Child abuse

In the 1970s I was a social worker in Cambridgeshire. I sent quite a few children to Midfield Observation Centre, which was run by one Keith Laverack. Listening to the radio in 1997 or thereabouts I heard that he had been suspended from his job because of allegations of child abuse. I got the impression from the item that prosecution was unlikely, and, being a novice then in the ways of the internet, didn't follow it up, despite feeling uneasy about having sent him a regular supply of deliciously nubile young women.

His name came to my mind this week, so I googled him, and rapidly discovered via the BBC that he had in fact been jailed for 18 years for his crimes. Judging from other stuff I've come across he was one of a number of people who began their abusive careers together. He is known to be responsible for at least 22 victims, and the abusers between them, apparently, for a number that I can't believe.

I still don't know what I feel about this. Most of his victims were young boys, so I feel relieved at one level that at least it wasn't me sending him the meat. But I am having a hard time reconciling myself to the scale of the abuse.