From the late 1980s until 2013, group-based child sexual exploitation affected an estimated 1,400 girls, generally from care home backgrounds, in the town of Rotherham, South Yorkshire, England. Between 1997 and 2013, girls were abused by grooming gangs predominantly consisting of men of Pakistani heritage.Helen Pidd (13 July 2015). "Alexis Jay on child sex abuse: 'Politicians wanted to keep a lid on it'", The Guardian. Researcher Angie Heal, who was hired by local officials and warned them about child exploitation occurring between 2002 and 2007, has since described it as the "biggest child protection scandal in UK history". In July 2025, investigations were being carried out into allegations that police officers had also raped child victims.
Evidence of the abuse was first noted in the early 1990s, when care home managers investigated reports that children in their care were being picked up by taxi drivers. From at least 2001, multiple reports passed names of alleged perpetrators, several from one family, to the police and Rotherham Council. The first group conviction took place in 2010, when five British-Pakistani men were convicted of sexual offences against girls aged 12–16. From January 2011, The Times covered the issue, discovering that the abuse had been known by local authorities for over ten years.
Following these reports, alongside the 2012 trial of the Rochdale child sex abuse ring, the House of Commons Home Affairs Committee conducted hearings and published its recommendations in six reports. Alexis Jay led an independent inquiry, known as the Jay report, which found multiple failings of the police and local authorities. Girls would be regularly taken in taxis to be abused,"Rotherham child abusers 'brazen', says care home worker", BBC News, 29 August 2014. Keith Perry (29 August 2014). "Rotherham: 'Brazen' sex abusers sent taxis to collect girls from children's home", The Daily Telegraph. Olivia Goldhill and Ju Zhang (7 June 2015). "A Rotherham abuse survivor speaks out", The Sunday Telegraph. and were gang raped, forced to watch rape, threatened, and trafficked to other towns. The resultant pregnancies, miscarriages, and terminations caused further trauma to the victims."DNA tests negative over mother, 12", BBC News, 6 December 2001.Lizze Dearden (30 August 2014). "Rotherham abuse scandal: Authorities' decisions to take away babies born to abused girls caused yet more suffering", The Independent. Most victims were White British girls but British Asian girls were also targeted. British Asian girls may have feared social isolation and dishonour had they reported their experiences. Failure to address the abuse has been linked to factors such as fear of racism allegations due to the perpetrators' ethnicity; sexist and classist attitudes towards the mostly working-class victims; lack of a child-centred focus; a desire to protect the town's reputation; and lack of training and resources.
Following the Jay report, Rotherham Council's chief executive, its director of children's services, as well as the Police and Crime Commissioner for South Yorkshire Police all resigned. The Independent Police Complaints Commission and the National Crime Agency both opened inquiries."NCA begins two-stage investigation into child sexual exploitation in Rotherham" , National Crime Agency, 18 December 2014. "Operation Stovewood—Summary of Terms of Reference" , National Crime Agency.Andrew Norfolk (7 June 2016). "Rotherham abuse inquiry will run for eight years", The Times. Rotherham Council was also investigated and found "not fit for purpose". Nineteen men and two women were convicted in 2016 and 2017 of sexual offences in the town dating back to the late 1980s.
Background Rotherham
Rotherham is the largest town within the Metropolitan Borough of Rotherham in South Yorkshire, with a population of 109,691 in the 2011 census. Around 11.9 per cent of Rotherham's population belonged to black and minority ethnic groups,Thomas Brinkhoff. "Rotherham (South Yorkshire in Yorkshire and the Humber)", City Population. Retrieved 25 April 2017. compared to eight per cent of the population of the borough (population 258,400); three per cent of the population of the borough belonged to the Pakistani-heritage community. Unemployment in the borough was above the national average, and 23 per cent of homes consisted of social housing. The area has traditionally been a Labour stronghold. Until Sarah Champion was elected in 2012, it had never had a female MP.Helen Pidd (9 February 2015). "Sarah Champion MP: 'The job is fabulous. The lifestyle is living hell'", The Guardian. The council was similarly both controlled by Labour and male-dominated.
Terminology In 2009, the Department for Education began using the term child sexual exploitation (CSE) to replace the term child prostitution, which implied consent. CSE is a form of child sexual abuse in which children are offered something—monetary or otherwise—for sexual activity, with violence and intimidation common.Safeguarding Children and Young People from Sexual Exploitation: Supplementary Guidance, Department for Education, 2009. CSE includes online grooming, and localised grooming which typically happens in a public place. Targets of abuse sometimes include children cared after by the local authority, as was particularly common in the Rotherham case. In CSE, children may be contacted initially by another child, who hands the target to an older man. The adult then enters into a "relationship" with the target, but often the girl is used for sex by a larger group, in some cases leading to group rape. Trafficking is common, with the child "sold" to other groups. According to one victim, targets are preferably 12–14; the group loses interest as the child ages and expects the child to supply other, younger children.
