Grooming gang in Plymouth are jailed after victim saw BBC TV drama

A grooming gang of predatory men who targeted teenage girls in Plymouth have been jailed after one victim saw the BBC television drama Three Girls.

The harrowing three-part drama tells the true story of the Rochdale sex trafficking case which involved vulnerable white girls being abused by organised networks of men, largely from a subsection of the Pakistani community.

Maxine Peake stars as the sexual health worker who blew the whistle on the scandal, Sara Rowbotham, leading it to be eventually revealed in 2012.

The 2017 drama's three young girls are a combination of stories from the girls who gave evidence that led to the conviction of the men, but false names were used. 

It received 8.24 million viewers on its first broadcast and would go on to win the BAFTA for Best Mini-Series, as well as more than a dozen other awards.

But the impact of the show lives on as it was revealed in court recently that another grooming gang from Plymouth, Devon, was brought to justice after a victim and her mother contacted the police after watching it.

After a five-week trial at Plymouth crown court, a jury convicted three men of rape and sexual assault on four vulnerable teenage girls at drink and drug-fueled parties in the city held between February 2017 and December 2017. 

Abalzaq Salih, 31, a Kuwaiti citizen living in Plymouth, was the party organiser. He was convicted of two rapes on girls under 16 at a party a few days before Christmas in 2017. This week he was jailed for 19 years. 

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Saif Kahya, 32, from Liverpool, who is now a father of two, was found guilty of raping a girl in 2017 and was jailed for 12 years. 

Anthony Anantharajah, 35, from London, was found guilty of rape of a girl aged 16 or over in February 2017. 

He was found not guilty of engaging in non-penetrative sexual activity with a girl aged 15 or under between January and May 2016. Anantharajah will be sentenced on Monday. 

Meanwhile Moussa Ahmadou, 45, from Plymouth, was found not guilty by the jury of one charge of sexual assault on a female. 

The court heard how the pair had given the girls drugs and alcohol at parties they had thrown. 

The methods were remarkably similar to those used by the Rochdale grooming gang years earlier.

Sentencing at Plymouth Crown Court, Judge Peter Johnson said the case had 'brought back extremely painful memories' for those involved and it took 'commendable inner strength' to come forward, according to the BBC. 

Devon and Cornwall police said that the men were arrested initially in February 2017 but the suspects claimed the girls were lying.

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However between 2018 and 2022 more victims came forward to provide crucial evidence. 

The court heard a statement from the mother of one of the girls who revealed that she had repeatedly contacted the authorities, raising her concerns for the welfare of her daughter, saying that 'it felt like I was fighting the whole world and no one was listening to me', according to The Times. 

But the abuse was only investigated again after another girl came forward and gave key evidence to police after watching the BBC drama.

Prosecutor Dan Pawson-Pounds said the men targeted and groomed the girls with alcohol and drugs at isolated flats at night.

He told the jury they were designed by them to exploit the vulnerable young girls by getting them away from their family structures, then giving them money, drink and drugs, before sexually assaulting them when their defences were down.

One of the girls, who was 14 and a virgin when she was raped by Salih, said afterwards she felt 'dirty' and as if he had 'taken away my childhood innocence'. 

She told the court: '[I] lost my life and hated everything about life.' 

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A second victim said that she was also 14 and a virgin when she was raped by Salih as she tried to protect two friends who had passed out. 

A third victim, who was raped by Kahya, said that she was 16 and a virgin before it took place, with the trauma of the event causing her to want to end her life.

Police were first alerted to the gang's rapes in the summer of 2017, but few of the victims and witnesses were prepared to engage due to their vulnerabilities and lack of trust in the authorities. 

However the detectives persisted with their inquiries despite understanding that the girls did not consider themselves to be victims.

Between 2018 and 2019 further victims began to engage with detectives and provided crucial evidence. And in 2022 the final victim engaged fully and reported that she had been raped in 2017.

Timeline of the Rochdale grooming gang scandals

2008 - A 15-year-old girl reports to police she has been raped repeatedly by a gang of men, and gives details of the abuse taking place above a takeaway in Rochdale. Police arrest two members of a grooming gang - ringleader Shabir Ahmed and Kabeer Hassan.

2009 - Police find evidence that Ahmed had sex with the girl, with the older man claiming she could have swapped underwear with a different young girl he had already admitted to having sex with. Later that year a Crown Prosecution Service lawyer rules that the victim's evidence is 'not credible' and decides the accused should be released without charge.

2010 - Operation Span, a new operation looking into allegations of grooming gangs in Rochdale, is launched with DC Maggie Oliver involved.

2011 - Chief prosecutor for the CPS North West, Nazir Afzal, reverses this decision and authorises charges against the pair.

2012 - His decision is vindicated when Ahmed – then 59 - and eight other men were jailed for a total of 77 years for raping and abusing up to 47 girls aged as young as 13. This sparks apologies from the police, council and CPS for failures that allowed the men to continue abusing girls for an additional two years.

2013 - Maggie Oliver resigns from Greater Manchester Police, claiming that evidence was ignored that could have convicted men who weren't part of the nine jailed the year before.

2016 - A second group of men are sentenced to up to 25 years in prison for sexual abuse after a victim, encouraged by previous convictions, comes forward with her ordeal.

2017 - A BBC documentary titled The Betrayed Girls features whistleblowers Ms Oliver and Sara Rowbothan, who ran an NHS sexual health clinic in Rochdale, with claims about grooming gangs. Both alleged that multiple known abusers were left free to prey on a generation of girls, with grooming culture embedded in parts of the town. The same year Andy Burnham, the Mayor of Greater Manchester, orders a series of reports into how victims were protected up to 2013.

2023 - Five men are given sentences totalling more than 70 years after being found guilty of abusing two girls between 2002 and 2006.

2024 - The third of four reports into grooming gangs - and the first to focus on Rochdale - is released and points the finger at police and council bosses for failing to protect girls from their abusers.