Top police officers protected in UK grooming gangs inquiry
Date
1/16/2025 6:43:04 AM
(MENAFN) A whistleblower has revealed that the inquiry into Police failures during the Rotherham grooming scandal in the UK deliberately avoided investigating senior officers, instead focusing on junior ranks. The scandal, involving the abuse of over 1,400 young girls by grooming gangs primarily made up of Pakistani men, was facilitated by systemic police negligence.
The Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) led Operation Linden, a seven-year investigation into South Yorkshire Police’s handling of child sexual exploitation cases between 1997 and 2013. The probe uncovered numerous failings, including the failure to file crime reports for serious offenses, neglecting to question adult men with vulnerable girls, and misclassifying victims as problematic rather than vulnerable. Despite these findings, few officers were disciplined.
The whistleblower criticized the investigation for its limited scope, revealing that investigators were instructed not to probe the roles of senior officers. Operation Linden examined 91 cases and 47 officers, with only eight found guilty of misconduct. The highest-ranking officer investigated was a detective inspector, and no officer lost their job.
The IOPC defended its investigation, asserting that its focus was on survivor welfare and that its recommendations had been implemented to improve victim care and officer training. However, the whistleblower questioned whether the failings of the broader system had been fully addressed.
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