Oldham midfielder on trial for sex with 14 y/o - England
Pensioner upgraded to Crown Court for CSA 14 y/o - Wales
Pensioner upgraded to Crown Court for CSA 14 y/o - Wales
Tusla denies malicious intent in false accusation of Garda - Ireland
NZ pervert connected to Russian baby rape extradited - Queensland
10-12 children report being molested by school employee - India
Franciscan cleric arrested for sexually exploiting migrant children - Greece
Former Oldham midfielder Jack Tuohy
denies five child sex offences
Jack Tuohy sex abuse trial: Schoolgirl 'told footballer she was 14'
From BBC Manchester
A schoolgirl told a professional footballer accused of sexually abusing and grooming her that she was 14 years old, a court has heard.
Former Oldham Athletic midfielder Jack Tuohy, 20, denies five sexual offences against a child in 2015.
The girl told Manchester Minshull Street Crown Court she "told a little lie" about her age on Facebook, which resulted in her being listed as 17.
But she remembered telling Mr Tuohy on Snapchat she was 14, the jury heard.
During cross examination, the girl also accepted her profile picture at the time made her appear older, and agreed she was "pouting a little bit".
But she denied the suggestion she had been trying to make herself look older.
Oldham, UK
Photographs 'liked'
Mr Tuohy first met the "football mad" girl at a schools tournament hosted by the League One club in 2015, the court heard.
The prosecution claims he went on to groom her before sexual activity took place in his car.
Paul Hodgkinson, defending, put it to the girl that it was she rather than his client who initiated contact shortly after the tournament and that she had known him for "some considerable time".
The court heard the complainant had "liked" a number of photographs of the defendant which he had posted on social media before the schools day at the club - one dating back to 2013.
The girl accepted she had liked the photographs but said that did not necessarily mean she did so before the tournament.
Mr Hodgkinson accused her of concealing her age because she wanted to "keep hold" of Mr Tuohy as a boyfriend - a claim she denied.
Mr Tuohy, of Shaw in Oldham, denies two counts of engaging in sexual activity with a child, two counts of inciting a child to engage in sexual activity and one count of meeting a child following sexual grooming.
The trial continues.
Oldham, UK
Denbighshire pensioner faces charges of historic sex abuse against a young child
Michael William Patrick Eastwood, 75, of Erw Wladys, Glyn Ceiriog, Llangollen, today denied the charges laid against him
A pensioner today faced charges of historic sex abuse against a young child.Michael William Patrick Eastwood, of Erw Wladys, Glyn Ceiriog, Llangollen, pleaded not guilty to nine charges at Wrexham Magistrates this morning.
The 75 year-old faced six charges of inciting a girl under the age of 14 to commit an act of gross indecency.
He faced a further three charges of indecent assault against the same child, who cannot be named for legal reasons.
Michael William Patrick Eastwood, 75, of Erw Wladys, Glyn Ceiriog, Llangollen
All the offences were alleged to have happened between January 1998 and July 2003.
Sion Chapel, Glyn Ceiriog, Llangollen, Wales
Robert Blakemore, prosecuting, said the offences were too serious to be dealt with by the magistrates.
Magistrate chairman Catherine Wantling agreed and the case was sent to Mold Crown Court to be heard on Friday March 24.
Eastwood was bailed with conditions.
Llangollen, Wales, UK
Child protection chief denies whistleblower
sex abuse claim was malicious
Garda whistleblower Maurice McCabe was falsely accused of sexually abusing a colleague's daughter
There is no evidence child protection workers acted with "malice of intent" in the Garda whistleblower scandal, the head of the state child agency has said.
Tusla (The Child and Family Agency in Ireland) is among those being investigated over its role in an alleged smear campaign against Sergeant Maurice McCabe, in a controversy that has brought the government close to collapse.
The agency had a file containing false allegations of sexual abuse against Mr McCabe, at a time when he was exposing wrongdoing within the force in.
Fred McBride, chief executive of Tusla, confirmed it began "formally engaging" with the public tribunal set up to probe the affair on Tuesday.
"But I think it is important to point out that I have no knowledge or evidence that Tusla staff acted with any malice of intent," he said.
"I also wish to make it clear that if I did receive - or in any time in the future receive - such evidence or information, I will intervene personally and immediately and publicly."
Bailieborough, IE
Mistakes - sure!
