Tag Archives: esther baker

The blog in 2015: Driven by Aaronovitch and Amy Winehouse

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Chris Grayling last yearsigning the memorandum of understanding with the Saudis; Pic Credit: UsSembassy
Times columnist David Aaronovitch. Pic credit :Flickr
Cotton bay; The main pool

The unlikely combination of combative Times columnist  David Aaronovitch and the tragic pop star Amy Winehouse drove traffic to my blog last year.

I doubt either have met each other but in different ways it reflects the present obsession with controversial names and celebrity culture.

The Amy Winehouse blog is three years old and is a travelogue based on the fact that I found myself and my wife staying at the same tourist complex in St Lucia that acted as a retreat for Amy when she was chilling out from drugs. I suspect the film about her has driven the traffic but the blog got over 1500 hits last year – 50 per cent more than the combined total of the two previous years taking it to nearly 2700 hits.

David Aaronovitch’s critique of my journalism in The Times led to 3537 hits when I decided to respond – though it was eclipsed by my critique of Dominic Lawson’s take on the Leon Brittan alleged child sex abuse scandal which attracted 6447 views.

Interest in the case of child sex abuse survivor Esther Baker was reflected in two high scoring blogs- at 2674 for an analysis of the challenge facing Staffs Police in investigating her case and 2096 when the first arrest was announced.

The scandal over former justice secretary Chris Grayling seeking contracts from the despicable Saudi Arabian justice system – which this blog  and Tribune broke- was a big highlight – with 4250 hits when his successor Michael Gove faced court action and 2795 when the story originally broke.

Otherwise the biggest hits were reserved for the attempt to get rid of the Speaker, John Bercow, on the last day of Parliament – with 3933 on a piece criticising William  Hague’s botched action  in changing the election rules and 2497 on the midnight email to MPs from Julian Lewis MP which alerted everyone to the dodgy deal.

The most controversial blog has been my reporting of a Northern Ireland judge’s decision to compensate a paedophile for a campaign against him by one of his victims -comments were both virulent in their hatred and support for the judge.

Altogether the number of hits  recorded by WordPress on my blog – 127,725 were down from 182,000 the previous year. I also wrote fewer blogs as I was away some of the time. But this is not the full story as the blog is getting increasing additional traffic from Linked In, Facebook and is now run on Byline.com so I am not longer sure how many hits I am getting any more.

WordPress also records I have had hits from 155 countries. Over 80 per cent (107,000) is from the UK but there were over 7,700 from the United States and over 1000 each from Australia, Ireland and France. I have had just one hit from Iran, Syria, Armenia and the Turks and Caicos Islands to name but a few.

The blog’s rating on http://averypublicsociologist.blogspot.co.uk/ has gone up from number 62 to number 50 on the top independent bloggers This partly reflects my twitter following increasing to 8085.

For a small one man blog however it is gratifying that so many people are interested – given I do no promotion.

 

 

Police make first arrest in Esther Baker child sex abuse investigation

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Esther Baker

Esther Baker

Staffordshire Police confirmed today that they had arrested a 64 year old man as part of their investigation into an historic child sex abuse ring following allegations made by  Esther Baker. a survivor.

The full statement in reply to a question from me on behalf of Exaro News is:“A 64 year old man has been arrested on suspicion of rape and conspiracy to rape in connection with the ongoing investigation in allegations of historic child sexual abuse.He remains on bail pending further inquiries.In line with our normal policy we will not confirm the details of a person under investigation until such time as charges are made.”

For legal reasons I have been told we cannot name the man but I can say for those who have followed this story it is NOT the former MP.

Police investigations are continuing into the allegations which involve a child sex abuse ring which operated in Staffordshire and the West Midlands.

Esther Baker child sex abuse allegations: A challenging case for Staffordshire Police

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Esther Baker

Esther Baker

The allegations of historical child sex abuse made by Esther Baker are going to be a big challenge for Staffordshire Police to investigate.

Her testimony  reported first on Sky News and developed in stories published at the weekend on Exaro News and in the Sunday Mirror make grim reading. I won’t repeat it all here.

What it suggests is that some 25 years ago a group of young girls – in Esther’s case as young as six – were taken into the deep woods of Cannock Chase in Staffordshire and  raped on numerous occasions  while a couple of police officers watched to make sure no member of the public stumbled upon such a scene.

She has been unable to identify any of the other girls – though she says they may have been six or seven of them and not all the same ones – and has until recently not been certain who all the assailants were. Some were alleged to VIPs, others were not.

But she has now told police that a former MP of repeatedly raping her not only there but at other places. He  is adamant that this is untrue and  insists that she has either fabricated this  or been manipulated by others to accuse him of criminal sexual acts he did not commit.

She points out to me that the first time she made the allegation it was to another survivor and was before she was being counselled by any organisation.

Staffordshire Police are at the moment nearing the end of a scoping exercise which has involved interviewing Esther seven times for hours before they proceed to a full investigation which  they have promised to undertake.

What has also emerged that quite independently two other women have come forward and made similar allegations against the same former MP. Unlike Esther these two women have not made their complaints public and still have to talk to Staffordshire Police in any detail about their allegations. Neither are known to Esther.

And to add to the complications a third survivor,  a man already talking to the Met Police, about allegations in Dolphin Square, London has identified from a picture of Esther as a child, her being there. She remembers being taken to London but had no idea where she had been taken.

All this is going to require a painstaking detailed investigation by Staffordshire Police which is going to take a lot of time and energy. It is a very good exemplar of how these allegations – which would have been dismissed years ago – are now being taken seriously by the police in the present climate. No doubt the naysayers would argue that these allegations  still should not be taken up because they sound so extreme.

But to clear up what looks like a hidden epidemic of child sex abuse that is being uncovered in this country Esther is entitled to a full and thorough investigation into exactly what happened in Staffordshire 25 years ago. And the police need to  track down  who is alleged to have carried out  such vile acts and bring them to trial.