Sheffield 11, Pensioner, MI5, Murderer, Nursery Boss, Swim Teacher on Today's Global PnP List

Note: The once 3rd most powerful man in the Vatican has been sentenced
to 6 years in prison for child sex abuse - article is here

Sheffield: 11 Men Charged in Historic
Child Sexual Abuse Inquiry

Ten men from Sheffield have been charged with historic child sex offences including rape and trafficking for the purpose of sexual exploitation and another has been charged with conspiracy to pervert the course of justice.

Charges were brought on Monday against Usman Din, Tony Ejoune, Kamaran Mahmoodi, Shangar Ibrahimi, Farhad Mirzaie, Soran Ali Karim, Kawan Omar Ahmed, Saman Mohammed, Jasim Mohammed, Nzar Anwar, and Saba Mohammed. All are due to appear before Sheffield Magistrates’ Court on Tuesday.

The crimes allegedly occurred in Sheffield between 2010 and 2011 against one victim, who cannot be named for legal reasons.

South Yorkshire Police have said that the charges were part of “an ongoing multi-agency investigation.”

The list of charges as reported by the BBC are:

Kawan Omar Ahmed, 29, has been charged with one count of rape.

Nzar Anwar, 39, has been charged with one count of rape and one count of conspiracy to pervert the course of justice.

Usman Din, 34, has been charged with one count of trafficking for the purpose of sexual exploitation and three counts of rape.

Tony Ejoune, 60, has been charged with one count of rape.

Shangar Ibrahimi, 29, has been charged with one count of rape.

Soran Ali Karim, 43, has been charged with one count of rape.

Kamaran Mahmoodi, 39, has been charged with one count of rape.

Farhad Mirzaie, 29, has been charged with two counts of rape.

Jasim Mohammed, 36, has been charged with three counts of rape.

Saman Mohammed, 40, has been charged with one count of rape.

And Saba Mohammed, 40, has been charged with one count of conspiracy to pervert the course of justice.

Only 3 Mohammeds! Nevertheless, all but one appear to be Pakistani Muslims. Is anyone surprised?

MI5 has 'deep regret' child sex abuse claims against Tory MP were not passed on to police, inquiry told

"The knowledge and understanding of child sex abuse at that time was much, much lower than it is now"

By Aine Fox, Press Association

The security service has expressed its "deep regret" that allegations of possible child sex abuse by a Tory MP was not passed to police.

A member of MI5, giving evidence anonymously at the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA), said the report on the late Chester MP Peter Morrison was looked at from a "narrow security-related view".

A 1986 letter from MI5 to the Cabinet Office read to the Westminster strand of the inquiry, which is sitting for its second week, referred to a rumour that Mr Morrison had a "penchant for small boys".

An MI5 lawyer, who did not work for the service at the time, said such allegations would be passed to police nowadays as a matter of policy.

Brian Altman QC, lead counsel to the inquiry asked the witness: "Do you say that there is no material in MI5's corporate recording to suggest that the 1986 allegations were ever passed to the police?"

Speaking via video-link and visible only to the inquiry panel, he replied: "That's right."

He went on: "I can only take the view that with hindsight it is a matter of deep regret.

"I can't speak about what appreciations ought to have been at the time.

"I am aware, everybody will be aware, that the knowledge and understanding of child sex abuse at that time was much, much lower than it is now.

"So I am not surprised, to some extent unsurprised, that the wider consideration wasn't given in 1986.

"With hindsight it is a matter of real regret."

Asked how such allegations would be treated today, he said: "Today as a matter of formal policy MI5 would report all allegations of this sort to the police and if the same information had come to MI5 today it would be passed to the police."

The inquiry heard two memos in relation to Morrison were written by Eliza Manningham-Buller, who was later to go on to become chief of MI5 and who is now Baroness Manningham-Buller.

One written on November 13 1986 stated that then prime minister Margaret Thatcher was aware of the rumours and was supporting Morrison, and that Morrison hoped the press would publish a story so he could sue and "nail the lies" he felt were being spread about him.

Mr Altman asked the witness if he agreed that it seemed the information given by Baroness Manningham-Buller to MI5's director general at the time Sir Antony Duff "relied upon what Peter Morrison himself said to her, his word was simply taken as read and what he said was accepted rather than inquiries made?"

He said: "Looking at the bald paperwork there does seem to be a chain from Morrison through Eliza to the director general to the cabinet secretary."

He added that he felt this was probably down to the belief the prime minister was aware of the allegations and supported Morrison and that if the then cabinet secretary Sir Robert Armstrong had any doubts "he was in a very good position to check".

The inquiry also heard from former Labour MP Christine Russell who denied a deal was struck to keep quiet about a rumour that Morrison had been caught by police at a railway station with a teenage boy.

Christine Russell, a former MP for Chester, said she could not recall any such meeting about Morrison when she worked as a Labour party election agent.

But the inquiry heard from another Labour Party member who said they believed there had been a meeting which resulted in what he called "a Chester cover-up".

Trade unionist Grahame Nicholls said rumours were "rife" about Morrison's private life, that he "liked little boys".

He said: "That's the expression that was used in that period. I didn't hear the word paedophile at all."

He said the rumours were known by the "political elite" in the area.

Asked if he had any evidence to substantiate the rumour, he replied: "No, the evidence was the rumour. The rumours that were going round Chester."

Mr Nicholls said a meeting had taken place, at some point between 1988 and 1990, in which Ms Russell said Morrison, who had been the area's MP since 1974, was not going to stand in the 1992 general election.

He told the inquiry: "The reason she gave was that Peter Morrison had been caught by Cheshire Police in a toilet in a railway station."

Mr Nicholls said he had been told about the alleged railway station incident before the meeting, by a local reporter, and said he heard it involved a 15-year-old boy.

He added: "The agreement was that if he wasn't standing then we wouldn't break cover on this particular story."

He said he understood that the police had agreed not to take the matter any further.

But, contradicting this, Ms Russell said: "There was certainly no deal."

The inquiry will continue on Tuesday.

Ontario man whose murder case was stayed over excessive time in solitary, now charged with sexual assault

CBC News 

Ontario Provincial Police say the man whose murder charge was stayed in January after he spent more than four years in solitary confinement is now facing a new charge.

