Man pleads guilty to drugging and sexually assaulting two boys at UK summer camp | UK news

A 76-year-old man has admitted drugging and sexually assaulting two boys, aged 9 and 10, at a summer camp in Leicestershire.

Jon Ruben, 76, was arrested in July 2025 after eight children and one adult fell ill at Stathern Lodge.

He pleaded guilty to 17 charges at Leicester crown court on Friday. These include sexual assault on a child under 13, assault by penetration on a child under 13, eight counts of cruelty to children, three counts of making indecent images of children and four drug charges.

Ruben, from Ruddington in Nottinghamshire, pleaded not guilty to one count of sexual offenses against a nine-year-old boy. Prosecutors were given two weeks to consider whether to pursue the charge.

Prosecutor Mary Prior KC told the court Ruben had run a holiday camp for at least 27 years and “there was a long history of children feeling ill at the camp over many years”.

He added: “For years he’s been playing what he calls the dessert game with kids, where he goes into their bedrooms. The game is that they each have to eat really sticky desserts as quickly as possible, but they have to chew them.”

“Children always feel sick the next day, but he explained it because they were overly nervous.”

Ruben was detained until the next hearing in the same court at the end of this month.

More details coming soon…