposed to make me feel safe do the opposite?"
The fraud charge related to a successful job application Agnew made to a secondary school while he was suspended from his youth worker job due the allegations against him.
He faked an email address from one of his colleagues and wrote a reference for himself "in glowing terms", the prosecution said.
Judge Mark Bury said Agnew had "a sexual interest in younger females".
"You were somebody who was setting out in a career in youth work," he said.
"You were trusted, you abused that situation and the people you abused have been badly affected by it."
Agnew was banned from contact with people under 18, and must register as a sex offender.
Eight men (four Mohammeds) charged in historical child sex gang inquiry
15 July 2026
Nicholas Bourne
BBC Wales
Eight men have been charged with 34 offences as part of an investigation into historical child sexual exploitation.
Police arrested the men from locations in Newport, Swansea, London, Birmingham, Lancashire, Edinburgh and the Argyll and Bute area of Scotland.
Operation Oak involved a "complex and long-running investigation into group-based child sexual exploitation in south Wales", said Det Ch Supt Andrew Tuck from Gwent Police.
The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said it had authorised charges, including 17 counts of rape.
The inquiry focuses on allegations made by several women of sexual abuse committed against them as children between 1985 and 1996.
Jenny Hopkins, chief crown prosecutor for Wales, said prosecutors had "worked to establish that there is sufficient evidence to bring the case to court and that it is in the public interest to pursue criminal proceedings".
"We remind all concerned that criminal proceedings against these defendants are active and that they have the right to a fair trial."
The men, aged 54 to 73, are all British citizens and are due to appear before Newport Magistrates' Court on 24 July.
They are:
- Shafaq Mohammed, 58, of Birmingham, charged with a total of 11 offences; four counts of rape of a female under 16, three counts of rape of a female aged 16 years or over, two counts of aiding and abetting the rape of a female under 16, causing the prostitution of a girl under 16, causing the prostitution of a woman
- Syed Mohammad Ashan Taqvi, 65, of Newport, charged with three counts of rape of a female under 16
- Mohammed Sheikh Abdul Hannan, 54, of Edinburgh, charged with eight offences; two counts of rape of a female aged 16 years or over, one count of indecent assault on a woman over 16 years of age, three counts of aiding and abetting the rape of a female under 16 years of age or over and two counts of conspiring to rape a woman aged 16 years or over
- Kevin Lawrence, 54, of Dunoon, charged with three offences; two counts of conspiring to rape a woman aged 16 years or over and causing the prostitution of a woman
- Sheikh Mohammed Tahir Ullah, 73, of Newport, charged with one count of rape of a female aged 16 years or over and one count of rape of a female under 16
- Aminur Rahman Chowdhury, 58, of Tottenham, charged with one count of rape of a female aged 16 years or over
- Shakeel Babur, 58, of Lancashire, charged with four counts of indecent assault on a girl under the age of 16
- Murad Ali, 57, of Swansea, charged with two counts of rape of a female under 16.
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‘It’s so unthinkable’: the parents sexually abused by their children
UK support group says more women are seeking help for experiences that one mother calls ‘lifelong punishment’
He was convicted and given a community order but Lucy said she felt left to suffer in silence.
She has not told her family because she felt “humiliated and embarrassed” by what happened. Despite her ordeal, she also feels uncomfortable about people thinking badly of her son.
“I can’t make sense of it so I can’t expect anybody else to. It’s a torture. It’s lifelong punishment,” she said. “And there’s nothing out there to help you at all. I felt like I was the only person this had happened to.”
Pegs, a social enterprise (the acronym is for parental education, growth, support) for people affected by child to parent abuse (CPA), said that while data on the issue was scarce, it had begun to notice a rise in parents seeking help for sexual abuse. In response, it surveyed 188 parents who approached it for help, and 17% – predominantly mothers – reported experiencing sexual harm from their child.
Michelle John, the founding director of Pegs, said the organisation was seeing more parents reporting sexual harm. “We are seeing graphic assaults and rape, attempted rapes, we’re seeing parents being suffocated and inappropriately touched, we’re seeing really concerning and high-risk sexual behaviours towards parents and caregivers.
“But no one out there is really asking the question. Parents are almost thankful that we’re asking them about this – we’re giving them permission to answer. Because it is the taboo within the taboo.”
Poor access to mental health support, social isolation and growing access to harmful sexual content online are all thought to be contributing to the rise. Similar factors are also believed to be fuelling an increase in matricide.
While there has been little research on sexual abuse towards parents, generally CPA is linked to neurodiversity, trauma and specific mental health conditions such as oppositional defiant disorder – persistent uncooperative and hostile behaviour towards authority figures.
Amanda Holt, a professor of criminology at the University of Roehampton whose recent paper, Understanding Harmful Sexual Behaviour Towards Parents, is thought to be the first academic research into the subject, concluded that “we can no longer avoid talking about it”.
Sexual abuse is now “interwoven into the dynamics of child to parent abuse for a significant number of families”, her research found, and was linked to exposure to domestic abuse and childhood trauma.
“I’ve been researching in the field of child to parent abuse for 20 years, and we talk about physical, psychological and financial abuse, but never sexual abuse,” she said.
As well as interviewing mothers and practitioners, she analysed data from 2,000 parents who sought help from a UK-based support service for CPA in 2023, and found that 13% had experienced harmful sexual behaviour from their child.
Of these, 96% were mothers and 4% were fathers. The children, aged five to 31, were 66% male and 33% female.
Parents reported their children making sexual noises and simulating sex acts, making sexual threats, being physically violent including touching, grabbing and thrusting, and also carrying out non-contact behaviour such as voyeurism and exposure.
“The mothers I interviewed talked about how they’d sought help for quite a long time because their child had shown what they thought were quite worrying signs of sexualised behaviour before it was actually targeted at them. But often it was minimised, they were told to just get on with it,” she said.
She also found mothers were fearful of speaking out due to concerns they would be blamed, accused of sexually abusing their child, or they would lose custody.
John said many of the parents Pegs spoke to were fearful their children were being exposed to harmful sexual and misogynistic content online that could be influencing their behaviour.
“They’ve reported their children making indecent images using ChatGPT,” she said. “Parents are putting safeguards in place, but children are finding different ways to go around it. We’re supporting some parents that don’t even have access to wifi because of this.”
Lucy said she had spoken to mental health services about her son searching for “rape” online as a teenager, but she “didn’t think of it as a concern” to herself. His mental health deteriorated when he went to university, he began drinking and using drugs and became socially isolated.
But there were no signs that he had developed an “obsession” with her, as police later found out after seizing his computer, until the night she woke up after being drugged by her son.
“I’m always thinking, is there something I could have done differently? Did I miss something?” she said. “And you question what people think about you – do they think that I’ve been abusing my own child? You become quite paranoid.”
She said she obsessively searched online for help in the aftermath but could find nothing, and when she did speak to therapists she often felt misunderstood.
“I feel passionately about this being a subject that’s not hidden,” she said. “It’s not about me, I’ve missed the boat. But if I can help just one person not feel lonely then it’s a job done for me.”
John added: “It takes a lot of bravery and courage to speak out [about sexual assault], and then add on to that it’s from someone you absolutely love and adore, your own child. It just adds that extra layer of shame and isolation, guilt maybe.”
*Name has been changed
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