Adam Capay was arrested on Friday after an incident in Lac Seul. Ont., about 600 kilometres from Thunder Bay, around March 5, said sergeant Mike Golding, the OPP's media relations and community safety coordinator for the northwest region. 

He is charged with sexual assault with a weapon.  

Capay was originally arrested by the Lac Seul Police Service in connection with one of the Lac Seul force's investigations, Golding said. While in custody, he was rearrested the same day by OPP in connection with the sexual assault investigation.

Capay appeared in court over the weekend and was remanded in custody, Golding said. He was due to appear in court again Monday in Sioux Lookout.  

Capay was charged with first-degree murder in 2012 in connection with the death of another inmate at the Thunder Bay Correctional Centre.

His case rose to prominence in 2016 when Ontario Human Rights chief commissioner Renu Mandhane toured the Thunder Bay District Jail in early October of that year. Mandhane reported that Capay had been held in solitary confinement in a windowless room for more than four years, spending 24 hours a day in artificial light.

Ontario Superior Court Justice John Fregeau stayed Capay's murder charge on Jan. 28, saying his treatment violated several of his constitutional rights — including his rights to life, liberty and security of the person; the right not to be arbitrarily detained; the right not to be subjected to cruel and unusual punishment; and the right to be equal before and under the law.

Of course, there is no mention of his victim's rights: the right to life, the right to not be raped. Canadian justice is so absurdly criminal-centric.

UK pensioner, 70, is jailed for 12 years for having more than 2 million child abuse images

By MARK DUELL and RORY TINGLE FOR MAILONLINE

Geoffrey Crossland, of Harrogate, amassed more than 2.2 million indecent images

A 70-year-old man who amassed one of the largest known collections of indecent images in Britain was today jailed after admitting storing prohibited firearms in a secret underground bunker.

Officers who raided Geoffrey Crossland's £750,000 farmhouse in Harrogate, North Yorkshire, found guns and ammunition hidden underneath the property.

Police had been investigating the former company director, who lived with his wife Anne, 61, after he was found to have more than two million indecent images. The vast collection was stored on SD cards, USB sticks, DVDs, SIM cards, floppy disks, laptops, tablets and mobile phones.

His wife, apparently, was devastated when she found out. (7th story on link)

The court heard how Crossland was found to have 34,612 images in the most extreme category A, as well as 2,107,873 in the least extreme category C. 

Crossland was imprisoned for 12 years and eight months at York Crown Court.

The court heard he had 'painstakingly categorised' the images and had wrote lists of the best websites to access sexual pictures and videos of children.

The scale of the police response at Crossland's £750,000 farmhouse in Harrogate last October

Prosecutors told how Crossland had demonstrated a 'long-standing interest in children', with the earliest images dating back to 1998. 

The haul was described by the Crown Prosecution Service as one of the biggest known collections in England and Wales.

North Yorkshire Police said the seizure of the images was the biggest ever in the county, and included 6,946 in the most extreme category A.

Appearing at court today, Crossland pleaded guilty to six charges of possessing prohibited firearms, two charges of possessing firearms without the relevant certificate, two counts of possessing ammunition without the relevant certificate, and one count of possessing a shotgun without the relevant certificate. 

He had previously pleaded guilty to three counts of making indecent images between January 2011 and October 2018.  

Crossland lived at this farmhouse in Harrogate, which is pictured in an estate agent's photo

Geoffrey Crossland pleaded guilty to making 2,204,992 indecent photographs and videos of children between January 1, 2011 and October 22, 2018. These included:

• 28,686 images and 5,826 videos of the most extreme category A

• 46,271 images and 3,008 videos in category B

• 2,095,528 images and 12,302 videos in category C

• 12,281 images and 201 videos containing prohibited images of children

• 814 images and 30 videos containing extreme pornography

Sentencing him this afternoon, Judge Andrew Stubbs QC said the 'scale of the depravity' of the images depicted was hard for the public to understand.

'Your criminality was unearthed, almost literally, on October 18 last year, when officers searched your house for images of children,' the judge said.

'One issue which is not forgotten is that these images capture real life people, and at the same time real life sexual abuse being carried out on them.'

Prosecutor Stephen Wood explained how the vast haul of images included 34,612 in the most extreme category A, and 2,107,873 in the least extreme category C.

Mr Wood explained how the pensioner had 'painstakingly categorised' the pictures, with some being listed under terms like 'animal abuse', 'peach Asian street meat', and 'young Russian brother and sister'.

The judge heard how the former business manager, who ran a company that manufactured electronic components for vehicles, had an 'arsenal of weapons' in the bunker, as well as around 24,000 rounds of ammunition.

Geoffrey Crossland also admitted 11 charges relating to the possession of prohibited firearms, shot guns and rifles without licences, and ammunition offences, including:

• a Hi Standard pistol

• a .22 calibre revolver which used a self-contained gas cartridge system

• two .22 calibre Weihrauch revolvers which use a self-contained gas cartridge system

• a FN .22 automatic pistol which had a barrel less than 30 centimetres in length and which was less than 60 centimetres in length overall

• a Miroku double barrelled shotgun

• a Jager Armi/Moda P74 rifle

• a smooth bore ornamental pistol

• a .38 Brocock bolt action rifle which uses a self-contained gas cartridge system

• bullets designed to be used with a pistol and incorporating a missile designed or adapted to expand on impact

• bullets in quantities in excess of those authorised by a firearms certificate in force at the time

Susannah Proctor, defending, explained how the defendant had an enthusiasm for weapons dating back to him being given a firearms licence back in the 1970s. She added there was no evidence Crossland had any intention to cause harm with the weapons and ammunition.

The former company director was arrested at London Heathrow Airport days after his home was searched by officers, having been on a clay pigeon shooting holiday in Argentina.

A neighbour said eight police cars and two police vans rushed to the property around five months ago before asking to park on his drive.

The man, who has two young grandchildren, said neighbours believed he was making his own ammunition when reports of his activity first came to light. However, after reading about the full details of the court case, he described his shock at living so close to Crossland.

He said: 'It is so worrying knowing we lived so close. I have a young granddaughter who comes around here often. Knowing something could've happened is distressing.'

