The Sheffield incest case concerns the conviction in November 2008 in Sheffield

Sheffield

Sheffield is a city and metropolitan borough of South Yorkshire, England. Its name derives from the River Sheaf, which runs through the city. Historically a part of the West Riding of Yorkshire, and with some of its southern suburbs annexed from Derbyshire, the city has grown from its largely...

 Crown Court

Crown Court

The Crown Court of England and Wales is, together with the High Court of Justice and the Court of Appeal, one of the constituent parts of the Senior Courts of England and Wales...

 of a 54-year-old English businessman who, undetected over a period of 25 years, committed incest

Incest

Incest is sexual intercourse between close relatives that is usually illegal in the jurisdiction where it takes place and/or is conventionally considered a taboo. The term may apply to sexual activities between: individuals of close "blood relationship"; members of the same household; step...

uous rape

Rape

Rape is a type of sexual assault usually involving sexual intercourse, which is initiated by one or more persons against another person without that person's consent. The act may be carried out by physical force, coercion, abuse of authority or with a person who is incapable of valid consent. The...

 of his two daughters, fathering seven surviving children with them. Apparently unrepentant, he received 25 concurrent life sentences and must serve a minimum of nineteen and a half years in prison. After this and a similar incest case in Swindon

Swindon

Swindon is a large town within the borough of Swindon and ceremonial county of Wiltshire, in South West England. It is midway between Bristol, west and Reading, east. London is east...

 in 2003, independent inquiries were set up to examine the way in which the case was dealt with by local authorities, the medical profession and child help agencies.

"British Fritzl"

The defendant in the case was referred to as the "British Fritzl", "The Gaffer", his own preferred name, or "Mr. X", due to a court order to protect his daughters and their seven surviving children, his name could not be revealed publicly. He was responsible for bringing about many pregnancies with his two daughters since the early 1980s until his arrest in 2008. Parallels were drawn between him and Josef Fritzl, the perpetrator of an Austrian incest case which came to light a few months previously. He received 25 simultaneous life sentences and must serve a minimum of nineteen and a half years in prison.

Prolonged incestuous abuse

The man continued the abuse by frequently relocating his family to keep them isolated

Social isolation

Social isolation refers to a lack of contact with society for members of social species. There may be many causes and individuals in numerous generally social species are isolated at times, it need not be a pathological condition. In human society, in those cases where it is viewed as a pathology,...

, keeping them out of school when they had any visible injuries, and threatening them with violence. The children's mother had left some years before due to the violence she endured.

The sexual abuse began when the girls were eight and ten years old. He would call their names in the middle of the night, and even smear "fake blood" on their doors while they were sleeping. There was threatening behaviour used to enforce it including beatings, and their heads being pushed by the gas fire so they were scorched if they moved away. He threatened to kill both them and their children if they told anyone of the abuse. All the children said he dominated the family. To begin with, the attacks were every day, then frequently every two to three days, with the one daughter babysitting while the other was raped. He would even rape them while they were pregnant.

His two daughters had nineteen pregnancies between them, including five miscarriages, five terminations and two children dying soon after birth. Seven of their children survived. He was said to have 'taken pleasure' from the harm he was inflicting, and the fathering of the children, despite the difficult pregnancies and deaths. If they took contraceptive pills, he told them to stop it and they felt they had to obey.

The women's relationships with their current partners gave them the courage to come forward. Although the man at first denied the crimes, DNA

DNA

Deoxyribonucleic acid is a nucleic acid that contains the genetic instructions used in the development and functioning of all known living organisms . The DNA segments that carry this genetic information are called genes, but other DNA sequences have structural purposes, or are involved in...

 testing confirmed that he was the father of the women's children. The women said his imprisonment gave them only the knowledge that he could not physically touch them again, the suffering he caused will continue for many years and they now have to concentrate on finding the strength to rebuild their lives.

Response of government and local authorities

Gordon Brown

Gordon Brown

James Gordon Brown is a British Labour Party politician who was the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Labour Party from 2007 until 2010. He previously served as Chancellor of the Exchequer in the Labour Government from 1997 to 2007...

, the British Prime Minister at the time, responded to the concerns of MP

Member of Parliament

A Member of Parliament is a representative of the voters to a :parliament. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, the term applies specifically to members of the lower house, as upper houses often have a different title, such as senate, and thus also have different titles for its members,...

s from Sheffield, including Nick Clegg

Nick Clegg

Nicholas William Peter "Nick" Clegg is a British Liberal Democrat politician who is currently the Deputy Prime Minister, Lord President of the Council and Minister for Constitutional and Political Reform in the coalition government of which David Cameron is the Prime Minister...

 the leader of the Liberal Democrats

Liberal Democrats

The Liberal Democrats are a social liberal political party in the United Kingdom which supports constitutional and electoral reform, progressive taxation, wealth taxation, human rights laws, cultural liberalism, banking reform and civil liberties .The party was formed in 1988 by a merger of the...

