Grooming case reveals major police and CPS failures, says former victims commissioner

We spoke to the former victims’ commissioner Vera Baird, to get her reaction to our report on a grooming victim breaking her silence after her justice was denied.

Jackie Long: I want to ask you, first of all, for your reaction to the piece – to the story in the piece.

Vera Baird: This is a major failure of safeguarding, prevention, protection and prosecution, I’m afraid.

Jackie Long: I mean, obviously, the police would say any successful conviction for a historical sexual abuse crime, we know that is difficult, that that is in itself a success. But that length of time – we know some of the girls spoke out in 2009/2010 – what’s your assessment of why it would have taken almost 15 years to get a conviction?

Vera Baird: I’m afraid I think it is just extremely poor policing and not being willing to take on the task. If they had acted on that information, Ellie Reynolds would never have had to be abused.

Jackie Long: But are you sympathetic at all to the idea that, yes, the girls did initially speak to the police, but they did withdraw cooperation precisely because of this level of extraordinary intimidation. I mean, are you sympathetic to that?

Vera Baird: To the girls? Of course.

Jackie Long: To the idea that the police perhaps…

Vera Baird: No, I mean, there’s a whole raft of things that has to happen when something like this happens. The primary thing is safeguarding. I mean, the classic neglect of safeguarding is Ellie, isn’t it? They tell the parents that she is being groomed. The parents corroborated by the story they tell you of her jumping out of windows, all kinds of nonsense. And she is suffering in the most appalling way. They’ve got all manner of things they can do to take a girl away, put her in a safe place where her parents can see her. Give her some support from the right social worker so she gets over it. They leave her exposed to all of what they’ve told the parents is happening.

Jackie Long: Ellie Reynolds does go to the police. They do send a file to the Crown Prosecution Service, but the Crown Prosecution decides not to prosecute on the grounds that she is facing an allegation of blackmail.

Vera Baird: I mean, this is absolutely hopeless, isn’t it? So the CPS don’t just have her testimony. They presumably also have Charlotte and Ava and everything else that the police have collected and should have collected in the meantime. The tone of that rejection by the CPS is appalling. She hasn’t been convicted of it. The CPS are ready to see this girl as a criminal and to reject the people who they should be looking at. It is a dreadful decision, quite dreadful.

Jackie Long: The fact that she hasn’t got justice and probably will never get justice. It’s a devastating thing for her, isn’t it, and for her family. And she has been vilified in the town.

Vera Baird: Yes.

Jackie Long: Called a liar online and in the street.

Vera Baird: Yes, that is awful and it really needs to stop. Because what shines out to me about Ellie, you know, the calibre of what she says. She could have told all she told you to the police in exactly the same way. Is there really anybody who, having watched that, doesn’t believe that it is correct? And the other thing is that although she didn’t get justice, it seems pretty plain, doesn’t it, that it is her that triggers the police into doing more. So I think there’s probably another chunk of women in Barrow who owe their safety to the courage that young woman had to speak out in the end. But it has to be said that there did come a time when better police eyes and ears were applied to this case. And it was triggered, I think, by Ellie – it went back to 2009, 2010, and they brought these excellent witnesses forward and got these men finally convicted. But what a legacy all of this will have left in Barrow among such a lot of women.

Jackie Long: And the issue of race and accusations of racism and the fact that girls are told they’re lying – that complicates everything, doesn’t it?

Vera Baird: Yes, of course it does and it mixes it all up. But race is much less important than looking at a complainant, taking in seriously what she says. Looking at whether there’s more evidence. You know, there is stuff that is dead straightforward police stuff they would do if it was terrorism, they would do it with gangsterism. They don’t do it for women.