The work of North Yorkshire Police in investigating the case and bringing Crossland to court was praised by the judge at the end of his sentencing remarks.

Detective Chief Inspector Graeme Wright, of North Yorkshire Police, said that the investigation into the defendant's potential criminality is ongoing.

Marc Horsfall, of the National Crime Agency, said: 'A team of specially trained NCA officers spent several months working through Crossland's horrific catalogue of abuse images to grade them in order of severity.

'Crossland and men like him are fuelling the actual contact abuse of children and the sickening distribution of those images. The NCA works with partners at home and abroad to catch child sex offenders and bring them to justice.'

Ex-nursery boss sentenced for online child sex abuse in UK

A former day nursery manager has been sentenced for viewing sex abuse images of children online.

Alison Whateley, 44, from Farnham, Surrey, used an internet chatroom to watch and exchange messages about children being abused in 2017.

She initially pleaded not guilty but changed her plea ahead of her trial at Guildford Crown Court last month.

Whateley was sentenced to a 30-month community order and a 50-day rehabilitation order.

She was also put on the sex offenders register, given a five-year sexual harm prevention order, and barred from working with children.

She had pleaded guilty to encouraging the distribution of indecent images of children.

The National Crime Agency (NCA) said there was no evidence to suggest any material was made at nurseries she had worked at or that she had been in sexual contact with any children.

She worked for a number of nurseries including ones in Teddington and Hampton Wick, the NCA said.

After her arrest on 26 September 2017, NCA investigators found an audio recording in which Whateley was heard admitting to being a paedophile and expressing an interest in abusing very small children.

Whateley initially claimed she had been visiting the conference room for six months to entrap paedophiles. But she had made no notes, passed no offenders' details to law enforcement and had also deleted nearly all her phone's contents, the NCA said.

A reporting restriction, which banned Whateley being named, was lifted on Monday.

Swimming instructor charged with

child sexual abuse at a Sydney pool

By Rachel Clun, Canberra Times

A swimming instructor will face court on Wednesday after he allegedly sexually abused two young swimming students at a pool on Sydney's north shore.

Detectives from the child abuse and sex crimes squad began an investigation after receiving reports two girls, aged six and eight, were sexually touched on separate occasions during swimming lessons at a Mosman pool in February.

The 20-year-old will face Manly Local Court on Wednesday. CREDIT:NSW POLICE

Following inquiries, detectives arrested a 20-year-old man at a Balgowlah home just before midday on Tuesday.

The man was taken to Manly Police Station where he was charged with two counts of intentionally sexually touching a child under 10 years, and sexual intercourse with a child under the age of 10.

Refused bail, the man will appear at Manly Local Court on Wednesday.

While it's not clear how long the man had worked as a swimming instructor, police said the man's employment at the swimming school was suspended prior to his arrest.

Investigations are continuing.

Northern Ireland Child Abuse Inquiry Singles Out Police and Church

 Campaigners for alleged victims of historical institutional abuse outside the hotel where Sir Anthony Hart was making his statement. Photograph: Paul Faith/AFP/Getty Images

Henry McDonald Ireland correspondent, The Guardian

Police were guilty of a “catalogue of failures” over the abuse of boys at a Belfast care home run by a paedophile ring, a comprehensive report into child mistreatment across Northern Ireland has found.

The historical institutional abuse inquiry, established in 2014, found that a Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) investigation into sexual abuse at the Kincora care home in east Belfast was “inept, inadequate and far from thorough”.

The report, released on Friday, also accused the Catholic hierarchy in Ireland of ignoring repeated warnings about a serial paedophile, Fr Brendan Smyth, who sexually assaulted and raped dozens of young victims.

The implications of the Smyth scandal and other clerical abuse in the region were so serious that a senior Catholic cleric was due to discuss the findings with the pope later on Friday.

Kincora care home was run by a number of paedophiles whom it was alleged were agents of the state. They included the prominent Orange Order member William McGrath, who was accused of being an informer for MI5 and special branch in the 1970s, spying on fellow hardline loyalists.

At least 29 boys were sexually abused by McGrath, the Kincora housemaster, and others at the home. One boy is said to have killed himself by jumping off a ferry into the Irish Sea in the late 1970s following years of abuse. Three senior staff at Kincora – McGrath, Raymond Semple and Joseph Mains – were jailed in 1981 for abusing 11 boys.

The retired judge Sir Anthony Hart, who chaired the inquiry, said if the RUC had carried out a proper investigation into Kincora many of the victims might have been spared. He said 39 boys were abused by McGrath and others running Kincora at the height of the Troubles.

Hart arrives at the Crowne Plaza hotel in Belfast to deliver the findings. Photograph: Paul Faith/AFP/Getty Images

But Hart said the notion that the home was a homosexual “brothel” used by the security services to entrap paedophiles to spy on influential political figures was without foundation.

Controversially, he also dismissed the notion that McGrath was a state agent. “We are satisfied that McGrath was never an agent of the state. William McGrath was a sexual pervert who had political views of a bizarre type.”

Hart was extremely critical of a number of individuals who had previously made claims about Kincora, including the former army intelligence officer Colin Wallace, who first raised allegations of a paedophile ring at the home.

See: STATEMENT ISSUED BY COLIN WALLACE FOLLOWING THE PUBLICATION OF THE HISTORICAL INSTITUTIONAL ABUSE INQUIRY REPORT 

Wallace criticized the Inquiry because it wasn't given sufficient power, among other things. Hart could not compel a certain MI5 agent to testify, nor did he have the power to investigate several missing files related to MI5 and Army Intelligence. 

Wallace spent 7 years in jail framed for a murder he did not commit (it was later proven he was innocent). Some believe he was sent away to be quiet.

The judge said the cooperation of the current Police Service of Northern Ireland was in “marked contrast to the unwillingness of some individuals”.

He stressed that all requests by the inquiry for classified files relating to Kincora were “honoured” by government and security agencies.

Hart said there was “no credible evidence” to support allegations that a paedophile ring including senior British establishment figures had abused children in Kincora. The report had “stripped away decades of half-truths masquerading as facts in relation to Kincora”.

The inquiry, which sat at Banbridge courthouse in County Down for two years, investigated children’s care homes and institutions from the Northern Ireland state’s foundation in 1922 to 1995.

