Centre for Women’s Justice (CWJ) welcomes the publication of the Assurance Review into ‘Operation Span’ by Andy Burnham, Mayor of Greater Manchester. The extremely thorough report exposes abject failures by all the state agencies that left so many girls exposed to horrific predatory exploitation and violence by organised networks of sexual abusers (known as ‘grooming gangs’).
CWJ represented three of the victims, known as ‘Amber’, ‘Ruby’ and ‘Daisy’, in civil proceedings against Greater Manchester Police (GMP) and the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) and secured an historic settlement of damages and a public apology from the Chief Constable of GMP. Unfortunately, the CPS, to date have not been willing to offer an apology or any recognition of the harm caused to ‘Amber’ who was named on the indictment as a co-conspirator, without her knowledge, in the prosecution of some of the Rochdale grooming gang members, despite her previous assistance with the investigation and earlier designation of ‘Amber’ as a victim. In the report published today, the authors state;
“Amber was not informed that she would be named on the court indictment and was unable at any stage of the procedure to defend herself against these allegations. We can find no evidence to indicate that any consideration was given to how the decision would affect Amber personally or what the repercussions of the decision might be for her family. By naming her as a co-conspirator, in our judgement, there was a foreseeable risk to her and her family’s personal safety that was either ignored or not considered. We regard this as deplorable further abuse of a CSE survivor.”
At the press conference this morning, Mayor Andy Burnham invited the CPS to review the decision making in respect of ‘Amber’, to consider whether any disciplinary action should be taken against anyone responsible and to explore introducing a protocol for dealing with such cases in the future to prevent repetition.
Harriet Wistrich, Director of CWJ and part of the team that represented ‘Amber’, stated;
“I welcome the overall report and its recognition of the appalling criminalisation of victims of abuse. I welcome the Mayor’s call for accountability through a review of conduct matters for those responsible in the various agencies that failed the victims.
“We call on the CPS to offer a formal apology to Amber and to introduce a protocol for dealing with such cases. Far too often victims of abuse are criminalised for the convenience of criminal justice agencies. It is utterly unacceptable such victims should be further damaged by such agencies whose purpose should be to protect them and hold perpetrators accountable.”