History
From the early 1990s, several managers of local children's homes set up the "taxi driver group" to investigate reports that taxis driven by Pakistani men were arriving at care homes to take the children away. The police reportedly declined to act.Andrew Norfolk (28 August 2014). "Rotherham child sex abuse: How the truth finally came out", The Times. Dominic Ponsford (27 August 2014). "'Girls suffered as council obfuscated' says Times journalist as Jay report reveals 1,400 Rotherham sex gang victims", PressGazette. In 1997, Rotherham Council created Risky Business, a local project to work with girls and women aged 11–25 at risk of sexual exploitation on the streets. Jayne Senior, awarded an MBE for her role in uncovering the abuse, began working for Risky Business as a coordinator around July 1999.
Around 2001, Senior began to find evidence of a localised grooming network. Most Risky Business clients had previously come from Sheffield, which had a red-light district; now the girls were younger and came from Rotherham. Girls as young as 10 were being befriended, perhaps by children their own age, before being passed to older men who would rape them and become their "boyfriends". Many of the girls were from troubled families, but not all.Nicholas Blincoe (24 March 2016). "Rotherham whistleblower explains why sex abuse ring was covered up", The Daily Telegraph. The children were given alcohol and drugs, then told they had to repay the "debt" by having sex with other men. The perpetrators obtained personal information about the girls and their families—where their parents worked, for example—which was used to threaten the girls if they tried to withdraw. According to Senior, Risky Business gathered so much information about the perpetrators that the police suggested she forward it to an electronic dropbox on the South Yorkshire Police computer network to protect the identity of Risky Business's sources. She later learned the police had not read the reports, and they could not be accessed by other forces. Risky Business was seen as a "nuisance" and shut down by the council in 2011.
In July 2025 it was reported that five survivors of abuse had said that they were also raped by police officers when they were as young as 12. Three former police officers were arrested as part of an investigation, and another had died. The women accused corrupt police officers of turning a blind eye or participating in the grooming.
Criminal proceedings and convictions Criminal proceedings are ongoing and expected to continue until 2027. The Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse said assumptions that abuse had fallen since high-profile cases in Rotherham and Rochdale were "flawed", and that children were still being sexually exploited in all parts of England and Wales in the "most degrading and destructive ways".
Operation Central (2010) In 2008, South Yorkshire Police set up Operation Central to investigate the allegations. Eight men were tried at Sheffield Crown Court in October 2010 for sexual offences against girls aged 12–16. Four victims testified. Five men were convicted, including two brothers and a cousin."Five guilty of grooming teenage girls for sex", Press Association, 5 November 2010. One of the brothers, Razwan Razaq, had a previous conviction for indecently assaulting a young girl in his car, and had breached a previous sexual offences prevention order. His brother Umar appealed against his sentence and was released after nine months.Claire Duffin (29 August 2014). "Rotherham sex abuser boasts about 'living the high life' after release from jail", The Daily Telegraph. All five were placed on the sex offenders' register.
Operation Clover, trials (2015–2017)
Initial convictions (December 2015) In August 2013, South Yorkshire Police set up Operation Clover to investigate historic cases of child sexual abuse in the town.Chris Burn (7 November 2016). "Inside Operation Clover: The three-year police operation to bring evil Rotherham child abusers to justice", The Star (Rotherham). Six men and two women were tried on 10 December 2015 at Sheffield Crown Court. Four were members of the Hussain family—three brothers and their uncle, Qurban Ali—named in Adele Weir's 2001 report."Guilty: Mad Ash, Bash and Bono – gun-toting, grooming family who 'owned' Rotherham", The Yorkshire Post, 24 February 2016.Chris Burn (27 February 2016). "Rotherham abuse trial: The role of each defendant", The Star (Rotherham). The Hussain family were said to have "owned" Rotherham. Ali owned a local minicab company, Speedline Taxis. One of the accused women had worked for Speedline as a radio operator.Lisa O'Carroll (10 December 2015). "Rotherham grooming victim was abused daily and used to settle debts, jury told", The Guardian."Rotherham sex abuse trial: Teenage girls 'repeatedly raped'", BBC News, 10 December 2015. On 24 February 2016, Ali was convicted of conspiracy to rape and sentenced to 10 years."Hussain brothers jailed in Rotherham abuse case" BBC News, 26 February 2016. Lisa O'Carroll (26 February 2016). "Ringleader of Rotherham child sexual abuse gang jailed for 35 years", The Guardian.