During the Kincora section of the inquiry it emerged that MI5 and MI6 were legally represented at Banbridge. Critics of how the hearing into Kincora had been framed expressed concerns the government would use the Official Secrets Act to prevent the inquiry gaining access to files from MI5 and MI6.

The report severely criticised the Catholic Church’s behaviour

Among the other scandals highlighted in the report was that surrounding Fr Brendan Smyth. He was a paedophile priest whom the Catholic hierarchy kept moving around parishes in both Ireland and the United States long after it knew about his abuse of children in places such as west Belfast.

“Father Brendan Smyth was able to carry out widespread sexual abuse of children, including some children resident in homes investigated by the inquiry, due to the failure of branches of the Roman Catholic church to properly address his behaviour from before he was ordained as a priest, despite clear warnings,” it said.

“There was repeated failure to assess the risk he posed to children, to confine him to his abbey, to thoroughly investigate allegations of abuse, to notify the police and social services, and to share information between dioceses and report matters to the appropriate civil and ecclesiastical authorities.”

The report also criticised an order of Catholic nuns, the Sisters of Nazareth. Of the homes they ran in Belfast and Derry, it said: “In each of the four homes, some nuns engaged in physical and emotional abuse against children. Emotional abuse was widespread in all homes.”

Hart and his team found that a disinfectant was used in baths in the orphanages. He said there was a significant number of cases of sexual abuse involving priests and lay staff. Many of these incidents were known to members of the clergy, who did nothing to stop them, the report said.

The leader of Ireland’s Catholics, Archbishop Eamon Martin, said he would discuss its findings with Pope Francis when he met the pontiff in Rome later on Friday.

He said the report “reminds us that much work remains to be undertaken in this regard”.

Public hearings were held into 22 institutions across Northern Ireland which were run by the state, local authorities, the Catholic church, the Church of Ireland, and other voluntary organisations. Hart’s report runs to 2,300 pages and contains 10 volumes of findings and testimonies.

The NSPCC children’s charity said: “This inquiry has shed light on horrendous and widespread abuse carried out against children in Northern Ireland in the past. Institutions must now be held to account for the prolonged, systematic failings against the children in their care. It is right that the survivors receive the justice they deserve and we support the recommendation for redress.”

N.I. Historical Institutional Abuse Inquiry Report with Serious Disclaimer

STATEMENT ISSUED BY COLIN WALLACE FOLLOWING THE PUBLICATION OF THE HISTORICAL INSTITUTIONAL ABUSE INQUIRY REPORT ON 20 JANUARY 2017

Although I initially offered to give evidence to the Inquiry, I later decided not to mainly on the grounds that the Government repeatedly refused to give it the same legal powers as the corresponding Inquiry in London. I believe that both the perception and the reality of the Government’s decision is one of unfairness to the victims.

Despite my decision, I did, however, provide the Inquiry with 265 pages of comment and supporting documents, drawing attention to false or misleading information contained in the transcripts of the public hearings. My reason for doing so was to enable the Inquiry to investigate and corroborate the accuracy of my past comments about Kincora and related matters, and to provide the Inquiry with the opportunity to correct the relevant errors in the its published transcripts.

John Colin Wallace is a former British member of the Intelligence Corps in Northern Ireland and a psychological warfare specialist. He was one of the members of the intelligence agency-led 'Clockwork Orange' project, alleged to have been an attempt to smear various individuals including a number of senior British politicians in the early 1970s. 

Colin Wallace (left) with Field
Marshal Lord Alexander of Tunis

He also attempted to draw public attention to the Kincora Boys' Home sexual abuse scandal several years before the Royal Ulster Constabulary finally intervened. 

He was wrongly convicted of manslaughter in 1981, for which he spent six years in gaol, until 1987. The conviction was later quashed in the light of new forensic and other evidence that raised serious questions about the dubious nature of the evidence used to convict Wallace initially. 

The journalist Paul Foot, in his book Who framed Colin Wallace?, suggested that Wallace may have been framed for the killing, possibly to discredit the allegations he was making. This view was similarly expressed by Alex Carlile QC (now Lord Carlile), who later speculated that this may have been the motive not just for the alleged frameup, but also for murder. Wikipedia

With thanks to Cathy Fox Blog

and The Needle

Info not made available to Inquiries

None of the information I provided to the Inquiry is new. Although some of it has not previously been in the public domain, it has been in the possession of the Ministry of Defence and other Government agencies for many years and should have been made available by those authorities to the Inquiry. It should also have been made available by the authorities to previous Inquiries and the Government needs to explain why that did not happen.

Info gone missing

Even more worrying, is the acknowledged fact that key Army Intelligence files relating to Tara and William McGrath appear to have gone missing after they were handed over by the Army to MI5 in 1989, prior to Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s admission to Parliament (30 January 1990) that Ministers had “inadvertently misled” Parliament about my case. There also appears to be no record whatsoever of what became of all the ‘Clockwork Orange’ project files which I handed over to my superiors when I left Army Headquarters in Lisburn in February 1975. Some of those files related to William McGrath. To make matters worse, it is now clear from the Inquiry’s transcripts that a senior MI5 officer, Ian Cameron, falsely accused me of ‘leaking’ information to the press about William McGrath. His claim was that I did so without authority.

The MI5 claim is bizarre because, as my Army superior at the time has confirmed in the press, I was officially instructed by my superiors in Psy Ops, at the behest of Major General Peter Leng, to brief the press about McGrath as early as 1973, in a bid to draw media attention to his activities. I have no doubts whatsoever that because General Leng wanted the press to investigate McGrath, he had very good reasons for doing so and deserves credit for what he did.

MI5 officer refused to testify

It is also significant that MI5 officer who accused me of ‘leaking’ information about McGrath to the press later refused to be interviewed by the Terry Inquiry investigators about why he ordered Army Intelligence officer, Captain Brian Gemmell, to stop investigating William McGrath. Clearly, the Army and MI5 had very different agendas regarding McGrath and his activities.

