'Sex gang groomed girls of 13': Asian men accused of luring teens and turning them into prostitutes

A gang of Asian men went on trial yesterday accused of a sickening catalogue of child prostitution offences against vulnerable teenage girls as young as 13.

The nine – six are married and one is a grandfather – face 55 charges, including inciting child prostitution, grooming and rape between 2007 and 2009.

The girls – who cannot be named for legal reasons – were said to have received cash, alcohol, drugs, meals and mobile phone credit in exchange for sex with some of the defendants.

Three of the men – Ahdel Ali, 23, his brother Mubarek Ali, 28, and Tanveer Ahmed, 39 – allegedly acted as ‘pimps’, passing two of the young girls among their friends and using them as sexual commodities.

Mubarek Ali is also accused of trafficking one of the girls, while Abdul Rouf, 34, and Mohammed Younis, 59, are accused of using their homes as brothels for child prostitution.

Deborah Gould, prosecuting, said: ‘The Crown say that the men in the dock variously trafficked, raped or sexually abused girls both over and under the age of 16 years over a considerable period of time.

‘These men ensnared these girls. They had cars, jobs and money which gave them both freedom and power. They enticed the girls, groomed the girls and then exploited them either for their own sexual gratification or for money.’

 Accused: Mohammed Islam Choudhrey (L) and Noshad Hussain are among the defendants facing trial at Stafford Crown Court

 Also accused: Mohammed Ali Sultan, left, and Marhoof Khan are on trial for sex offences

 Brothels: Defendants Mohammed Yunis, left, and Abdul Rouf are accused of using their homes for child prostitution

'Pimp': Tanveer Ahmed Tanveer Ahmed, 39, allegedly passed two of the young girls among his friends

Nursery worker, 20, admits horrifying rape of toddler in his care and 45 other sex charges

A paedophile nursery worker pleaded guilty today to raping a toddler in his care and a string of offences linked to the online grooming of more than 20 other girls.

Paul Wilson admitted two counts of oral rape of a girl aged two or three years old.

He also pleaded guilty to a further 45 charges of making and distributing indecent images and inciting youngsters to engage in sexual activity on the internet.

The 20-year-old, of Newbold Croft, Nechells, Birmingham, was charged with rape in January after his arrest on suspicion of child abuse prompted an investigation into his employment at the nearby Little Stars Nursery.

During an earlier hearing at Birmingham Magistrates' Court on April 7, a district judge was told the grooming charges related to a total of 22 girls aged between 12 and 15.

Marni Chimba, prosecuting, told the lower court Wilson used multiple identities to befriend the girls on chatlogs and social networking sites, even pretending sometimes to be a previous victim.

The prosecutor said: 'Some of the aliases were female names and he also pretended to be the complainants, encouraging others to send their movies to him.'

Miss Chimba said some of the victims were directed to expose themselves using webcams. Others were filmed and recorded performing and taking part in sexual acts.

Wilson also distributed indecent images and threatened some of the children that he would show images he had already captured to their friends or parents.

Worker: Wilson worked at the Little Stars Nursery in Birmingham where he admitted orally raping the youngster.Rapist: Male nursery worker Paul Wilson admitted attacking a toddler in his care

Scene of the abuse: Little Stars Nursery in Nechells, Birmingham, where Wilson worked as an assistant

Two counts of oral rape: Paedophile Paul Wilson

Undercover beauty queen aged 10: A mother and daughter go behind the scenes at one of the U.S.-style child beauty pageants spreading over Britain

Sunday mornings usually find me reading the papers in bed, eating pancakes with my children or taking the dog for a walk.

Today, however, I am standing in a hotel ladies’ toilet with my ten-year-old daughter, trying to prise her feet into a pair of ridiculously strappy high-heeled shoes.

‘Ow, Mummy, that HURTS,’ Annie protests loudly, attracting a smug glance from another mother who is viciously sticking curling pins into the hair — and occasionally the head — of her silent, uncomplaining daughter.

Outside, in a vast conference room, chaos is brewing. Girls as young as three are being coaxed into strappy dresses and adorned with body glitter, as their mothers — all tight white jeans, manicured nails and enough bling to accessorise the whole of Essex — fight for wall sockets to plug in hair straighteners.

Welcome to the UK Cinderella Beauty Pageant at the decidedly unglamorous Ramada Hotel in Ealing, West London, a stone’s throw from the North Circular.

This is the latest event in a disturbing trend that is fast gaining ground in the UK and could soon be taking place in a three-star hotel near you.

Unsurprisingly, this pageant originated in America 36 years ago. It was launched here two years ago by former model Diana Hare.

Today, there are 24 contestants, ranging in age from three to 16. Their sights are set firmly on Las Vegas, since that is where one winner and her posse of family hangers-on will be heading to compete in a ‘sister’ pageant.

