Beechwood children's home was a care home for children in Mapperley in Nottinghamshire, England, where staff committed serious sexual and "sadistic" abuse against children spanning several decades before it closed in 2006. Some abusive staff received lengthy prison sentences.
By June 2019, 136 former residents had reported being sexually abused there, which police considered "the small tip of a very large iceberg".
Beechwood was described by witnesses as "intimidating", "like a prison", "a horrible place" and having a "really toxic mix" of people. It was considered "appalling and squalid" by staff and "atrocious" by a psychologist. A judge later called it "a home from hell".
Site The Beechwood site, in Mapperley, Nottinghamshire, is known to have been a children's home in 1966 and there were reports of Beechwood operating as one in the 1950s. It has also at various times been a remand home and an "observation and assessment centre". It was jointly run by Nottingham City Council and Nottinghamshire County Council. Some local residents opposed it with a "Close Beechwood" campaign.
Police found the centre was "riddled with abuse" between the late 1960s and late 1980s. Staff reports and a psychologist found it "appalling and squalid" and visiting psychologist asked "how is it we can place young people in such atrocious conditions?" A council social services leader in the 1990s said Beechwood had an "intimidating" atmosphere and a "macho" undercurrent and she "didn't feel comfortable". A second female professional visitor agreed: "It was a very macho place. You went in and there were a lot of male workers, with a lot of power. They were very keen to show who was boss."
Beechwood was closed in 2006.
Buildings By 1976, Beechwood consisted of four buildings – the "Lindens", "Enderleigh" and "Redcot" units and an administration building.
The main "Lindens" building was built in 1887 and became the home of eye surgeon Charles Bell Taylor. Later, its owners included a brewing family. By the 1960s, it was a children's care home and sometimes had other names, until it closed in 1990. It was sold in 2013, with the £550,000 sale price divided evenly between the city and county council. The buyers converted it to a single-family home and moved in. In 2018, some abuse victims wanted the Lindens razed. Haunted by memories from the late 1970s, one victim who would often pass by said: "The sooner they knock the Lindens down the better, for me. Please, please, let's have that building demolished."
The "Enderleigh" building included a "notorious" padded cell. A victim later recalled it "looked like a lovely house" from the outside, but upon entering, "the atmosphere changed" and "it was a horrible place" with boarded up doors, a "damp and fusty" smell and "nothing in there that was soft or homely". The baths "were either freezing or boiling" and the bathrooms were missing doors, offering no privacy. It was a care home from 1967 to 1978 and was later demolished.
The "Redcot" building was a children's care home from the mid-1960s or earlier, until 2006. It housed 17 children in 1986, aged between 10 and 17. It was later demolished and replaced with private houses.
Abuse Staff subjected the children to numerous forms of serious sexual and physical abuse.
They raped children and forced them into fights and masturbation competitions, then punished them for trying to speak out about it. A victim who was sexually abused in Beechwood in the 1980s testified that it was a violent place with "a lot of shouting" and "challenging behaviour", where care staff made children scream by painfully twisting their arms, dragged girls by the hair and sadistically forced boys to fight each other before beating up the loser. She was sent there as a 12-year-old girl.
Children's basic dignity was routinely violated. Some were prevented from leaving by being stripped naked and one victim recalled that the bathrooms had no doors, "so anyone walking by could see whatever you were doing in there".
One girl who had been raped before being taken into care was raped again by the same man in Beechwood.
When Beechwood permanently closed in the 2000s, hundreds of children had lived there and many suffered life-long harm.
Concealment Some children were punished when they tried to report being raped by care workers. Detective Inspector Mandy Johnson said children were too frightened to report abuse because of Beechwood's ferocious regime in which "Punishments were quite brutal, people being kicked and punched, and split lips and bloodied noses, which made it very difficult for the children to be able to go to staff to disclose what was happening to them".
A victim explained to an inquiry: "When a grown man turns around and says: 'I'm going to kill you' – what does a child say to that?" Another was repeatedly warned by her abuser: "It's my say-so whether you go home at the end of this term".
In the 2000s, staff ignored a report of an attempted sexual attack by one resident against another and stopped the male victim from informing police by threatening to move him elsewhere. Reporting the assault to Beechwood staff was "like I never told them" and "like talking to a brick wall".
IICSA witnesses Some professionals involved with Beechwood described to the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) being pressured into silence by council managers.
Michelle Foster, a Beechwood carer in the 2000s, described being visited by a council overseer the day before a Beechwood suicide victim's inquest. She testified that the overseer told her not to inform the inquest about the sexual activity and drug-taking at Beechwood or she would be sacked. Foster said managers "obstructed anything I put to them", wanted "yes men" and that "anybody else was called a trouble-[maker]". She described Beechwood as overcrowded, understaffed and having a "really toxic mix" of people.