MI5 lied

The astonishing claim by the authorities, including the Intelligence Services, that they knew nothing about the allegations surrounding McGrath’s sexual activities until 1980 is a total travesty. As my documents clearly show, it is simply not credible that I knew more about McGrath and his activities than the combined Intelligence community did in 1973/74. One must conclude, therefore, that the Intelligence Services did not tell the Inquiry all they knew about McGrath during the 1970s. Indeed, most of the information I possessed about McGrath in 1973/74 came from within the Intelligence community and was quite substantial. Moreover, my 1973 press briefing document clearly contains more information about McGrath than the Intelligence Services have claimed to the Inquiry that they possessed at that time! Finally, to suggest that because I gave the press the exact postal address (including the street number of the property) and telephone number of the Kincora home, but did not actually include the name, ‘Kincora’, somehow invalidates my evidence, is an unacceptable attempt to avoid facing up to what I have been saying over the years. That information also shows that the claim made by the Intelligence Services to the Inquiry that they were not aware until 1980 of where McGrath worked is demonstrably false.

Overall, I believe the Inquiry has been a wasted opportunity to establish the full facts relating to this matter and I feel the victims have been let down yet again, as they were by previous Inquiries.

The Historical Institutional Abuse Inquiry

Welcome to the website of the Inquiry into Historical Institutional Abuse in Northern Ireland between 1922 and 1995.  The Inquiry was independent from government and had two main components.  One was the Acknowledgement Forum, whose members listened to the experiences of those who were children in residential institutions (other than schools) in Northern Ireland between 1922 and 1995.  

The other component was the Statutory Inquiry. In its 223 days of public hearings between 13 January 2014 and 8 July 2016 it investigated 22 institutions, as well as the circumstances surrounding the sending of child migrants from Northern Ireland to Australia, and the activities of Fr Brendan Smyth, and issues of finance and governance. We delivered our Report to the First Minister and deputy First Minister on Friday 6 January 2017, and were obliged to deliver the Report to them at least 14 days before the Report could be published. Today we publish the Report in both hard copy form and on the Internet.

Historical Institutional Abuse Inquiry - Report Chapters

Kincora Material          

Social Workers Told About Kincora Sex Abuse Claims 'as Early as 1967'

The inquiry is currently focusing on the former

Kincora Boys' Home

Social workers were told of sex abuse allegations at the former Kincora Boys' Home as early as 1967, a public inquiry has heard.

Belfast Telegraph
 

The Historical Institutional (HIA) Abuse Inquiry was shown a handwritten letter sent to the Belfast Welfare Authority in which it was claimed boys were being regularly assaulted by the house warden Joseph Mains.

The letter, dated September 1967 also described how one boy, known only as R5, was sent to bed early, made to scrub floors and work in the garden for rejecting Mains' advances.

R5 wrote: "I first realised something was wrong as far as Mr Mains was concerned.

"Very often when boys were washing he would come into the washroom and put his arms around our chests and hold us tightly to him.

"Also, sometimes as boys walked past him in the home he would touch them up."

The long running inquiry, at Banbridge Courthouse, is examining allegations of state sponsored child prostitution, blackmail and cover up.

There have been persistent allegations that a high-ranking paedophile ring preyed on vulnerable teenage boys at Kincora during the 1970s.

It is further alleged that the UK security services knew about the abuse but did nothing to stop it, instead using the information to blackmail and extract intelligence from the influential men, including senior politicians, who were the perpetrators.

In a statement given to police in the 1980s, R5 recalled how Mains had become jittery, frightened and offered him cigarettes and possibly money when he heard that the complaint had been lodged with the authorities.

It also emerged that another boy reported allegations of child sex abuse in two detailed letters in 1971.

The five-page documents, also shown to the inquiry, were delivered to the Belfast Welfare Authority and to the office of a social worker with a reference that they should be handed into a central police station.

However, Joseph Aiken, counsel to the HIA said the reference to give the letter to police was "missed" and detectives did not receive the information until 1976.

In 1981, Mains and two other senior care workers, deputy warden Raymond Semple and house-master William McGrath were convicted for abusing boys at Kincora during the 1970s.

A year later, a detective from Sussex Police, who had been looking into the allegations of a paedophile ring said many of the residents had been "sexually naive youngsters".

"It is difficult for an investigator to believe that persons in authority did not know or suspect what was taking place," the detective noted.

Statements from a number of boys who were placed in Kincora during the 1960s were put to the inquiry throughout the day.

Although they included graphic details of extent of the abuse by staff members, none claimed to have been aware of a vice-ring.

One boy, referred to as R7, who was abused at the age of 16, said: "I was not aware of any prostitution or vice ring or important people being involved.

"The only homosexual behaviour I know of at the hostel concerned Joseph Mains and Raymond Semple," he said.

Another, given the cipher B3/R1 said: "I have no knowledge of politicians, police or such people involved in any such activity.

"When I read of the goings on, I was very surprised. I knew nothing of prostitution and homosexual relations with fellas outside the hostel. If it was happening there I would have known of it."

Some boys described being abused while bathing or changing while others said it happened on an almost daily basis.

There was also abuse among peers, the inquiry heard.

Another ex-resident, known only as R4, said he had grown used to being assaulted by Mains but did not like it and feared speaking out.

On Wednesday, the inquiry was told that MI5, MI6 and the Ministry of Defence could find no evidence that officials were involved in, condoned or exploited the sex abuse at Kincora.

Outside the court, solicitor Claire McKeegan, who is acting for a number of victims, said the claims would be treated with caution.

"We look forward to hearing full and detailed evidence of exactly what agencies of the state knew and when they knew it," she said.

The inquiry continues on Friday.

Paedophile IRA Brothers Moved South of Border

Siblings 'blackmailed' to work as British agents

Despite claims by Sinn Fein President Gerry Adams that the IRA 'shot' paedophiles or rapists, the brothers - now aged in their 50s - were allowed to go free because they had close family connections to senior figures in the organisation.

Both were subsequently active in Sinn Fein, one holding office. Although rank-and-file party members might not have known about their background, their history was well known among senior IRA and Sinn Fein figures in Belfast. Their history was also well known to senior British security and RUC figures.

One former British security figure, speaking on grounds of anonymity, last night said the brothers were recruited as agents after it was learnt both were "of that type of bent".

The source used the same term that Gerry Adams used in the Dail last week about the way the IRA "resettled" abusers in relation to the brothers, though he had not heard Adams' speech.

