LONDON: Seven Pakistani-origin men have been found guilty of sex crimes against girls, some as young as 11, in Britain.
A London court heard six girls were drugged and suffered sadistic abuse while aged between 11 and 15.
“You have been convicted of the most serious offences and long custodial sentences are inevitable,” the judge at the Old Bailey said in his ruling on Tuesday.
All seven, facing charges of running a sex grooming ring near Oxford, will be sentenced on June 26.
The court heard victims were plied with alcohol and drugs before being forced to perform sex acts. Some had also been beaten, burned and threatened.
The abuse began in Oxford but some of the victims would be later taken around the country to be offered to other men who were in contact with the gang.
Kamar Jamil, Akhtar Dogar, Anjum Dogar, Assad Hussain, Mohammed Karrar, Bassam Karrar, Zeeshan Ahmed and Mohammed Hussain – all in their mid-20s and early 30s – were found guilty of either rape or conspiracy to rape.
The jury was told that key members of the group used and abused the six victims in a systematic and organised sex trafficking ring over eight years until their arrest in 2012.
The court heard how the men identified vulnerable girls for abuse then groomed each one of them until they were under the control of the gang.
Acts of physical and sexual violence escalated into using objects to cause pain and humiliation.
The court heard that girls were tied up, burnt, suffocated, bitten, scratched and urinated upon.
The victims would return to Oxford bleeding, injured and carrying sexually-transmitted diseases.
One of the victims described being plied with hard drugs and forced to have sex with strangers while being filmed at the age of 13.
The men had denied charges including rape, arranging child prostitution and trafficking between 2004 to 2012.