Could a head lice infestation have led to the unravelling of a child rape gang that inflicted unspeakable horror?

Warning: This article contains graphic details of abuse

A paedophile ring, a mix of seven Glasgow men and women, operated in plain sight for seven years despite what may appear to be major red flags.

From 2012, a group of children, including some young enough to still be wearing nappies, were subjected to organised “rape nights” by drug users who plied them with alcohol and cocaine.

None of those present tried to help the children, who were all aged under 13. Instead, they clapped, filmed and paid for the abuse to continue.

One boy remembers hearing a “beep” indicating a timer when one rape would end, and another would begin.

This horror unfolded behind the doors of a dirty drug den – a ground-floor flat in a city suburb infested by insects, which was known as the “beastie house”.

The gang even forced the primary school-age children to eat dog food and abuse each other while their molesters crowded round to spectate.

They were shoved in microwaves and a locked fridge and freezer. One girl was hung by her clothes from a nail in the kitchen.

During the trial in 2023, which eventually saw the seven abusers each receive an order for lifelong restriction, judge Lord Beckett said the scandal plunged to the “depths of human depravity”.

The gang comprised Iain Owens, 46; Elaine Lannery, 40; Lesley Williams, 43; Paul Brannan, 42; Scott Forbes, 51; Barry Watson, 48 and John Clark, 48. They are all now in prison for a total of almost 100 years.

There are questions around how this could have happened in the first place.

The children were visited by social workers and even placed on the child protection register in 2018 before police cracked the case in 2020.

How can it be those youngsters, who were being regularly raped as part of an organised ring, could simultaneously sit on a register designed to prevent them from harm?

The High Court jury heard a selection of evidence from people who had concerns.

Police painstakingly worked through almost 1,000 pieces of evidence – so surely there would be someone willing to discuss the warning signs they spotted?

Sky News tracks down concerned witness

But nobody I encountered, from barbers to local shopkeepers, would speak. Until finally, I tracked down a man who had spoken to detectives as part of the investigation.

Speaking publicly for the first time, he revealed he saw the children regularly and recalled an evening where he spotted head lice on one girl and tried to arrange treatment.

“One of their hair was messy with head lice and because she was the same age as my child, I said ‘why won’t you do your hair’,” he said.

“She left them on her head to try and keep those beasts away from her. The head lice protected her from them.”

The man said he had concerns about how malnourished some of the victims were and described noticing the situation going “wrong” in 2018.

“They were always lingering around adults to try and get food. They were scavenging… It was heartbreaking,” he said.

“The system has failed.”

Sky News has learned concerns were raised with charities too. The actions of social workers, police and child protection services are now being investigated as part of an independent review.

These reviews are commonplace across Britain when serious harm or death is inflicted on a child.

Do reviews actually work?

But how effective are they when a commitment of “lessons will be learned” is then undone when the next tragedy comes along?

One former children’s commissioner for Scotland and leading child protection expert told Sky News the entire review process was being re-examined.

Tam Baillie said: “Learning reviews are important. The challenge for them is how effectively we implement the recommendations that come from reviews, as that is the bit that really counts.

“There is no point in doing the review unless it actively effects change in the system.”

Mr Baillie, who has 35 years of experience in child protection, said the public were right to ask questions about this case.

He said: “Currently, the process of learning reviews is being looked at so that we can make improvements to ensure we don’t keep looking at the same lessons coming up time and time again.”

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The gang branded the children liars

I sat in the courtroom during the trial as the paedophiles, who were on bail at the time, laughed and joked in the dock between breaks.

Their sober performance when the jury was present was very different to their behaviour outside the confines of the High Court in Glasgow.

I have been reporting on criminal proceedings for almost 15 years and their boisterous conduct stands in stark contrast to other people accused of such serious crimes who seem to have more respect for the process.

As the Sky News team filmed their mask-covered faces entering and leaving court, they would yell obscenities and threaten to attack us.

One repeatedly shouted that the children were “liars”. The jury did not believe a word of it and found them guilty.

At the end of another gruelling day of evidence, two of the accused walked out to their waiting taxi and threatened to “batter” me. One of them lunged in our direction.

They were swiftly told to “shut up” and “get in” the car by the lingering police officers.

Days later, a jury convicted them of some of the most heinous crimes this country has ever seen.

Leading KC calls it quits after this case

One leading KC, Thomas Leonard Ross, who was involved in the trial, has told Sky News this case was a tipping point for him.