, and David Blunkett

David Blunkett

David Blunkett is a British Labour Party politician and the Member of Parliament for Sheffield Brightside and Hillsborough, having represented Sheffield Brightside from 1987 to 2010...

 by saying he was "outraged at the unspeakable abuse", and any changes to the system that were needed would be made.

The case had gone undetected by social services agencies and schools or hospitals, despite the numerous pregnancies, and despite the girls at times having unexplained injuries. Schools put facial injuries of the girls down to bullying. The victims had hid from hospitals that the children were fathered by their own father. The man had previously been faced with reports of the incestuous rape of his daughters in a police complaint filed by their brother, but no action was taken by the police, as they considered the brother's word to be hearsay

Hearsay

Hearsay is information gathered by one person from another person concerning some event, condition, or thing of which the first person had no direct experience. When submitted as evidence, such statements are called hearsay evidence. As a legal term, "hearsay" can also have the narrower meaning of...

 evidence that would not hold up in court, and because the girls would not say anything, due to intimidation.

Family members reported their concerns to the authorities over two decades but nothing was done. Social workers say that because the father moved the family so often, what rare chance there was of someone disclosing incest was lessened by the girls not forming a close relationship with a teacher

Teacher

A teacher or schoolteacher is a person who provides education for pupils and students . The role of teacher is often formal and ongoing, carried out at a school or other place of formal education. In many countries, a person who wishes to become a teacher must first obtain specified professional...

, other professional, or anyone else. They were known to social services in both Lincolnshire and South Yorkshire, but the abuse was not recognized. In 2008, the family doctor who failed to recognize or report the abuse was suspended by the General Medical Council.

The county council

County council

A county council is the elected administrative body governing an area known as a county. This term has slightly different meanings in different countries.-United Kingdom:...

 and police are to be investigated. The judge said although the phrase was overused, it is difficult to imagine a worse case; he had not seen a similar case in forty years of criminal law practice. No action had been taken, although there were obvious signs and agencies were suspicious, and that was why it was going to independent Serious Case Review. The review is to be conducted by professor Pat Cantrill.

Medical guidelines

Doctors were said to have failed professional guidelines of the General Medical Council

General Medical Council

The General Medical Council registers and regulates doctors practising in the United Kingdom. It has the power to revoke or restrict a doctor's registration if it deems them unfit to practise...

 by not informing the authorities, and the handling of the case, together with the failure of institutions to share information with each other, breached recommendations following a review of another case of protracted incest four years before in Swindon

Swindon

Swindon is a large town within the borough of Swindon and ceremonial county of Wiltshire, in South West England. It is midway between Bristol, west and Reading, east. London is east...

.

The family doctor who failed to recognise the signs had already been suspended by the GMC four years before, due to his falling below the minimum standard to the extent that he was exposing patients to risk. Before this doctor's suspension and subsequent departure from practice, the father would bring his daughters with the complications from their nineteen pregnancies and other injuries to him if they needed to see a doctor, even when they moved out of the area. The County Council's director of children's services said treatment of such cases was now handled differently from when the childhood abuse occurred.

Child protection

The case coincided with several other cases in the United Kingdom which highlighted possible problems with the efficiency of child protection services. The whole country was said by Prime Minister Gordon Brown to be appalled at the crime and the many chances there may have been for the abuse — which continued for 28 years — to be stopped.

The father, shown with a pint of beer in his hand, was said by his sister-in-law to have been motivated in part by wanting to keep for himself the money paid to him by the state in child support

Child support

In family law and public policy, child support is an ongoing, periodic payment made by a parent for the financial benefit of a child following the end of a marriage or other relationship...

 for the numerous children. There were said to have been 150 opportunities for authorities to notice what was happening. For several months the girls tried to pay their father to stop raping them by giving him £100 a month. They gave him whisky, hoping his drinking would lead to his death. They had called ChildLine

ChildLine

ChildLine is a free 24 hour counselling service for children and young people up to 18 in the UK provided by the NSPCC. ChildLine deals with any issue which causes distress or concern, common issues dealt with include child abuse, bullying, parental separation or divorce, pregnancy and substance...

, but were not reassured that their children would not be taken from them, which their father had said would happen, so they ended the call.