Britain’s Forgotten Girls

“When 13-year-old Christine first saw the “boy” who had moved from the group chat she was in into her private messages, she was shocked. “Oh my gosh,” she remembers thinking. “That’s a grown man.” When she told him how old she was, he – 23 – said it didn’t change anything. He still wanted to be with her. Lonely at school, after a move precipitated by the end of her mother’s relationship with Christine’s father, she took the apparent affection offered. The rest of the women contributing to Britain’s Forgotten Girls – a harrowing hour-long documentary about the sexual and criminal exploitation of young girls over the last 20 years by drug gangs acting with virtual impunity – have similar stories to tell. The approach by the gangs happens at 12, 13, 14. Grooming follows. Then the game is switched. Rape or sexual assault occurs (“I was so scared, so scared,” says Annie, who was 14 when “all aspect of choice just got taken away from me” by the three older boys who had befriended her) and, through threatened and actual violence – perhaps supplemented by blackmail or by the lack of anywhere else for the child to turn – continues for years thereafter. The details are few and horrifying. A number of them mention having to go to school as if nothing had happened the night after an inaugural gang-rape. Your mind can hardly take it in.”
Lucy Mangan, The Guardian

“The documentary is powerful when the girls tell their stories. They could have done this anonymously, but in all but one case they have chosen to show their faces; I was reminded here of Gisèle Pelicot’s declaration that “shame must change sides”. A police whistleblower, experts in the field and former deputy children’s commissioner Sue Berelowitz add context. Berelowitz set up a national inquiry into sexual exploitation by gangs, which came out in 2012, and was criticised at the time by a government source who said its language was “hysterical” and its claims exaggerated.”
Anita Singh, Telegraph

“I watched parts of Britain’s Forgotten Girls (BBC2) in a state of weary disbelief. How can police find, as we were told, DNA samples from multiple men inside and on a 13-year-old girl, and yet the men are never prosecuted for rape? In this instance the girl was told years later that police had closed her case because they didn’t think her mental health was strong enough to stand up to cross-examination. Am I missing something? The DNA evidence alone would surely form a pretty strong case. She received a criminal compensation payment, so it was clear a crime had happened. By the end of this excellent film, a dismal tale of widespread abuse and the authorities repeatedly failing several girls like her, it began to feel like indifference. It was hard not to suspect that some police officers and prosecutors saw the children as having brought their predicaments on themselves.”
Carol Midgley, The Times