National grooming gang probe ‘must be extended to Scotland'
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THE national criminal investigation into grooming gangs must be extended to Scotland to avoid a 'missed opportunity', the peer in charge of a damning report into the scandal has said.
Baroness Casey's report found victims were failed by cops and officials who were in 'denial' about the rape and abuse of white girls by disproportionately Asian men and called for a major UK-wide criminal probe into the issue.
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Baroness Casey's damning report laid bare how the State was in 'denial' over the rape and abuse of white girls.
Credit: PA
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A national inquiry into grooming gangs has been announced
Credit: Getty
Asked whether Scotland should be part of it, she said: 'I would be disappointed if the opportunity of the national criminal investigation [was missed].
'I can move from Scotland to England pretty easily and criminals do, so that would be a missed opportunity.'
Sir Keir Starmer bowed to pressure at the weekend and ordered a national inquiry into mass child sex abuse ahead of the publication of Baroness Casey's review.
Her devastating report on Monday laid bare how the State was in 'denial' over the rape and abuse of white girls.
Dame Louise Casey found perpetrators — disproportionately involving Asian men, many of Pakistani heritage — got away with it because of fears about inflaming community tensions.
And the Scottish Tories demanded the public inquiry into the scandal must also be expanded to cover Scotland.
Shadow Scottish Secretary Andrew Bowie yesterday/today said: 'Now that the Labour Government has finally bowed to the huge public demand for a national inquiry into the grooming gangs scandal it is essential that it is truly national in scope.
'That means extending the remit to include Scotland, where there have been well-documented cases of gangs responsible for the rape and sexual abuse of young women.'
The MP called on Home Secretary Yvette Cooper to work with Nats chiefs on what is covered by the inquiry to all the 'voices of Scottish victims of these vile gangs' to be heard.
Mr Bowie added: 'We already know that vulnerable young women were appallingly let down by Labour-run councils, where it appears that partisan political considerations led to the cover-up of the issue.
Ethnicity of child sex abuse suspects will be logged after truth about Asian grooming gangs was 'dodged for YEARS'
'It's essential to uncover if sensitivities over the racial make-up of the perpetrators was a factor in the Scottish cases too.'
In 2020, it was revealed cops kept secret a huge asylum seeker grooming gang in Glasgow which had at least 44 victims.
All the perpetrators were asylum seekers from the Kurdish, Afghani, Egyptian, Moroccan, Turkish, Pakistani or Iraqi communities.
Speaking in Westminster, Baroness Casey said it was a 'matter for Scotland to decide' whether to take part.
She added: 'Criminals move to wherever they can get their prey. And with the internet, they do that even quicker and easier. I mean, it's an issue internationally, not just between the devolved nations.
'I think it is really important that across certainly Northern Ireland, Scotland, Wales and England, there's some join up around these sorts of issues.'
Baroness Casey also urged Scots not to think grooming gangs could not be taking place in Scotland.
She said: 'Don't just read this report and think it may not happen to you.'
The Home Office was contacted for comment.
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McGarry admitted dangerous driving, aggravated vehicle taking, driving whilst disqualified, failing to stop and driving without insurance, and was given 12 months custody in a Young Offenders Institution. The court heard that his 'unenviable' list of 42 previous convictions included offences of drug possession and trafficking, burglary, theft, assault of an emergency worker, and dangerous driving. After seeing footage of the pursuit, Judge Jodie Mittell said: 'Frankly it was very lucky that there was nobody walking along the pavement'. Referencing his previous convictions relating to dangerous driving, Judge Mittell said: 'The concern I obviously have is that the fifth time he will kill someone. 'That could be his sister.' The judge told him: 'There's a risk not only to you, that you would get injured, but that people you care about, who were in the car, might also be injured.' Judge Mittell added: 'The last thing any of us want to see is you being back here, having killed somebody.' 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One linked event was a 'crazy fight' at a music event in a park a mile from Aurman's home a month before he died. Aurman, born in Italy but understood to have been of Indian Sikh heritage, lived in a mid-terraced home with his 46-year-old mother and younger sister in Smethwick, West Midlands. He attended the Sandwell and Birmingham Mela, a two-day festival promoting Punjabi culture, which took place between July 22 and 23, 2023 in Victoria Park in Smethwick. A former neighbour told MailOnline how Aurman had allegedly been caught up in trouble at the Kabaddi event. He said: 'I heard he had been involved in an altercation at the festival shortly before he was killed. 