crime and punishment

Cyril Smith

Nick Clegg, deputy Prime Minister and Liberal Democrat leader:
"Cyril Smith was a larger-than-life character and one of the most recognisable and likeable politicians of his day. I am deeply saddened to hear the news of his death today, and offer my sincere condolences to his family and friends."
Manchester Evening News, September 07 2010



RAP has obtained evidence that, during the 1960’s, Cyril Smith was using his position to get lads aged 15 – 18 to undress in front of him in order that he could get them to bend over his knee while he spanked their bare bottoms or let him hold their testicles in a bizarre ‘medical inspection’.
The evidence comes from the interviews conducted by RAP over the last six months and in the form of statements made on oath before a solicitor. The allegations are not new – some were originally made as long as 15 years ago, but they were made in statements to the police during their investigation of these allegations in 1969/1970.
There is also disturbing evidence to suggest that that police investigation may not have had its proper end.
RAP decided last September to investigate the allegations in order to determine the facts in an area dominated ever since by rumour. This was prompted partly by the stance Smith had adopted in the Thorpe affair. And partly by the fact that his position as M.P., like his election campaign, was totally based on his personal character of “Smith the Man” – there was part of that man which has to date been concealed and which we feel to be sufficiently disturbing for it to be made public.
Rochdale Alternative Press (RAP) May 1979

Cyril never sued Rochdale Alternative Press or Private Eye when the details of his abusive spanking and non-consensual testicle squeezing were published in 1979.

For years, hacks and editors at the Rochdale Observer have known about the claims of Cyril's sexual abuse at Cambridge House- and elsewhere - but the Powers That Be in that great Liberal Institution have helped keep things quiet.
rochdale's alternative website




Derek Slade

"A former boarding school headmaster who sexually and physically abused boys during the late 1970s and early 1980s was today jailed for 21 years.

Derek Slade, 61, of Burton-on-Trent, Staffordshire, was found guilty of sexually assaulting and beating 12 boys aged between eight and 13 following a four-week trial at Ipswich crown court. He was convicted of more than 50 offences, including possessing pornographic images of children on a computer.

The judge, Peter Fenn, recommended that Slade serve at least 14 years before being released on parole and ordered him to pay £30,000 towards prosecution costs. He said Slade's victims – who were abused between 1978 and 1983 – had 'lost days of childhood innocence', been left with feelings of inadequacy, blame and worthlessness, and had become men whose 'lives were seriously damaged'."
The Guardian, Monday 6 September 2010


Derek Slade 2010


“I swear the only reason she got as long as she did was because she didn’t get her roots done. She’d be out by now if she’d had her hair fixed.”
John Waters on Myra Hindley


Marcus Harvey, Myra