Oldham child gang-rape suspect later attempted to murder wife | Grooming gangs inquiry

A maintenance gang suspect who evaded investigation after a series of police errors attempted to murder his wife, the Guardian’s investigation has revealed.

The man, identified only as Criminal J in documents seen by the Guardian, is alleged to have been involved in the gang rape of 12-year-old Samantha Walker-Roberts in Oldham, Greater Manchester, in 2006.

Criminal J tried to kill his wife in 2009. Two years ago he was alleged to have been complicit in the abuse of Walker-Roberts by ringleader Shakil Chowdhury, but Greater Manchester police were unable to follow up and closed the case.

Dozens of items recovered from Chowdhury’s home, where Walker-Roberts said she was raped for hours by five men, were destroyed by officers or returned to Chowdhury. After being kidnapped from a police station where she had attempted to report an earlier assault, she was abducted around town to be harassed by various groups of men.

The Guardian understands that Guilty J is now unlikely to face charges in relation to Walker-Roberts’ ordeal because surviving forensic evidence shows he was not linked to the abuse. Chowdhury, who was sentenced to six years in prison in 2007, remains the only person convicted in the case, but Walker-Roberts was told last month that police officers were pursuing two suspects.

Sarwar Ali fled after being accused of rape and was never traced. Police are trying to identify a third person with criminal connection to the incident. The Guardian understands he does not appear to have come to the attention of police before.

Walker-Roberts said: “All my life I’ve been told I have to move on but how can I do that when I don’t have the answers? Most people get closure when they get a sentence but I’ll never get to that stage so for me answers are closure.”

She added that she “long ago lost hope” that all the men involved in her abuse would be brought to justice, but feared they had attacked other victims. “I pray for others to come forward, for others to get justice in one way or another,” he said.

An internal police investigation in 2014 concluded that if forensic investigations had been adequately conducted in the Walker-Roberts case, Criminal J’s wife might have survived the attack.

Examination of forensic evidence remaining during this investigation revealed that two other girls were linked to Chowdhury’s property. They were interviewed and said they had sex with Chowdhury at his home when they were 16, but did not press charges.

A. protection review The organisation, appointed by Greater Manchester mayor Andy Burnham, said it was unable to assess the quality of inquests made after the original forensic submissions in 2022.

The report also stated that Guilty J’s wife told police in 2011 that he confessed to raping a 12-year-old boy. He said Criminal J had kept newspaper clippings about Chowdhury’s trial and subsequent conviction.

The information was passed to Operation Messenger, a now-defunct multi-agency taskforce designed to tackle child sexual exploitation in Oldham, but again no action was taken. The safeguarding review said it was a “serious failure”.

In 2007, 22 pieces of evidence taken from Chowdhury’s home, including bedding and towels, were returned to him through his lawyer, despite the possibility that they were related to outstanding suspects. The following year, officers destroyed a further 24 items, including materials from Chowdhury’s car and the contents of the bin.

When faced with Walker-Roberts’ appeal eight years later, police were unable to provide a “forensic strategy” for her case. Walker-Roberts said she was asked to name Criminal J at a police identification parade in 2014 as part of a new investigation but was unable to identify him.

The failings at Oldham were central to the establishment of a national inquiry into grooming gangs, to be chaired by former children’s commissioner Anne Longfield, which will start in March.

The government initially resisted calls for a national investigation, including from X owner Elon Musk; Instead it funded a local investigation in Oldham, chaired by former judge Tom Crowther, who led a similar investigation in Telford, Shropshire.

But an audit by Whitehall troubleshooter Louise Casey suggested a national investigation was required. Crowther has now been dismissed and the Oldham investigation will be incorporated into a wider investigation.

The national inquiry, which will examine abuses in England and Wales, has sparked controversy since it was announced in June.

In October, four women left a survivors advisory panel, saying they felt the government was manipulating them to expand the scope of the investigation beyond street-based grooming rings.

They called for the resignation of Conservation Minister Jess Phillips, but five people, including Walker-Roberts, wrote to prime minister Keir Starmer to support him.

Longfield was chosen to head the investigation after two previous frontrunners, former police officer Jim Gamble and former social worker Annie Hudson, withdrew.

A spokesman for Greater Manchester police said Walker-Roberts “was subjected to appalling abuse that was compounded by the appalling failures of the authorities who were supposed to protect her at the time” and that she would receive an apology in 2022.

“Samantha’s treatment by the police was far from the standards survivors would expect from today’s GMP. Now that a man has been convicted of abusing Samantha, we have two further suspects who we are committed to bringing to court to face charges. One remains charged and is pending; efforts to find him will not stop until he is found. There is another suspect who is forensically linked to the investigation and whom we are seeking to identify.”

• Information and support for anyone affected by rape or sexual abuse issues is available from the following organisations. in the UK, Rape Crisis It offers support in England and Wales on 0808 500 2222 and in Wales on 0808 801 0302. Scotlandor 0800 0246 991 Northern Ireland. in the USA, Rain Offers support at 800-656-4673. Support in Australia is available at: 1800Respect (1800 737 732). Other international helplines can be reached at: ibiblio.org/rcip/internl.html