 Inspiration: The formal wear round brings out gowns akin to those favoured by Katie Price

 Dressed to impress: Shona Sibary and her ten-year-old daughter Annie in her pageant outfit

Annie is a tomboy at heart and thinks the whole thing is pretty stupid

Frightening: One mother in California gives her eight-year-old daughter Botox all in the name of beauty pageant success

British man jailed for seven years after sexually abusing young girls in Cambodia

A Cambodian court has convicted a British man of sexually abusing two girls and sentenced him to seven years in prison.

Matthew Harland, 38, was arrested in May last year at the house he rented in the capital, Phnom Penh. He was found to be living with two girls aged 11 and 12.

Phnom Penh Municipal Court judge Kor Vandy convicted Harland on charges of buying sex from the girls and ordered him to pay each child compensation of two million riel (£300).

Cambodia has long been a magnet for foreign pedophiles because of poverty and poor law enforcement. In recent years police and courts have increasingly targeted sex offenders.

Jail: John Harland (left) arrives at the Phnom Penh Municipal Court in Cambodia at an earlier hearing

Haiti earthquake children sold by their parents for less than 76p each to traffickers, say Unicef

* Over 76% of Haitians live on £1.50 a day
* Parents forced to sell children to traffickers
* They believe their young will have better life - but most don't

As Haiti continues to slowly rebuild following the earthquake which devastated the Caribbean island in January 2010, it has come to light that helpless children are being trafficked for as little as 76 pence each.

Registering 7.0 on the Moment magnitude scale, the earthquake - which struck on January 12, 2010, near capital city Port-au-Prince - killed between 100,000 and 300,000 people, and displaced well over a million.

Aftershocks were felt for weeks afterwards and, with conditions difficult to build in, there were further complications when there was a cholera outbreak in makeshift camps last year.

Over 76 per cent of the country are living on less that £1.50 a day, and just when you thought that the horror could not be any worse, charity Unicef have found that a number of children - many of whom lost their parents in the tragic earthquake - are been sold for next to nothing.

 Devastation: Men attempt the massive clean up job following the earthquake which killed up to 300,000 people.Displaced: Over one million people lost their homes after the earthquake in January 2010

Vulnerable: Young children in Haiti are being sold by their parents for as little as 76 pence

Mother shot twice with a Taser after she was arrested for leaving baby in car to go to tanning salon

 Arrest: Ashley Agerenza, 19, is accused of leaving her seven-month-old daughter in the back of her car while she went to a tanning salon

A woman had to be shot with a Taser twice after she was arrested for leaving her seven-month-old daughter in her car while she went to a tanning salon.

Ashley Agerenza, 19, has been charged with child abuse, resisting arrest and battery of a police officer after an incident outside Extreme Tan and Smoothies in St Petersburg, Florida.

Man, 24, arrested for paedophilia after girl, 12, gives birth to baby

A 12-year-old schoolgirl has given birth in Romania while the baby girl's 24-year-old father is being held on paedophile charges, say police.

The youngster, Claudia Feraru, had managed to keep her pregnancy secret from her parents in Bucharest for six months before confessing.

Her father, Sorin, said she had been scared 'like any girl who hides something from her parents' before the birth on Wednesday.

A street view of Bucharest, where a 12-year-old girl has given birth

Albino boy killed in Burundi, witchcraft suspected

A twelve-year old albino boy was killed late yesterday by armed men in the central
Burundi district of Kiganda in what authorities suspect could be linked to witchcraft.

Albino hunters kill their victims and use their blood and body parts for potions. Witchdoctors tell their clients that the body parts will bring them luck in love, life and business.

“The twelve-year-old albino was killed by four men with guns and knives. They cut off his left hand and fled away with it,” Kiganda administrator Joseph Ntahuga, told Reuters today.

Ntahuga, a government official in the district 80 km from the capital Bujumbura, said the victim had two other albino siblings.

The murder brings to 14 the number of albinos killed in the tiny central African country since 2008.

The coffee producing nation of 8 million people has around 500 albinos, who lack pigment in their skin, eyes and hair.

Burundian authorities believe the killings are carried out local residents who work with witchdoctors in neighbouring Tanzania, where 53 albinos have been killed since 2007 for their body parts, which are sold for use in witchcraft. There are around 170,000 albinos living in Tanzania.

Religious ritual believed to be behind death of girl who was found with her heart cut out and other organs strewn round home

Neighbours of a mother arrested after her four-year-old daughter was killed as an apparent religious offering told how they heard screams from the family's flat.

Nusayba Bharuchi's corpse was found stabbed to death in the kitchen with her heart and other organs cut out and strewn around her flat and lying next to her mother, Shayna.

The 35-year-old woman was allegedly chanting verses of the Koran as her daughter's disembowelled corpse lay next to her in the home in Clapton, East London.

