A lawyer suing Islington Council over alleged child sexual abuse has appealed for potential witnesses to come forward.
The Islington Gazette revealed last week that a woman is suing the council, claiming she was repeatedly sexually assaulted in her bed at Park Place, Conewood Street, in the 1990s.
The complainant, who we codenamed Sally, spoke in a harrowing interview about the horrors she said she experienced and their lasting impact on her life.
Her lawyer Andrew Lord, at Leigh Day, has now urged witnesses to contact him.
“My client alleges that she experienced serious sexual abuse in a children’s home at a time when there was increased scrutiny of the local authority,” he said.
“Sally described how the abuse occurred on several occasions and, alarmingly, she recalls people being given access to the home through fire escapes at a time when the London Borough of Islington ought to have been conducting a thorough overall review of their safeguarding procedures.”
In 1992, the London Evening Standard published a series of award-winning articles revealing widespread abuse and neglect in Islington’s children’s homes.
Allegations included staff sexually abusing children, trafficking them to other paedophiles, and homes having lax security, which enabled predators to get in.
Sally was not placed in the Conewood Street home until after these articles had already been published, meaning the council should have been taking extra care to safeguard children, her lawsuit contends.
She told the Gazette that unidentified men entered her darkened bedroom in the middle of the night and assaulted her.
After they finished and left, she would hear the distinctive sound of the fire escape door opening and closing.
'Sally', now in her 40s, says her alleged abuse occurred in the mid-1990s - after the Evening Standard had already exposed widespread abuse in Islington Council's children's homes (Image: Charles Thomson)
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“They took advantage of me sexually, emotionally and physically,” she claimed in Leigh Day’s witness appeal.
“I was placed in their care and they exploited me. I spend the days of my life marinated in grief. I’m unable to trust. I fear people.”
Islington Council has said it cannot comment on live legal cases.
It has previously admitted and apologised for decades of abuse in its children’s homes, saying it is now a very different organisation.
Mr Lord has represented other Islington children’s home victims and also helped design the council’s Support Payment Scheme, which offered £10,000 to survivors.
He urged anybody with knowledge of Park Place in the early to mid-1990s to call 0207 650 1200 or email alord@leighday.co.uk.
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