A senior republican source told the Sunday Independent one of the brothers was known in west Belfast as a "kiddie fiddler", though he was never charged with any sexual abuse related offences or faced any sanction from the IRA other than exile to the Republic.

This brother was involved in serious offences including the murder of another IRA member suspected of being an informant for the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC). Despite this he was allowed to continue his activities in the IRA and free to continue his abuse of children, while working for British Army Intelligence.

He subsequently left the North in the late 1980s and 'resettled' in Co Louth, where he still lives. It is not believed he came to the attention of gardai.

The other brother was said to have been a lower level IRA member not involved in serious terrorism. He too was 'resettled' south of the Border after a complaint was made by one of his victims but subsequently returned to Belfast.

Both were identified as paedophiles by the British intelligence services and "turned", the term used for recruitment as agents within the IRA, the security source told the Sunday Independent.

He said one brother was "turned" after a collection of paedophile pornography was found in his home. The source said it was known there was a history of abuse in the brother's family background.

The source added: "On the (mother's family name) side of the family there would have been others, I think from memory, who were guilty of the same thing. In some ways it was seen as a tool which could be used to exploit somebody. Both worked for FRU (Force Reconnaissance Unit, the British Army's secret undercover unit in Northern Ireland). "I know (name of one of the brothers) had a penchant for child porn. They were both into that type of bent, for want of a better word.

"Both (the names of the brothers) were well known about within the Republican Movement. (Name of one of the brothers) was moved to Newry and, from memory, there was a bit of a bad reaction there because they knew he was a 'kiddie fiddler' and they moved him to Dundalk."

The brothers escaped execution by the IRA once it learned both had been recruited as agents because of their family connections.

One of the brothers was subsequently allowed to return to Belfast.

A former senior IRA figure told the Sunday Independent: "Yes, it was well known" that the brother who was more seriously involved in IRA terrorism was, in his words also, a 'kiddie fiddler' and: "a "Brussel, ('brussel sprout', the Belfast slang term for a 'tout' or informant) for (expletive) sake, everyone knew that."

The Sunday Independent previously revealed how another Sinn Fein figure, subsequently well known in the North, who was similarly "turned" by the RUC Special Branch after they secretly filmed him having sex with his niece who was aged only 13 or 14 at the time. The abuse was said to have taken place in a caravan used by Sinn Fein as a polling office during elections in the North in the 1980s. The video tape is said to have been explicit and watched for entertainment by Special Branch officers. This man remained in Northern Ireland.

The former British intelligence figure also revealed that one of their own agent handlers was caught "taking pictures of kids" at a location in Co Armagh. "We had our own bad apples," he said. "It wasn't just in the Republican Movement. You get it in all walks of life."

A separate republican source said another Sinn Fein figure was 'resettled' in the Republic after it was alleged he had raped a young IRA woman at a party on the night she was released from a jail term for explosives offences. The boyfriend of another IRA woman prisoner who complained to Sinn Fein was badly beaten by an IRA squad with iron bars and hurleys.

The British security services and the IRA could both come under the spotlight if, as suggested by the North's Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness last week, a commission of inquiry is set up to investigate the movement of abusers across the Border.

Sunday Independent

Blackmailing gays, pedophiles and other perverts was a common occurrence during the 2nd World war and the subsequent cold war. MI5 often used such people as agents or double agents against communist intelligence. It is no stretch to see it used by the Army and the RUC in its struggles with the IRA. 

It's still very disappointing that they considered the children to be acceptable, collateral damage in their operations. As we see by the Special Branch officers choice of entertainment, they were not much better than those they blackmailed.

MI5 and Kincora House - "One of the Biggest Scandals of Our Time"

Kincora Home for Boys, Haven for Perverts, courtesy MI5

British intelligence agency MI5 faces allegations it covered up child sex abuse at a care home in east Belfast for decades to protect its intelligence operations, Northern Ireland’s high court will hear on Tuesday.

Victims of child sex abuse which took place in Kincora Boys’ Home throughout the 1970s are pursuing a full independent inquiry into the matter.

If successful, the victims’ legal challenge will result in a robust inquiry that compels key witnesses to testify. MI5 would also be forced to supply investigators with vital documents.

The Belfast-based court case is the first to address the British state’s alleged links to the notorious care home in the 1970s. It begins on Tuesday, and is expected to continue throughout the week.

Former Kincora residents are calling for a full, independent inquiry into the British state’s collusion in the abuse, similar to the inquiry set up to investigate Westminster child abuse, chaired by judge Lowell Goddard.

Goddard was recently appointed by Home Secretary Theresa May as the new head of Britain’s Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse. May has conceded allegations of state involvement in the pedophile ring that infiltrated Kincora Boys' Home should be investigated.

She agreed in January that Britain’s Official Secrets Act should be waived to allow ex-military intelligence officers to come forward with evidence.

‘One of the biggest scandals of our age’
Amnesty International describes the abuse at Kincora as “one of the biggest scandals of our age.” The rights group supports victims’ demands for an independent inquiry with full powers.

Patrick Corrigan, Amnesty’s Northern Ireland Program Director, told RT:“The allegations could scarcely be more serious – that MI5 used a pedophile ring at the boys' home for its own intelligence-gathering purposes and then blocked police investigations which could have ended the abuse years before it was finally stopped.

“If true, that means that the UK security services used vulnerable boys as nothing more than sexual bait in a blackmail trap. Some people talk about a 'dirty war' in Northern Ireland – but these allegations are stomach-churning and must be fully investigated with an inquiry with the full-powers to do so.

Gary Hoy, an alleged victim at the Kincora home,
says the security services should not be allowed to hide the facts.

“If proven, those responsible must be held accountable before the law – whether perpetrators of abuse or those who perpetuated that abuse by allowing it continue for years. That would mean prosecutions and the prospect of prison to follow police investigations, and should also mean compensation for the victims.”

Lawyers representing the victims will argue that MI5 personnel had knowledge of the child abuse at Kincora, allowed it to continue, and were complicit in protecting those involved from investigation or prosecution, according to documents submitted to Belfast’s high court.

One alleged victim, Gary Hoy, entered Kincora with his little brother in the 1970s. He claims the abuse he experienced there severely damaged him in later life.

