A
report released on Tuesday on accusations of widespread sexual abuse in
the northern England city of Rotherham found that about 1,400 minors —
some as young as 11 years old — were beaten, raped and trafficked from
1997 to 2013 as the local authorities ignored a series of red flags.
Some children were doused in gasoline and threatened with being set on fire if they reported their abusers, the report
said, and others were forced to watch rapes and threatened with the
same fate. In more than a third of the cases, the victims appear to have
been known to child protection agencies, but the police and local
government officials failed to act.