'I don't know in what capacity, he may have just been present, but I was told there was a big fight between one group and another. 'A few friends of mine who went to the Mela told me that there had been this 'crazy fight' and people had been moved away from the area by security. 'The kid I was talking to gestured over to Aurman's house and said 'your neighbour was involved, did you know that?'. 'I had no idea but didn't know what to think. He seemed to me to be a quiet man, but a good neighbour. Not someone who would cause any problems. 'I saw Aurman parking his DPD delivery van the day after I was told he was involved in the fight. I didn't know him well so I never asked him about it. I didn't have that sort of relationship with him. 'But a few weeks after being told that information about him I found out that he was the delivery driver killed on his round over in Shrewsbury. 'Reading the details of what happened to him, the fact his killers ambushed him and with such ferocity, makes it look like some sort of revenge attack.' Derbyshire Police did not have Aurman marked down as a suspect in any fighting but even so his killers are understood to have picked him out from footage, which was uploaded onto social media within hours. The following morning Aurman got up for work and drove 45-miles north from his home to his DPD depot in Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire. As normal he loaded his van with packages and then started out on his round. But unbeknownst to him a colleague at the depot - Sukhmandeep Singh, 24 - had passed on details of his delivery route to his killers. Mehakdeep Singh and Sehajpal Singh drove to Shrewsbury from their homes in Tipton, West Midlands, in a white Mercedes Benz. With them were Harpreet Singh and Harwinder Singh Turna, both of whom remain at large. Four other men - Arshdeep Singh, 24, Jagdeep Singh, 23, Shivdeep Singh, 27, and Manjot Singh, 24 – followed in a grey Audi. They carefully tailed Aurman through the historic Shropshire county town to a quiet suburban area in Coton Hill, where he pulled up just before 1pm and got out of his van to start unloading the packages. The Mercedes parked up behind and Harwinder was the first out, charging at Aurman and his startled colleague with a metal bar. The colleague ran off in terror and Harwinder hurled the bar at Aurman as he too tried to flee, the impact of which caused him to lose balance and tumble to the floor. Circling around him – several clutching weapons – they moved in on their hapless victim, chopping him with an axe, stabbing him and beating him mercilessly with a hockey stick, shovel and golf club. The attackers left him in a bloodied heap in a side-road. Residents who found him called an ambulance but his injuries were too severe and he died at the scene. Both the Mercedes and Audi drove off at speed. During his trial at Stafford Crown Court, Sehajpal said an argument broke out during their getaway between his co-defendant Mehakdeep and Harwinder about the metal bar being thrown and his fingerprints being on it. The suspects later abandoned their cars and dumped their weapons. Sehajpal and Mehakdeep then booked a cab to Shrewsbury rail station, where they met some of the others who had travelled there by bus. They travelled as a group to Wolverhampton. When asked what the atmosphere was like during the journey, Sehajpal said: 'It was stressed. We were also panicking. 'There was not much talking between us.' Sehajpal told jurors Mehakdeep booked an Uber to a friend's flat in High Street, Tipton, for the both of them. He recalled how he was at the flat when he discovered Aurman had died, adding: 'My friend was using his mobile phone and then he saw a DPD driver was dead in Shrewsbury. 'Then it came to my mind that it was the same case. 'It was shocking and stressful because I thought, at the time when I was in Shrewsbury, I thought that Aurman had some serious injuries but when I got the news that he had died, it was shocking. 'It was terrible news.' The court heard how Harwinder boarded a flight to Delhi, India, on August 22 and has since disappeared. Harpreet is said to have withdrawn cash from various cashpoints before the trail to catch him likewise went cold. Sehajpal and Mehakdeep, meanwhile, lay low for a couple of weeks before booking flights to Austria, where they were both arrested last May. Footage released by West Mercia Police shows the moment they were caught during a sting by armed cops in the Austrian village of Hohenzell, about 44 miles north-east of Salzburg and 146 miles west of the capital of Vienna. The pair denied Aurman's murder but were found guilty by a jury on Tuesday. Their convictions follow that of Arshdeep Singh, Jagdeep Singh, Shivdeep Singh, and Manjot Singh, who were each jailed for 28 years for murder in April 2024. Their inside man, Sukhmandeep Singh, was convicted of manslaughter and jailed for 10 years.