Investigations officer Bronwen Cooper testified that in 2001, the same council overseer "convinced" her to withdraw a recommendation to close Beechwood from a draft investigation report that was meant to be independent. Cooper's independence was "slightly compromised", she said, by being a council employee. The retracted recommendation referred to staff's "inappropriate behaviour", which put children "at a high level of risk" of being abused.
The overseer accused of silencing Foster and Cooper denied this to the IICSA and denied Foster's assessment of Beechwood as overcrowded, saying that overcrowding happened on "emergency" occasions. She denied having "absolved myself of responsibility" for abuse at Beechwood. A second council manager also denied the dismissal threat against Foster.
Victims Many Beechwood residents abused by staff, both male and female, suffered lifelong harm. Police believe the 136 former residents who contacted the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) having been abused there are "the small tip of a very large iceberg".
Joni Cameron-Blair Joni Cameron-Blair was placed in Beechwood in 1981 to protect her from her violent drunken father, who had struck her head with the back of an axe causing unconsciousness and an injury that necessitated hospitalisation.
When she reported her father's attack to police, the officer sexually assaulted her.
Beechwood proved to be even more unsafe than her family home. She found it "the most terrifying ordeal I have ever had" with most staff "beating kids and doing awful things". She said: "Staff would routinely punch children in the face. They would kick children down the stairs, spit in their food, spit in their faces, pull children round by the hair." She witnessed staff deliberately provoking a boy by spitting in his food, then severely assaulting him when he reacted angrily. She also witnessed staff sexually abusing the children.
She informed a social worker and a psychiatrist of her constant state of fear, to no avail. Only her mother's efforts enabled her to leave Beechwood after 10 weeks. Leaving involved returning to her dangerous father, who resumed physically abusing her.
"Laura" "Laura" was sent to Beechwood's "horrible" Enderleigh unit for several weeks just before her 15th birthday, where John Dent sexually abused her.
She had felt "unloved" by her family and was brought there by a social worker when she returned home from school, leaving her feeling "abandoned" and "absolutely heartbroken". Laura recalled immediately noticing Enderleigh's dispiriting atmosphere, boarded up doors, "fusty" smell, missing bathroom doors, baths that were "either freezing or boiling" and "nothing in [Enderleigh] that was soft or homely".
John Dent initially groomed her by adopting a friendly demeanour and by giving her alcohol and tobacco. Then he climbed on top of her bed one night, waking her up and terrorising her. He covered her mouth with his hand, told her to "be quiet" and sexually assaulted her. There was no one she felt confident reporting it to. She feared being disbelieved because "people would just think I was a rebellious teenager and making excuses, that I was in a care home and I wanted to get out."
Then her roommate was moved away, leaving her alone each night. Dent sexually assaulted Laura again "at every available opportunity" and stopped her from reporting it by reminding her over and over again "It's my say-so whether you go home at the end of this term".
When she left Beechwood, she overdosed and spent years feeling "awful". Her "education was ruined" and the abuse left her suffering post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), vivid flashbacks and depression, for decades.
She was the first victim to report Dent to the police. Later, other victims also did so, leading to a conviction and a seven-year prison sentence. She remained terrified of retribution by Dent for decades afterwards.
She and other victims want all police officers working with abuse victims to be specially trained, and a new independent body to hold social services records to prevent them from being destroyed.
She wants councils held to account because "It's such an enormous scale of abuse" and "I can't believe the evil that happened in those places. I really can't."
Claire Blake Claire Blake, who was abused in Beechwood from the late 1980s to the early 1990s, was "still suffering" in 2019. She "didn't even have respect for myself, never mind anyone else, I just existed." While welcoming that the abuse was acknowledged at long last, she wanted accountability: "The people that were in charge need to be held accountable. They knew, and they hid it, and I think people need to be held responsible."
Caroline Nolan Caroline Nolan said because of abuse in Beechwood, she "withdrew within myself" and "as I got older, I had very bad anger issues".
"D37" "D37" said Beechwood staff "picked out boys to be gagged" and sexually abused. He said he was raped there and "forced to participate in masturbation competitions with other boys and members of staff on multiple occasions", which he assumed "was normal".
"L17" "L17" from Nottingham suffered racist abuse and was "restrained" violently, and other staff knew about it. One staff member sexually abused her and was later sacked from Beechwood for his sexual relationship with a former resident.
She "knew something wasn't right" with his sexual abuse. Her hope was that by obeying him she "would be allowed to go home".
"C21" "C21" was sexually assaulted in a shower and on another occasion raped, by a care worker.
He was too frightened to report the crimes and said, "For years I blamed myself". After his time in Beechwood, he struggled for many years with drug and alcohol addiction.
"L45" "L45" was visited and assaulted in Beechwood multiple times by a man who had previously repeatedly raped her in her foster home, having abused her there from the age of 11.