A number of former pupils of a school for troubled boys who say they were victims of physical and sexual abuse are calling for a new investigation and a wide inquiry into care institutions.
The ex-pupils of Kesgrave Hall, near Ipswich, Suffolk, have described a culture of violence at the school in the 1980s.
The Guardian has spoken to 10 men who say they were victims of, or witnesses to, abuse while they were pupils, including three who were interviewed at length by Suffolk police during an investigation into the school in 1992, which was later dropped. They have described a spectrum of abuse, predominantly physical, and the use of disciplinary methods outlawed at the time as corporal punishment.
One former pupil, Alexander Hanff, said a member of staff “lingered around my genital region” while soaping him down in the school showers when he was 12. He claimed he once caught a member of staff masturbating while watching him in the shower.
Ross Dagley-Cleworth, another former pupil, alleged that he suffered a broken arm in an attack by one teacher and that he was punched in the face by another member of staff. Other former pupils said they were forced to kneel on their open hands for hours as a punishment. They said other disciplinary techniques included boys kneeling in the hallway for at least an hour at night with their hands above their heads.
At least 30 pupils were interviewed by police in 1992 as part of a joint investigation with Suffolk social services. Four members of staff were suspended and received psychiatric help before they were reinstated in September 1992. No charges were ever brought from this inquiry.
The former pupils say they were denied justice and are speaking out now, prompted by the Jimmy Savile scandal and renewed publicity around assaults on children at care homes in north Wales.
David Cameron has announced two urgent inquiries into an alleged paedophile ring in north Wales in the 1970s and 1980s; the Kesgrave Hall allegations will add to calls for a wider examination of institutions involved in the care of children and vulnerable adults.
The police investigation was prompted by a former Kesgrave Hall care worker who reported his concerns to social services. Kesgrave Hall school closed in 1993, less than a year after the police inquiry.
Eric Richardson, the school’s head at the time of the investigation, told the East Anglian Daily Times in 1992 that the four members of staff had received psychiatric help after they were suspended. Richardson told the paper that the suspended staff were not sadists, but conceded that their conduct was “probably heavy-handed to a point that it should not have been”.
Of the 10 former pupils who spoke to the Guardian, two said they were victims of sexual abuse by teachers or other staff at Kesgrave Hall. Hanff and another ex-pupil, Lee Woolcott-Ellis, alleged they were sexually assaulted. Eight others said they were victims of or witnesses to physical attacks by staff.
Hanff, who was one of the pupils interviewed in 1992, said he was told by Suffolk police that they were pursuing 108 abuse complaints by pupils at Kesgrave Hall; the force has been unable to confirm this number.
He urged prosecutors to review all complaints of abuse made by children over the past 40 years. Hanff added: “We were just children. Those paid to protect us abused us; they need to answer for their crimes. While we were hung out to dry with no follow-up support, counselling or psychiatric support, some of those suspended were permitted to return to work and received ‘psychiatric help’. How is that supposed to make us feel?
“It makes me feel very angry and clearly illustrates that the system was heavily stacked against us, with more concern about scandals and insurance payments than the actual abuse of children.”
Woolcott-Ellis, an NHS worker who was at the school before the 1992 police investigation, said he gave evidence in 1999 against a teacher, Alan Stancliffe, who was convicted of indecent assault against Woolcott-Ellis and two others between 1978 and 1980. Stancliffe was also convicted in 2007 of three counts of indecent assault on a pupil between 1978 and 1980. Woolcott-Ellis urged other ex-pupils to come forward and contact police about the school, which is now a luxury restaurant and hotel. He said “people knew” of abuse at the school, which he claimed was far-reaching.
Mike Ayling, a former army officer and ex-Kesgrave Hall pupil, said staff would use disciplinary methods that had been outlawed as corporal punishment in state schools in 1986.
Dagley-Cleworth, a pupil between 1988 and 1993 who was also interviewed by police, said: “The way in which the discipline was issued would see people go to prison today. If we were investigating military levels of abuse then it would be acceptable, but this is not because it was 12- or 13-year-old kids.”
Matthew Smith, another ex-pupil, said he had been attacked on at least three occasions by three different staff. In 1990, aged 13, he was slapped across the face by a teacher as a punishment, he said, and on his second day at the school a teacher dragged him down a corridor into his office, bent him over his knee and smacked him on the backside.
Pupils and former staff said there were good staff at the school but that there were problems with others. “It was about the general atmosphere,” Smith said.
However, other ex-pupils and people in positions of authority at the school sought to play down the claims of widespread abuse. They pointed out that Kesgrave Hall pupils were classified as having emotional and behavioural difficulties and that disciplinarian methods were more acceptable in the 1980s. Some suggested the complaint that sparked the police investigation was malicious.
Michael Smith, the headteacher from 1984 to 1992, declined to comment explicitly when asked about the abuse claims. He said: “I am sure that you will find one or two ex-pupils who failed to thrive at Kesgrave, but you will find many more who will say that Kesgrave Hall helped them when many others had given up on them.”
He added: “The school was held in high regard by the local authorities that placed children there, because the outcomes for our pupils seemed so much better than pupils placed in other residential EBD [educational and behavioural difficulties] schools. I am satisfied that, during my tenure at least, the quality of care and education provided was of the highest standards.”
Nigel Kennard, who was a director of Kesgrave Hall School Ltd, the now-defunct private company that ran the school, refused to comment.
A former pupil whom Smith asked the Guardian to contact, but who asked not to be named, said Kesgrave Hall was “certainly no worse than any other” such school in the period. The pupil, who said he attended between 1984 and 1986, added: “What is important to remember about Kesgrave is that it was a school for maladjusted but highly intelligent pupils – we ran rings around most of the staff and the local constabulary, not the other way around – so I would be cautious about what you hear from some, and I think the silent ones will probably be in the majority.”
The former pupil described himself as “one of the popular boys” and said about the abuse claims: “I say this only to illustrate that if such abuse was going on, it is likely, though not certain, that I would know about it, or at least hear the rumours. There were none in my time.”
Matthew Donovan, who was a pupil from 1987 until 1993, said there were some good teachers but there was a “lack of consistent care” at the school.
A Suffolk police spokesman confirmed there was an investigation into claims of abuse at the school in the early 1990s. He said: “Suffolk police encourage anyone who has been a victim of abuse to contact police and would like to reassure them that their complaints will be taken very seriously and investigated thoroughly.”
The Crown Prosecution Service said it was unable to find any record of the case. A spokeswoman for Suffolk county council said this was a matter for the police to comment on.