In a sworn affidavit seen by the Guardian, he says, “I find it heart-wrenching that there were security men [who] could have been behind the abuse or involved in it … Because they were in positions of authority or supposed to be protecting the state they get away with it.”

Lawyers for Hoy will argue he suffered abuse at the care home, which is defined under article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) as torture.

'MI5 cover-up'
Colin Wallace, a former military information officer based in Northern Ireland, said British MPs had been deceived about child abuse at Kincora Boys’ Home.

He told the Guardian there is undeniable evidence UK government agencies' cover-up of the abuse was concealed from Britain’s Parliament.

However, victims’ demand for an inquiry with full powers was backed last week by Britain’s Home Affairs Select Committee.

The committee recommended that Kincora be included in the ongoing child abuse inquiry ordered by Westminster.

Amnesty’s Northern Ireland Program Director, Patrick Corrigan, said the committee’s recommendation was bad news for those who want Kincora’s murky past to remain secret.

“Nothing less than the inclusion of the Kincora home in this inquiry is liable to see the truth finally arrived at and justice finally delivered,” he told RT.

A spokesperson for the Home Office, the government department responsible for MI5, said the government is collaborating fully with all “investigations into allegations" relating to the Kincora Boys’ Home.

“It is not appropriate to comment further while these investigations are under way,” the spokesperson told the Guardian.

Three senior staff at Kincora were imprisoned in 1981 for abusing 11 boys in their care. But it is feared the facility hosted many more abusers and victims between 1960 and 1980.

To this day, allegations prevail that a pedophile ring at the children's home was linked directly to the British intelligence services.

Two ex-military intelligence officers insist MI5 blocked police inquiries into child abuse that occurred there in the 1970s.

One officer says MI5 was complicit in the abuse that took place, while another claims he reported it to the security services, but no action was pursued.

It is good that this is getting the attention it deserves. there absolutely must be a full inquiry into the horror show if there is ever to be any hope of honest and integrity the the British government and security services again.

Goodnight Sweet Pervert, Sleep Tight

When you are sick, it's nice to have someone tuck you into bed, pull the covers up over you and give you a little kiss. But when you are a Member of Parliament, your sickness is pedophilia, or murder, and you are covered and kissed by the Secret Service - it shakes your confidence in mankind.

Barbara Castle, the former Labour minister, tried to alert newspapers to the case

The security services are facing questions over the cover-up of a Westminster paedophile ring as it emerged that files relating to official requests for media blackouts in the early 1980s were destroyed.

Two newspaper executives have told the Observer that their publications were issued with D-notices – warnings not to publish intelligence that might damage national security – when they sought to report on allegations of a powerful group of men engaging in child sex abuse in 1984.

One executive said he had been accosted in his office by 15 uniformed and two non-uniformed police over a dossier on Westminster paedophiles passed to him by the former Labour cabinet minister Barbara Castle.

The other said that his newspaper had received a D-notice when a reporter sought to write about a police investigation into Elm Guest House, in southwest London, where a group of high-profile paedophiles was said to have operated and may have killed a child. Now it has emerged that these claims are impossible to verify or discount because the D-notice archives for that period “are not complete”.

Officials running the D-notice system, which works closely with MI5 and MI6 and the Ministry of Defence, said that files “going back beyond 20 years are not complete because files are reviewed and correspondence of a routine nature with no historical significance destroyed”.

The spokesman added: “I cannot believe that past D-notice secretaries would have countenanced the destruction of any key documents. I can only repeat that while any attempted cover-up of this incident might have been attributed to a D-notice the truth would be that it was not.”

Theresa May, home secretary, this month told the Commons that an official review into whether there had been a cover-up of the Home Office’s handling of child-abuse allegations in the 1980s had returned a verdict of “not proven”. The review, by Peter Wanless, the chief executive of the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, was prompted by the discovery that 114 Home Office files related to child abuse in the 1980s had gone missing.

Labour MP for Rochdale, Simon Danczuk

On Saturday night the Labour MP for Rochdale, Simon Danczuk, whose book Smile for the Camera exposed the child sex abuse of the late Liberal MP Cyril Smith, said it was a matter of deep concern that D-notice correspondence had also disappeared, presumed destroyed.

D-notices to media outlets are rare, with just five sent in 2009 and 10 in 2010, according to a freedom of information response from Air Vice-Marshal Andrew Vallance, secretary of the defence, press and broadcasting advisory committee, which oversees the system.

Danczuk said: “There are clearly questions to be answered as to why these documents were destroyed. They issue very few of them – where was the need to destroy correspondence?"

“It feels like just another example of key documents from that period going missing. We need to know more about what has happened. The journalists who have said that D-notices were issued are respected people with no reason to lie.”

The two journalists, Don Hale, the former editor of the Bury Messenger, and Hilton Tims, news editor of the Surrey Comet between 1980 and 1988, both recall their publications being issued with D-notices around 1984. Tims, a veteran of the Daily Mail and BBC, where he was head of publicity for the launch of colour TV, said that his chief reporter had informed him that a D-notice had been issued to him after he tried to report on a police investigation into events at Elm Guest House, where Smith is said to have been a regular visitor.

Tims, 82, said: “One of the reporters on routine calls to       More children are
the police learned that there was something going down     sexually abused in
at the guest house in Barnes. It was paedophilia, but       18 years than all the
that wasn’t the fashionable phrase at the time, it was          casualties from all
'knocking up young boys’, or something like that."             the wars, genocides
                                                                                             and epidemics of the
“The reporter was told that there were a number of             20th century. Pray.

high-profile people involved and they were getting 

boys from a care home in the Richmond area. So I put someone on to it, the chief reporter I think, to make inquiries. It was the following day that we had a D-notice slapped on us; the reporter came over and told me. It was the only time in my career.”

Hale, who was awarded an OBE for his successful campaign to overturn the murder conviction of Stephen Downing, a victim of one of the longest-known miscarriages of justice, said he was issued with a D-notice when editor of the Bury Messenger. He had been given a file by Castle, by then an MEP, which had details of a Home Office investigation into allegations made by the Tory MP Geoffrey Dickens of the existence of a Westminster paedophile ring. The files contained the name of 16 MPs said to be involved and another 40 who were supportive of the goals of the Paedophile Information Exchange, which sought to reduce the age of consent.

