CHELMSFORD: Failing social services left children at risk

By pdent-jones

SOCIAL services left children in the care of their mother, despite knowing she was sharing her home with a string of abusive partners and sex offenders, the Chronicle can reveal.

The shocking revelation comes as Ofsted published reasons behind its 'inadequate' rating of Essex County Council's safeguarding children services – one of just eight authorities in the country to receive the damning judgement.

Over more than seven years, dozens of neighbours, teachers and even an MP raised concerns that the Chelmsford mum neglected her children and left them in the care of unsuitable men.

Three youngsters were involved in the shocking story, now subject of a investigation, which came to light with the life imprisonment of Richard Moulding for a series of sickening sex attacks on children.

Social services had been warned about up to three other dangerous men who were known to spend time with the children, yet failed to act.

They had also received a catalogue of complaints from concerned neighbours and professionals who revealed, according to our sources:

Children wandering the streets at night asking for food;

They turned up at school unfed, unwashed and not wearing uniforms;

They were left in the care of 'unsuitable' men – including alleged and convicted sex offenders and violent criminals;

They suffered violent behaviour at the hands of their mother.

The father of one of the children, who cannot be named by the Chronicle for legal reasons, but still lives in Chelmsford, said: "I feel we have been totally let down by the system at every step."

MISTAKES by social services that left three children in the care of a mother who neglected and allowed them to visit paedophiles could be made again, a father has warned.

Essex County Council has launched a Serious Case Review into the way it handled the investigation.

The man's young daughter was sent by her mother to visit the caravan of evil child abuser Richard Moulding, despite warnings by the father and dozens of others.

Along with her half-brother and sister, the child shared a home – and sometimes a bed – with another man, previously jailed for making threats to kill, and false imprisonment of a teenage girl.

A third man, known to have lived with the family, was under strict bail conditions not to have contact with youngsters.

But even after seven years no move was made to remove the children from the care of their mother.

And when the father complained to the Police Complaints Authority, he was told: "There is nothing we can do if the mother considers them fit to look after her children."

The father, a Chelmsford man, said: "I feel as if it has been a constant fight to get

"Every time I have turned to the authorities for help I have been met by bureaucracy and red tape.

"The most frustrating thing was when I would say 'I don't think these are suitable people' I was told 'we agree but there is nothing we can do'.

"Common sense has got to come into play. Moulding lived alone in a caravan filled with pictures of children. He was seen taking photographs of kids in their underwear. Yet the mother was allowed to send her very young children to visit Moulding.

"This was all reported to social services."

One of the social workers initially assigned to the case, Julie Andrews, was jailed in January this year after being found guilty of a £25,000 fraud against the social care department.

In 2007, the children were finally removed completely from their mother's care.

The youngest girl is now living full-time with her father, and the half-brother and sister were taken in by a foster family.

The older girl then began to talk to her foster family about her abuse at the hands of Moulding.

Police raided the caravan at Gosfield Park and found DVDs he had made of himself abusing the brother and sister, and three other children.

Moulding pleaded guilty to 22 charges including rape of a child and received a life sentence.

The father says he has only just been offered counselling for his daughter – still under 10 – more than six months after the conviction.

He said: "It's impossible to say how what she has been through will have affected her.

"I have taken her to the prison in Chelmsford and shown her where he is."

"I said: 'Look, he's locked up in there now behind those huge walls, sleeping on a stone bed in a horrible cell, and that's where he's staying – he can't get you now'."