After working on 400 High Court cases, he is so traumatised he says he will never work on a sex abuse case again.

“It is the worst example of child abuse I have ever heard. It was awful to sit and listen to,” he said.

“You were left with the impression that these children were known to the social work department. It seemed surprising that steps hadn’t been taken to remove them from the scenario they were in earlier.

“Questions were raised, and I understand why the public are seeking answers to those questions.”

It is unclear when the independent review will report on its findings, but Glasgow City Council has told Sky News it will implement all recommendations in full.

A spokesperson said: “This is a uniquely complicated case involving unusually sensitive issues and a number of individuals, and our focus remains on supporting everyone involved in this process.”

There is a consensus these children were failed. But our investigation raises fresh questions about how Scotland’s largest paedophile gang managed to cause such prolonged pain.

The raw materials needed to keep the blast furnaces running at British Steel’s Scunthorpe plant will be delivered to the site today, the government has confirmed.

Ministers have been racing against time to secure the coking coal and iron ore needed to keep the furnaces at the UK’s last virgin steel-producing plant operating.

If they cool down too much, the molten iron solidifies and blocks the furnaces, making it extremely difficult and expensive to restart them.

Jonathan Reynolds, the business secretary, will visit the port in nearby Immingham as the supplies from two ships are unloaded and transported to the plant.

The Department for Business and Trade (DBT) said the materials had been provided by the US and would be enough to keep the furnaces running for weeks, while a third ship with coking coal and iron ore is on its way from Australia after a legal dispute between British Steel and the site’s Chinese owner Jingye was resolved.

The future of the British Steel plant at Scunthorpe had been hanging in the balance after Jingye decided to cancel future orders for the iron ore, coal and other raw materials needed to keep the furnaces running at the beginning of April.

After talks with the owner broke down, the government summoned MPs who had been away from Westminster for the Easter recess back to parliament to pass an emergency bill on Saturday to take over the facility.

The bill has brought the steelworks into effective government control, with the next step expected to be nationalisation.

Mr Reynolds said: “Thanks to the work of those at British Steel, and in my department, we have moved decisively to secure the raw materials we need to help save British Steel.

“Our industries depend on UK steel and – thanks to our plan for change – demand is set to shoot up: helping build the 1.5 million homes, railways, schools and hospitals we need to usher in a decade of national renewal.”

Jingye’s decision to cancel future orders of the raw materials needed to keep the furnaces running has led some to question whether the company might have purposefully attempted to shut the blast furnaces down.

While Downing Street said it was not aware of “sabotage” at the plant, it did acknowledge that it had become “clear” the Chinese owners “wanted to shut the blast furnaces” during talks.

Mr Reynolds said “it might not be sabotage, it might be neglect”, while Ms Rayner said there was “no evidence” of corporate sabotage.

However, the episode has sparked a debate about Chinese involvement in UK industries, with Mr Reynolds saying on Sunday that he “wouldn’t personally bring a Chinese company into our steel sector”.

The Chinese company stepped in with a deal to buy British Steel’s Scunthorpe plant out of insolvency five years ago.

Commenting on the situation for the first time on Monday, a Chinese embassy spokesperson urged the British government not to “politicise” the row by “linking it to security issues”, and to act with “fairness, impartiality and non-discrimination… to make sure the legitimate rights and interests of the Chinese company be protected”.

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“It is an objective fact that British steel companies have generally encountered difficulties in recent years,” it added.

UK ministers have faced questions themselves over why they have only just acted on British Steel, given the fact that unions warned earlier this month that Jingye had decided to cancel future orders for the vital raw materials.

The Conservatives accused the government of acting “too late” and implementing a “botched nationalisation” after ignoring warnings about the risk to the steelworks.

Under the new legislation passed at the weekend, ministers now have the power to instruct British Steel to keep the plant in Scunthorpe open, order materials for steelmaking and instruct that workers be paid.

It also authorises a jail sentence of up to two years for anyone who breaches this law.

A long-running strike by bin workers, that has left rubbish piling up on Birmingham’s streets, will continue after union members “overwhelmingly rejected” the city council’s offer in a fresh ballot.

The action by members of Unite, which began on 11 March as part of a dispute over pay, has seen thousands of tonnes of rubbish go uncollected and warnings of a public health emergency.

Hundreds of workers have been on all-out strike for a month, and residents have complained about “rats as big as cats”.

Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner visited Birmingham last week and called on the union to accept a “significantly improved” deal for workers.