Mr McBride added that "mistakes were made" and that the agency was looking forward to addressing the affair "in its totality" during the public inquiry.
Sgt McCabe was at the centre of an unfounded and false report on a Tusla file of an allegation of sex abuse against a colleague's daughter.
A counsellor working on behalf of the agency had claimed the error was made when details from a different case were cut and pasted on to a file.
Mr McBride said he wanted to reiterate an apology "to people affected by our mistakes and for the distress and upset they have endured".
Cutting and pasting from a file to another file that probably did not previously exist is hard to justify as a mistake. In fact, I would say it is ludicrous to even make such a suggestion. There should not have been a file on Sgt McCabe in the first place. One can't 'accidentally' paste something into a file until it has been created. The creator of that file is the culprit who attempted to destroy McCabe and his work. It's not rocket science!
He added: "I accept that public confidence in the system may well have been undermined because of that."
No kidding! And deservedly so.
"But what has happened here is not reflective, I think, of the high standards that staff hold themselves to, or that I as chief executive hold them to - particularly in relation to the handling of sensitive information."
However, the Tusla chief admitted shortcomings in the agency's computer and record keeping systems.
"Do we have confidence in our IT system? I'm afraid the answer to that is 'not yet'," he told the parliamentary committee.
Mr McBride also accepted it could be difficult for the agency to immediately discover if someone had deliberately created malicious information on their system.
This would only be discovered during a "deeper level of assessment", he added.
The Tusla chief also confirmed the Data Protection Commissioner had been in contact with them about an as yet unclear investigation or audit into the agency's systems.
Press Association
The ensuing scandal has helped contribute to:
the resignation of Garda Commissioner Martin Callinan in March 2014.
the vindication of Gemma O'Doherty, the journalist fired by the Irish Independent for her pursuit of the story.
the resignation of the justice minister Alan Shatter and vindicated McCabe in May 2014 when Shatter admitted to McCabe's role in his resignation.
the establishment of an independent Garda authority.
led to plans for a “new era of policing”, according to the Irish government.
an apology from the Taoiseach Enda Kenny in the Dáil for "the issues that he [Maurice McCabe] raised and for the fact that his raising these matters wasn’t dealt with more speedily in the first instance."
Online chat, video reveals alleged sex abuse of adopted child in Queensland
Amy Mitchell-Whittington
Pedophile ring revealed
A New Zealand man allegedly involved in a global child-sex offender network will be extradited to Queensland to face charges relating to the sexual abuse of a child under 12.
The 42-year-old was arrested by New Zealand police in August 2016 after he was identified in images, chat logs and video examined by police as allegedly engaging in the sexual abuse of a child.
An extensive investigation spanning from 2011 has resulted in the extradition of a New Zealand man to Queensland. Photo: Glenn Hunt
The content was found during an examination of an Australian gay couple's devices as part of a protracted international investigation into allegations the couple were members of an international paedophile ring.
The investigation started in 2011 and involved officers from Taskforce Argos and international police.
Police say the two men had adopted a baby from a Russian surrogate mother in 2005 and lived in Cairns with the intent to sexually exploit the child and facilitate the abuse of the child as part of an international network of child-sex offenders.
In February 2012 the couple was arrested during a trip to the United States and charged with sexual exploitation offences.
A 46-year-old man was sentenced to 40 years and a 39-year-old man was sentenced to 30 years, both in a US jail.
Cairns, Queensland
During an examination of the couple's devices, police identified a 42-year-old New Zealand man who had allegedly engaged in the sexual abuse of the adopted child while in Queensland and had taken hundreds of indecent images.
He will be extradited to Brisbane on Thursday and will face nine charges of indecent treatment of a child under 12 when he appears in Brisbane Magistrates Court on Friday.
Detective Inspector Jon Rouse of Taskforce Argos said the man's arrest was a "testimony" to the dedication and commitment of Queensland police.
"This arrest closes the final chapter on a protracted and difficult investigation that has resulted in the arrest of members of a child-sex offender network that spanned the globe," he said.
Horror Unfolds In Bengaluru School As More Children Claim Sexual Abuse
NDTV | Written by Maya Sharma
An employee of a private school in Bengaluru has been accused of molesting children
BENGALURU: Six more cases of child sexual abuse have been filed against Manjunath, the employee of a private school in Bengaluru. The first police case against the 31-year-old was filed last week, after the parents of a child accused him of molesting their child. But now, more and more parents say they have found out why their child did not want to go to school. The children -- girls and boys - are barely more than toddlers.
