An Asian grooming gang viewed two vulnerable schoolgirls as “easy prey” who they abused in the most humiliating and degrading way imaginable, a court heard. Tahir Rashid, 54, is alleged to have been the ringleader who abused both teenagers and also to have raped a 12-year-old girl in the late 1980s in a town “blighted” by child sex exploitation. Rossano Scamardella KC, prosecutors told jurors at Manchester Minshull Street Crown Court that Girl A and Girl C were friends in Rochdale who both led “troubled lives”.
Opening his case on Monday, he said: “They were very vulnerable children with chaotic home lives, and they were easy prey for men with an unhealthy interest in having sex with children. They had deeply troubled home lives and were known to the authorities. Their school attendance was poor, and they were often missing from home. They were abused at similar times by Tahir Rashid and others who sit with him in the dock.
“Their experiences at the hands of these predatory men was appalling. They were children passed around for sex – abused, degraded and then discarded.
“That it was the two of them that were exploited in this way, was not by chance.
“The defendants were only too aware of their tender ages and the difficulties they were experiencing with day-to-day life. It was obvious that they craved the attention that their home lives and families did not provide, which made them easy prey for older men to exploit.
“The girls would hang around groups of Asian men at various parks, woods, at the Moors or at Rochdale market and the snooker hall. They would be driven around by these men, picked up and dropped off at various flats and houses desperate for some stability and a sense of belonging.
“These men preyed upon those vulnerabilities for their own perverted sexual gratification in the most humiliating and degrading way imaginable.
“Unprotected sex was routine. The girls were lied to about it being forbidden for Muslim men to use protection. These men cared not a bit about sexually transmitted diseases or unwanted pregnancies.”
The prosecutor said the pattern of the case was “common” to child sexual exploitation.
He said: “The crimes committed by grooming gangs span the entire spectrum of sexual offending. Often beginning with non-penetrative touching over or under clothing, it then progresses to forced oral sex and full penetrative sexual intercourse. Rape in other words.
“The unique feature of child sexual exploitation or grooming is that the children are coerced, controlled, groomed and manipulated into sexual activity.
“Those who commit these offences are cunning. They appear affectionate and kind to the children they intend to exploit, often providing alcohol, drugs or a place to stay and at the heart of that very deliberate manipulation tactic is an imbalance of power.”
Mr Scamardella added that Rochdale and surrounding parts of Greater Manchester had been “blighted by this type of child sexual exploitation”.
Rashid, of Rochdale, faces allegations in relation to all three girls and denies rape, indecent assault and assault by penetration.
His co-defendants are charged with offences against Girl A and/or Girl C, said to have taken place on various dates between 2003 and 2006.
Mohammed Saleem, 46, of Rochdale; Sucklane Shah, 46, of no fixed abode, and Itfaq Hussain, 45, of Shawforth, all deny rape.
Arshad Mohammed, 55, of Rochdale, has entered not guilty pleas to rape and assault by penetration, while Amjad Mahmood, 53, of Rochdale – who was not in the dock – has pleaded not guilty to offences of rape, indecent assault, indecency with a child and assault by penetration.
The trial continues.
