Former care home owner guilty of assaulting youngsters over 20 years
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Version 0 of 1. The owner of a group of children’s homes may spend the rest of his life in prison after he was found guilty on 33 counts of sexually assaulting vulnerable youngsters in his care over more than 20 years. John Allen, 73, who was the owner and manager of the Bryn Alyn Community homes in north Wales, systematically abused children from the late sixties to the early nineties. The conviction is the first since detectives launched an inquiry called Operation Pallial into historical child abuse in and around the Wrexham area. Led by the National Crime Agency, Pallial was started in the wake of the discredited BBC Newsnight report in which a former children’s home resident claimed he had been abused by a senior Conservative from the Thatcher era. Lord McAlpine was widely identified on Twitter and elsewhere on the internet as the Tory referred to, until a Guardian investigation concluded he was the victim of mistaken identify. By then dozens of victims had come forward to say they had suffered abuse and to claim their complaints were not taken seriously at the time, sparking the NCA investigation. So far allegations made by 236 people are under “active investigation” and 120 people have been named as potential suspects. Thirty-one men and four women have been arrested or interviewed under caution and of those 12 are due to stand trial for various offences in 2015. Allen was working as a night porter at a hotel in Suffolk when the Newsnight report ran. He has already been in prison for abusing children after being found guilty in the early 1990s of sexual abuse relating to six boys. In 2001 he was charged with sexual offences connected to a number of boys but was not put on trial because of a technicality. During his trial at Mold crown court in north Wales this autumn, it emerged how twice-married Allen, a hotelier by trade, had set up the Bryn Alyn Community though he had no care qualifications. The prosecution described how he created a “sexualised atmosphere”, “grooming” some children by giving them gifts, including motorcycles, and treats such as lunches out but threatening others with violence if they did not comply. Children were assaulted in their dormitory beds, in bathrooms, during camping trips and night-time expeditions, at Allen’s home and at his hotel. Those who plucked up the courage to go to the authorities were disbelieved or ignored, it is claimed. The court was told that one victim alleged he saw Allen assault a child in front of a social worker without any comeback. Another boy claimed he told a social worker he had been abused only to be assaulted by the social worker’s boss. When youngsters did go to the police, Allen was called to pick them up and take them back. One boy alleged that he was introduced to Allen through a “paedophile gang” before being abused by him. A separate inquiry chaired by Lady Justice Macur is investigating an earlier probe by the late Sir Ronald Waterhouse into the abuse of children in care in the former Gwynedd and Clwyd council areas of north Wales between 1974 and 1996. Many former children’s homes victims have criticised the scope and findings of the Waterhouse review. Allen had denied 40 charges of abuse against 19 boys and one girl. Eleanor Laws QC, prosecuting, painted Allen as “a formidable presence” at the homes in and around Wrexham. She said many of the children arrived having already been abused but Allen took advantage of their vulnerability. “Most had to learn to live with it,” said Laws. “They felt there was no way out.” Laws gave the jury brief details of the horrific stories former residents had told Operation Pallial. One, who was taken into care in the late sixties for his own protection, recalled the smell of whisky on Allen as he was sexually assaulted. He described feeling “dirty” and “guilty” afterwards. One boy who said he was abused when aged just seven, said his ordeal was the “turning point” in his life. He said he was scared of the dark and “screaming himself to sleep” when Allen got into bed with him and sexually assaulted him. He said the pain was “unbelievable”. Another boy said he suffered a serious accident and was unable to walk. He claims he was not taken to hospital but was assaulted by Allen as he lay on his front immobile in a children’s home room. Yet another youngster said he was abused by Allen and a stranger in a toilet. He said it was like “torture”. He ended up face down in stale urine and had to eat through a straw for weeks. The only girl Allen was charged over said she blames herself for “letting” herself be abused. Victims have described Allen as charismatic and powerful. Youngsters believed he had been in the SAS and some thought of him as a father figure. There were two sides to him, “nasty and nice”, a daytime Allen, and a night-time one, they told police. Allen denied that he had a sexual interest in boys. He said he was bisexual and had a relationship with a man when he worked as a manager in the pop industry. Ian Mulcahey, senior investigating officer for Operation Pallial, said it was a large and complex ongoing investigation. “At the moment we are investigating allegations received from 236 people. The investigation is ongoing and I want to assure the public that we will continue to take allegations seriously and I would like to finish by saying that I would like to thank all those victims who came forward and played a part in putting John Allen where he belongs – which is behind bars.” |