"My daughter was crying for three weeks and pleading with us not to send her to the school," said a father. It took them some time to understand the reason. "She said 'Bhaiyya touches me'. We thought she meant other children... small children are playful," he said.
The couple was horrified when the child explained that she had pain in her private parts. They stood at the school gates and shared their story. "More than 10, 12 parents came back and said their children were also going through it. And they confirmed it was Manju Bhaiyya," the child's mother said.
One father said he was tortured by the thought that he had been forcing his child to go to school and face such abuse.
Bengaluru (Bangalore), India
The mother of a two-and-a-half year boy told NDTV, "For nearly a month, he has been complaining of a pain in his bottom. We gave him deworming medicine..."
Manjunath has been arrested and charged under POCSO, the law that deals with sexual offences against children. The school administrators have also been charged with not complying with safety regulations.
After the agitated parents met the city police chief, Praveen Sood told NDTV that the school had not been complying with the safety regulations ordered by the police department following a series of alleged sexual assaults two years ago. The school is now closed and the arrested administrators are out on bail.
The parents, however, are not ready to let the matter drop. They said they were consulting lawyers and want further action against the school. "He has assured us....But only action will give us any kind of hope," said the father of one of the children.
Greece charges Franciscan cleric with child refugees sexual abuse
Police arrest 52-year-old French cleric accused of molesting unaccompanied refugee minors after offering them food and shelter
Teo Kermeliotis
Hundreds of refugee children are alone in Greece without parents [File: Marko Djurica/Reuters]
Greek police say they have arrested a French cleric suspected of sexually abusing unaccompanied refugee children he had sheltered in his house in Thessaloniki, Greece's second-biggest city.
The 52-year-old man, who belongs to the Franciscan Church of France, allegedly molested four homeless Pakistani boys, aged 14 to 18.
The children, who had been sleeping rough around Thessaloniki's main railway station, told police officials that they accepted to stay at the man's home in January after he had offered to provide them with food and housing.
"When questioned, the children said they suffered repeated and persistent sexual abuse by the man," a police spokeswoman told Al Jazeera on Wednesday.
"They say that he took advantage of the fact that they were homeless and without food to sexually abuse them."
The alleged abuse came to light after the boys fled the man's house and one of them found refuge in a Thessaloniki centre for vulnerable migrants.
There, he revealed the abuse to the centre's staff, who then contacted police.
Following a search on Tuesday at the man's house in the Toumba area of the northern city, police seized six hard drives and one USB stick, as well as dozens of drug tablets that fall under the Greek law on addictive substances.
Police on Wednesday said the French cleric, who has been living in Greece for 12 years, has been charged with sexual abuse and possession and use of drugs.
Three of the boys are currently staying in centres run by NGOs, while one is living at the Diabata refugee camp, according to police.
Thessaloniki, Greece
'Entirely unprotected'
More than 62,000 refugees and migrants are currently stranded across Greece owing to a wave of European border closures and a controversial deal between the EU and Turkey in March 2016.
When the borders shut down last year, more than 2,500 children, many of whom had not been registered as unaccompanied, were trapped in Greece, according to Lora Pappa, the head of METAdrasi, a charity working with unaccompanied minors in the country.
"Currently, despite the big efforts that have taken place, more than 1,200 children remain trapped outside facilities in very difficult conditions - on the Greeks islands or in camps," Pappa told Al Jazeera.
"Sad cases, like the one in Thessaloniki, happen when there is no system of checks in place," she said.
For hundreds of vulnerable unaccompanied minors in Greece, life is full of risk and uncertainty.
Those who officially register with Greek authorities are taken by police. Despite being entitled to protection, they often find themselves facing prolonged arbitrary detention in custody and abusive treatment.
"This is very problematic ... and often forces many of them to lie to authorities about their age to avoid staying in poor and degrading conditions," Eva Cosse, Greece specialist at Human Rights Watch, told Al Jazeera.
For these children, alone in a foreign country without a parent or an adult responsible for their care, sexual abuse is just one of the many dangers they face.
"These are children who are entirely unprotected. They sleep rough, lack access to education and are exposed to sexual abuse, human trafficking and black labour," Cosse said.
"Greece needs to revise its entire system and services to protect unaccompanied migrant and asylum seeking children."
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