Drug gangs exploited and raped us as teens, then police failed us, women tell BBC

Warning: Contains details of sexual exploitation

“It was the thrill of being with a bad boy.”

Christine was 13 when she began exchanging messages online with someone she believed was a teenage boy.

On their first meeting, she discovered he was a grown man 10 years older than herself. He also told her he was involved with gangs and drugs.

“I always knew, OK, he’s probably hurt someone, but in terms of hurting me, I didn’t think it would get to that point,” she says.

Over the next few years, he would use Christine to courier drugs, subject her to extreme sexual exploitation, and assault her so violently she feared she might die.

Christine is one of four women who have chosen to waive their anonymity and speak publicly to the BBC documentary, Britain’s Forgotten Girls, about how they were targeted by criminals when they were children.

Their stories, covering 2002 to last year, differ in detail – but reveal strikingly similar patterns of abuse. All four describe being targeted by boys and older men connected to drug gangs, manipulated into abusive relationships, then repeatedly sexually exploited.

All believe the authorities failed to protect them and did not take their allegations seriously.

The sexual and criminal exploitation of girls by drug gangs has long been overshadowed in public discussion by the focus on sexual grooming gangs, according to front-line social workers and experts in the field.

“For grooming gangs, the primary purpose is often the sexual exploitation of those girls, but the primary purpose of a drug gang is to make money off selling drugs and other criminal activity,” says Connie Muttock from the children’s charity, Centre for Young Lives.

Girls are brought in to generate money, says Muttock, but many are also sexually abused by gang members.

A recent government audit of group-based sexual abuse and exploitation in England and Wales, external said that authorities often fail these victims.

The BBC understands that the issue of drug gangs will be tackled in an independent inquiry set up in response to the audit.

Christine grew up in London, but moved to Coventry with her mother after her parents’ divorce. She says she felt disorientated and alone in her new home.

“In school, everybody already had their friendship groups because of how late I’d moved in,” she says. “I didn’t really feel like I had friends.”

Then came the messages.

“We’d be texting through the night,” she says.

Christine claimed to be 16 in her texts. When she eventually met the man, she admitted she was 13, but he told her that age did not matter.

“He was like, ‘that doesn’t change anything. I still want to be with you.’ And that’s when we started, like, quote unquote, going out.”

The thrill of feeling wanted was also what led Annie, from south-east London, into the clutches of a gang.

At first, she says she “felt quite in awe, quite excited to have the attention” of three older boys who wanted to befriend her, even though she knew they were involved in drugs.

For both Christine and Annie, what began as attention, affection or friendship gradually turned into coercion and exploitation.