Operation Rectangle, as regular readers will be aware, is/was the police investigation into Child Abuse at State run institutions in Jersey spear-headed by Lenny Harper, Graham Power and their team of dedicated professionals. After Lenny Harper’s retirement and the possibly illegal suspension of Graham Power the investigation was taken over, and some would say “sabotaged” by Mick Gradwell and David Warcup.
The Children’s Home, Haute de la Garenne became its main focus, although there were other institutions such as the Sea Cadets and Blanche Pierre where allegations of abuse were made, but curiously no charges ever brought against the suspects and this is after one of the suspects had a miraculous recovery from a terminal illness!!
We have seen, over the last couple of years, what many of us believe to be, a handful of “show trials” a few lambs fed to the lions in order to keep the statistics of convictions up. In this posting I will just concentrate on the Jordans.
The violence, pain and suffering, that these two individuals inflicted on their victims is/was heinous and inexcusable. I was present at parts of the trial so know of the violence they dished out to the very people (vulnerable children) they were supposed to “care” for….but after listening to the evidence of their victims one could not help thinking these two (the Jordans) have been made scapegoats.
During the adjournments I got talking to a number of the victims and witnesses. One victim in particular gave testimony, in fact two witnesses that I know of gave testimony, but I got talking to one of them who was subjected to violent assaults from Anthony Jordan. Both said that the Jordans were not the most violent “carers” at Haute de la Garenne. The victim that I got talking to told me that when he/she first gave a statement to the police he/she didn’t even mention the Jordans because he/she didn’t believe the police would be interested. In comparison to the violence he/she was subjected to by another member of staff, the Jordans were pussy cats. In testimony the victim said when it came to dishing out violence xxxxxxx “took the biscuit”
This person (“carer?”) was named in the court by the defence advocate(s) and witnesses that many times that the judge asked them to desist from naming this person. Not being a lawyer myself it appeared to me that the defence might have been trying to show that if this person is not in the dock then neither should the defendants be, something that the victim I was speaking to didn’t necessarily disagree with!!
The victim told me that if anybody should be in the dock, first and foremost it should be xxxxxxx. The alleged abuser is currently a Civil Servant at the Education Department who was investigated as a suspect in the Child Abuse enquiry but was never charged. Not sure why not, whether apparently there was insufficient evidence or it was “not in the public interest”.
Many statistics were left out of the recent press release from David Warcup. One of them being that 93% of the suspects were never charged. Out of 121 living suspects 8 were charged, how does that stack up with the national average? Who are the remaining 118 suspects? Well we know one of them! What were their positions? How many of them are still employed by the States?
Anthony Jordan, who had absolutely no experience of child “care” was employed by somebody at Haute de la Garenne and was never given any training in childcare while working at HDLG, who employed him? Why was he not given any training? The victims were complaining about the abuse they were suffering, who were they complaining to, why haven’t they been in the dock? How was this abuse able to carry on for decades?
No managers, Senior Civil Servants, high ranking officials have been charged with any kind of neglect, dereliction of duty or Abuse……coincidence?………..or “The Jersey way?”
After the Jordans received their sentences, the victims I spoke to appeared to feel that justice had been, (to some degree) served. Is this because the victims expectations were so low? Or was justice served on the Jordans? Only the victims can answer that question.
There is little doubt that others should have been put in the dock, and might still face Civil action, but for the time being there are to be no more criminal trials coming from Operation Rectangle.
Is it the case that a few sacrificial lambs have been fed to the lions and those with more power and influence have been, and are being, “protected?” Only a full “public” inquiry will answer that question.