Cops left kids ‘at mercy’ of Rochdale grooming gangs & secretly took aborted foetus of victim, 13, shock report finds

POLICE left children at the “mercy” of Rochdale grooming gangs and secretly took an aborted foetus from one young victim, a damning report found.

Officers from Greater Manchester Police took the baby from Rochdale hospital in March 2009 without telling the 13-year-old.

They then placed the foetus in a freezer at a police station after DNA tests failed to match possible suspects in the grooming gang investigation.

The baby lay forgotten until a “routine property review” several years later, while the girl continued to be abused.

She was left to fend for herself while being threatened by gang members after bravely coming forward to report her abuser.

The horror story was revealed in a shocking report into the scandal, which saw hundreds of vulnerable young girls exploited by Asian men in the city.

Co-author Malcolm Newsam CBE found it was just one in a string of “deplorable” failings by GMP and council bosses.

He wrote: “Successive police operations were launched over this period, but these were insufficiently resourced to match the scale of the widespread organised exploitation within the area.

“Consequently, children were left at risk and many of their abusers to this day have not been apprehended.”

The 173-page report, which covers 2004 to 2013, identifies 96 men still deemed a potential risk to children – but most of these are yet to be prosecuted.

It warns the number is “only a proportion” of those involved in the horror.

There were also at least 74 children being sexually exploited – and in 48 of those cases there were serious failures to protect the child

On some occasions, no action was taken against grooming gang members – including one who left a 15-year-old girl pregnant.

One victim told officers she was kept in a cage and “made to bark like a dog or dress like a baby” but GMP took no action once she left the region and was put in care elsewhere.

If any cases did reach court, young victims were left by officers to be “harassed and intimidated by the men who had previously abused them” – sometimes at gunpoint, the report found.

In one particularly shocking finding, a victim known as Amber was arrested then bailed to live with a man who had already been held on suspicion of child sexual exploitation.

The Crown Prosecution Service, in consultation with GMP, decided to name Amber as a co-conspirator in a trial involving her abusers.

The report found this was “deplorable further abuse of a CSE survivor” and “an “incredible example of poor practice”.

It also detailed other examples that showed “compelling evidence” of widespread, organised sexual abuse of children in Rochdale from as early as 2004 onwards.

There was a “serious failure” to protect the children, who were often vulnerable and from poorer backgrounds.

The authorities even identified ringleaders of the gang but did not investigate further because the children were too frightened to assist, the report found.

Some police operations – including one into two takeaway shops that involved 30 adult male suspects – was aborted prematurely because police bosses failed to resource it properly.

The CPS also deemed the main child victim was an unreliable witness.

It wasn’t until 2010 – more than two years later – that GMP finally launched Operation Span into the abuse claims.

Nine men were convicted in 2012 after plying girls as young as 12 with alcohol and drugs before they gang-raped them.

But while police and council bosses presented the verdict as having “resolved” grooming in the town, the reality was that it had “only scraped the surface”.

The report was authored by Mr Newsam and Gary Ridgeway, a former detective superintendent, following allegations by whistleblowers Sara Rowbotham and Maggie Oliver.

The pair’s battle to bring abusers to justice and expose their horrific crimes was revealed in BBC TV documentary The Betrayed Girls.

Mr Newsham and Mr Ridgeway found they were “lone voices” who had flagged the clear evidence of “prolific serial rape of countless children in Rochdale”.

GMP has since apologised and said similar cases are handled very differently now.

They have launched further investigations, which have so far resulted in the conviction of 42 men involved in the abuse of 13 children.

But Greater Manchester mayor Andy Burnham said the review showed the victims involved had been “badly failed”.

He also praised Ms Rowbotham and Ms Oliver for their bravery in exposing the widespread abuse.

Addressing the victims, he said: “We are sorry that you were so badly failed by the system that should have protected you.”

Mr Burnham, who ordered the review, added: “It is only by facing up fully and unflinchingly to what happened that we can be sure of bringing the whole system culture change needed when it comes to protecting children from abuse.”