Hale said he asked the Home Office for guidance on the dossier and the progress of the investigation but was stonewalled.

Hale said: “Then shortly after Cyril Smith bullied his way into my office. I thought he was going to punch me. He was sweating and aggressive and wanted to take the files away, saying it was a load of nonsense and that Barbara Castle just had a bee in her bonnet about homosexuals. I refused to give him the files.

“The very next day two non-uniformed officers, about 15 uniformed officers and another non-uniformed person, who didn’t introduce himself, came to the office waving a D-notice and said that I would be damaging national security if I reported on the file.”

A spokesman for the D-notice system said: “If Don Hale was ‘served’ with anything purporting to be a ‘D-notice’, it was quite obviously a fabrication.” 

Is it possible that Smith had a D-notice fabricated and convinced or fooled the police into serving it? It certainly is possible, but then, what are those missing D-notice files?

Pressure Continues to Add Kincora Boys' Home to Child Sex Abuse Inquiry

First Minister Peter Robinson has said that child sex abuse at Kincora boys' home is a "national scandal" that needs to be fully investigated. The Kincora Boys' Home was located in east Belfast, Northern Ireland.

He said he has written to the prime minister to urge that the east Belfast home is included in the ongoing Westminister child sex abuse inquiry.

First Minister of Northern Ireland and Leader of the Democratic Unionist Party
Peter Robinson

Robinson adds a powerful voice to the many who have been calling for the inclusion of Kincora to the Westminster inquiry.

Earlier, a former Army intelligence officer said he was ordered to stop investigations into the home in 1975.

In 1981, three senior care staff at the home were jailed for abusing 11 boys.

Brian Gemmell said he presented a report on claims of abuse at the home to a senior MI5 officer but was told to stop his investigation.

It has been claimed that people of the "highest profile" were connected to abuse at the home.

Private Eye magazine alleges that high-ranking members of the Whitehall Civil Service and senior officers of the British military were involved in the sexual abuse of boys in Kincora. Whitehall is the administrative centre of the Government of the United Kingdom.

Earlier this month, another former Army officer, Colin Wallace, said any new investigation of Kincora must have access to information from intelligence agencies. Unless, of course, those files all happen to disappear.

Mr Wallace said he received intelligence in 1973 to say that boys were being abused, but claims some of his superiors refused to pass on the information.

Mr Robinson said that the allegations of a cover-up "need to be investigated".

"There are questions that have to be answered," he said.

"Because at the bottom of all this, and I've met some of the individuals concerned, we're talking about young boys who were put into the care of the state and we are now being told that there were agencies of the state who were aware of it and did nothing.

"That is the most serious allegation that can be made, particularly when you see just how much it has ruined the lives of so many people."

Kincoras Boys Home 1982

"I hope to see him over the weekend at some events. Again, I will prompt him on the issue because I think it is one that is important, that the prime minister of our country gives a very clear steer that something has to be done."

Mr Robinson said any investigation would require full access to information from intelligence agencies.

"I think there has to be complete freedom on the part of those who want to give evidence to be able to do so.

"I don't think anybody is asking them to divulge national secrets, but this is a national scandal that needs to be dealt with and I trust that whatever steps are taken to ensure that the truth comes out are taken."

"The extent to which there is an avoidance of that kind of thorough investigation adds at least circumstantially to the case that there is something to hide," he said.

"If there is nothing to hide, why would anybody fear opening the books?"

"Let's see exactly what has happened, whether the person at the heart of the Kincora scandal was indeed on the payroll of MI5, whether their handlers were aware of what was going on; why they chose, if that is the case, not to do anything about it and leave vulnerable boys in that situation.

"In some cases it goes beyond rumours," he said. "Again, you get down to what might be regarded as circumstantial evidence, but people did take their lives after being questioned by police on these issues.

"I've heard the rumours, I've read some of the documentation in relation to it and there is certainly a prima facie case that would merit an investigation."

Calls for Child Sex Inquiry to Include Kincora Boys Home and Links to MI5

Allegations that abuse at Kincora Boys' Home was linked to British intelligence services "need to be investigated", a former PSNI assistant chief constable has said.

Alan McQuillan said he had no proof of security service involvement, but that the claims were "potentially credible".

It follows calls for the east Belfast home to be included in a government inquiry into child sex abuse.

In 1981, three senior care staff at the home were jailed for abusing 11 boys.

Kincora Boys Home 1982

Speaking on Radio Ulster's Nolan Show on Wednesday, Alan McQuillan said, considering the context around the time that the abuse was alleged to have occurred, he believed it was "potentially credible" that intelligence services may have been involved.

He said: "The allegation is there and it needs to be investigated. I do not know if it did happen, but I have to say, due to everything that was going on at the time, it could have happened.

"Effectively when Kincora was at its peak we had undeclared martial law here, the police service had collapsed, the army were in charge of security.

"There were all sorts of very strange things and some very strange people operating in Belfast and other parts of Northern Ireland, as part of the security operations.

"There are issues around the circumstances in which the police investigation in the mid-70s was closed down. All of that needs to be opened up and examined."

Amnesty International and politicians, including the former Mayor of London Ken Livingstone, have already called for the remit of the Westminster inquiry to be widened to include Kincora.

The inquiry is being set up to examine how public institutions handled their duty of care to protect children from paedophiles.

Last week, Amnesty's NI director, Patrick Corrigan said there were fears that there were "many more victims and abusers" at Kincora, during the period between 1960 and 1980.

He said: "Allegations have persisted that paedophilia at Kincora was linked to British intelligence services, with claims that visitors to the home included members of the military, politicians and civil servants, and that police investigations into abuse at Kincora were blocked by the Ministry of Defence and MI5."

Alan McQuillan said getting Kincora included as part of the Westminster inquiry to examine the allegations surrounding the home was vital.

"We are looking at this with a very different light today, compared to what was considered even in the 80s and 90s," he said.

"We have seen so much more about what was going on in certain areas, and we are much more aware of the different issues surrounding child abuse now.

"But unless you get the active co-operation of the British governments and relevant agencies, then any investigation or public inquiry will get you nowhere. You need that level of co-operation and assistance."