However, the union said hundreds of its members had rejected the “totally inadequate” offer.

The offer, if it had been accepted, would have included “substantial pay cuts for workers” and “did not address potential pay cuts for 200 drivers”, according to Unite.

The latest ballot comes after previous talks failed.

Unite has been campaigning against plans to cut the post of waste recycling and collection officer (WRCO) from the city’s refuse and recycling service.

The union claims it will lead to around 150 of its members having their pay cut by up to £8,000 a year.

But the council has disputed the figures, saying only 17 workers will be affected, losing far less than Unite is claiming.

Local government minister Jim McMahon said the union’s rejection of the pay offer will be “deeply disappointing for Birmingham residents who have already endured weeks of disruption”.

“There is a fair and reasonable offer on the table and I would urge Unite to end the strikes and return to talks to reach the resolution that is fair to the workers and residents of the city,” he added.

‘Rejection of the offer is no surprise’

Unite general secretary Sharon Graham said: “The rejection of the offer is no surprise as these workers simply cannot afford to take pay cuts of this magnitude to pay the price for bad decision after bad decision.”

Unite national lead Onay Kasab told Sky News: “The proposal from the employers was completely and utterly inadequate. It still included a pay cut. It included a sharp cliff-edge drop in pay for our members.

“Unfortunately, the biggest thing about the proposal was what it didn’t include. It didn’t include the details of how and when the drivers are going to have their pay cut and what’s going to be done to mitigate that. It didn’t include issues around what happens if people finish their training and there are no vacancies for them.

“But what it did show up was this so-called figure of only 17 people being impacted is complete and utter nonsense. The proposal itself, that we’ve got in paper, impacts more than 17 people.”

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Wendy Morton, a Conservative MP whose Aldridge-Brownhills constituency is in the Walsall borough, said rats in Birmingham – labelled Squeaky Blinders – “must be dancing in the streets”.

She said: “This really shows yet again Labour-led Birmingham Council and this Labour government are failing residents and our region.

“They need to get a grip, stop blaming others, and face the unions – their paymasters. The Squeaky Blinders must be dancing in the streets.”

Rats have been seen scurrying around mounting piles of rubbish, food waste and bin bags outside homes, shops and restaurants in the city since the strike began.

‘It has been really bad’

A Birmingham resident whose car was wrecked by rats in a street where piles of rubbish were “as tall as” him is “disappointed” bin workers have rejected the council’s offer.

Adam Yasin, 33, from the Balsall Heath area of the city, said: “It’s more to do with hygiene on the streets. I take my son to the nursery and I use a specific street and honestly it was blocked. It’s just annoying, and when the kids are there they like to touch things as well.”

He said his Mercedes was “completely written off” just weeks ago because rats had chewed through wires in the engine.

He said: “It has been really bad, especially where I live, there are a lot of restaurants there. I swear there was a pile (of rubbish) as tall as me, I kid you not.

“Today they collected the rubbish that was on the floor, so the bags that were on the floor, but the bins are still left.”

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What has the council said?

Birmingham City Council said: “It is incredibly disappointing, that despite several weeks of extensive negotiations, Unite have rejected a second offer of settlement. However, our door remains open.

“The council must deliver improved waste services for our citizens – who simply deserve better.

“We must also guard against future equal pay claims, and while we have sought throughout the negotiations to protect pay for individuals, Unite’s proposals focus solely on retaining a role that does not exist in other councils and represents an equal pay risk for Birmingham.

“We have made a fair and reasonable offer and every employee affected by the removal of the WRCO role could take an equivalent graded role in the council, LGV Driver training or voluntary redundancy packages.”

It comes as the government called in military planners to help tackle the mounting piles of rubbish in Birmingham.

Amid an “ongoing public health risk” posed by the mounds of waste, the planners have been assigned to provide logistical support for a short period. The move has not involved soldiers being deployed to collect rubbish.

‘Army logistics deployed’

Ms Rayner insisted there were “no boots on the ground”.

She said “we’ve deployed a couple of army logistics to help with the logistical operation of clearing up the rubbish”.

“We’ve got over two-thirds of the rubbish cleared off the streets now, this week we’ll start to see cleaning up the pavements and streets as well as the clearance of all of that rubbish, I’m very pleased about that. The kids are off school, obviously it’s Easter holidays, we want that rubbish cleared.”

Waste collections have been disrupted since January, before the all-out strike started last month.

Birmingham City Council declared a major incident on 31 March in response to public health concerns.