CHARLIE - SATANIC ABUSE

“Since she first told police that her eldest son, Charlie, was involved with, and had been sexually abused by, a satanic ring, her house in Humberside has been under siege.

“Several times she and her husband Tom, a crane driver, have returned home to find bizarre signs smeared in excrement and blood on doors and mirrors; or bunches of keys and clumps of pubic hair half-hidden under pieces of furniture.

“But her real concern is the damage done to Charlie.

“Family photographs show a grinning six-year-old with blond hair and blue eyes turning into a pale, anxious-looking, pathetically thin adolescent…

“It took a telephone call from the mother of his best friend, Kevin, to alert her to the real cause.

“Kevin had a running-away bag hidden in his bedroom. As well as a change of clothes, there was a piece of paper inside with his name and age (11), a physical description and the words ‘Scorpio 444”.

“Elizabeth searched Charlie‘s room and found a similar bag.

“Her alarm intensified when she learned that Charlie had been trying to have sex with his five-year-old brother and seemed to regard this as normal behaviour. Finally the boy broke down and began to talk.

“At the age of eight, Kevin‘s father had introduced him to a group of men who performed rituals involving sexual and sadistic acts.

“He talked about watching pornographic videos and being made to take part in them.

“He said he had been drugged and that, on occasions, animals were sacrificed he had been warned that a similar fate awaited him if he ever told anyone what was happening.

“Charlie named 20 other children who were sometimes present.

“He also named some of the adults, giving a list which included a teacher from his own school.

“By the time Charlie revealed this to his mother he was 11 years old and deeply involved so much so that he had become a recruiter, bringing in other children in exchange for money.

CHILD SACRIFICE.

“Charlie was examined by a police surgeon, who said the boy had been sexually abused.

“Other children questioned showed similar symptoms.

“Eventually three local men were arrested.

“One, a 17-year-old, admitted acts of sexual abuse and indecency and was given two years’ probation. The other two were remanded but then released for lack of evidence. Charlie’s allegations of satanism were disbelieved, according to Elizabeth, or ignored.

“Charlie is not the first such child to be disbelieved. In cases of ritualistic abuse, the trustworthiness of victims’ evidence is confused by the fact that they may have been drugged and shown videos. Experts have to sort out what actually happened from what the child was led to believe had happened…

“Charlie is now a psychologically disturbed adolescent with a grossly distorted understanding of sexuality, and has been made a ward of court.

“On his weekend visits home from a residential school, he appears less traumatised than before, although he curls up in a foetal position when the past is mentioned.

“He is also convinced that the occultists are still keeping an eye on him and he has moments of terror when he thinks they may try to grab him in the street…

“The audacity of child abusers has taken a new turn only recently. Police in South Yorkshire have set up a special squad to track down a gang, including at least two women, that had been impersonating child care officials in an attempt to abduct children.”

- April 1, 1990, Sunday Times, ‘Satanic ring forces families to suffer from a hell on earth; Sexual abuse’

ISGP