Crime scene: Shayna Bharuchi, 35, was allegedly sitting in a her kitchen chanting verses of the Koran as her daughter Nusayba's disembowelled corpse lay next to her.

Parents horrified as children run up massive bills Smurfing the web

Huge bills: Thousands of parents have downloaded the games assuming because they're free to download, they're free to play

Paying the cost: Kelly Rummelhart had an unexpected bill after four-year-old son Sawyer played The Smurfs' Village

Computer giant Apple has come under fire for introducing ‘hidden and underhand’ charges into children’s games which many parents thought were free to play.

The US firm has made millions of pounds by developing a new generation of games to play on gadgets such as the iPad and iPhone.

Thousands of British parents have downloaded the games, assuming that because they are free to download they are free to play.

But they have been horrified to discover that children have run up huge bills by buying credits which allow them to progress faster and farther through the game.

The offending games, which include The Smurfs’ Village, Zombie Farm and Tap Zoo, all operate along similar lines and encourage players to build up a virtual community.

Mother sues Tyra Bank's show for $3m after her daughter, 15, was flown to New York to appear in episode on sex addiction

Chat show host Tyra Banks is being sued for $3million (£2million) by the mother of a teenage girl who appeared on her show to talk about sex addiction.

Beverley McClendon has filed a lawsuit against the former model for allowing her 15-year-old daughter Jewel to appear without her permission.

She claims her daughter was paid to fly to New York alone and take part in the studio discussion on teen sex addiction.

Lawsuit: Beverley McClendon is suing The Tyra Banks Show after she claimed it flew her daughter to New York to appear on a show about teenage sex addiction

Row as French mayor bans under-18s from art exhibition showing X-rated photos of teenagers having sex and taking drugs

The Mayor of Paris has come under fire for banning under-18s from a museum's photographic exhibition because it includes sexually explicit shots of teenagers.

The move by Bertrand Delanoe against influential American photographer Larry Clark has been branded 'backward and reactionary' by the French Human Rights League.

The show, Kiss The Past Hello, includes some graphic black and white images of teenagers kissing and fondling each other.

Mr Delanoe fears legal challenges if he lets minors into the exhibit by Clark, 67, who is also a filmmaker best known for his controversial 1995 film Kids with its raw portrayal of teens, sex and drugs.

A 2007 French law forbids showing pornographic images to minors under 18 and is punishable with up to three years' jail and a fine of £75,000.

Exploitatative? One of the black and white exhibition photographs showing a teenage couple caressing each other intimately in a bath

X-rated scenes: A drug addict suggestively squirts her syringe with a friend before shooting up

Cult leader who styled himself 'Black Jesus' convicted of raping young 'flower girls'

A cult leader known as 'Black Jesus' has been found guilty of raping young 'flower girls' belonging to his Papua New Guinea sect.

Steven Tari, 38, avoided a murder charge even though villigers claimed he had sacrificed at least three of the girls and drunk their blood.

The Lutheran pastor's first hit the headlines when he was captured in 2007 after eluding police for more than a year by moving from village to village in the Transgogol area of Madang province.

Guilty: Steven Tari (pictured) has been convicted by a court in Madang of four counts of rape

Girl, 15, who went on a post-Christmas diet dies from anorexia in a year

When Anna Wood said she was joining her mother on a post-Christmas diet, they expected to lose a few pounds then carry on life as normal.

But within months the grade-A student at an independent school was caught in the grip of a terrible eating disorder.

Her battle with anorexia took her through several crises, all the time reducing her frail body’s ability to survive.

And just over a year after starting the diet, she died aged 16.

A shadow of her former self: Anna in the grip of her anorexia and before she started the diet that ended up causing her death

Middle-aged blonde teachers 'plied young boys with drink and drugs at summer sex parties'

Two middle-aged teachers in the United States are facing up to ten years in jail after hosting summer sex parties for teenagers.

Blondes Sarah Lindsay and Audrey Grabarkiewicz plied boys with drink and marijuana at the illegal raves at their home.

Some of their victims were as young as 11.

Lindsay, 42, and Grabarkiewicz, 44, are being held in custody in Boiling Springs, South Carolina.

Fired: Audrey Grabarkiewicz has lost her job as a teacher at the church in Boiling Springs, North Carolina, over the sex party charges

Pope apologises for ‘shameful’ abuse

Pope Benedict apologised to victims of sexual abuse today, saying paedophile priests had committed unspeakable crimes and brought “shame and humiliation” on him and the entire Roman Catholic Church.

Hours after the apology, up to 10,000 chanting demonstrators snaked through the streets of London to protest against his handling of the abuse crisis and his views on homosexuals and the ordination of women.

Pope Benedict (centre) hope the “chastisement” contribute to the healing of the abuse victims.

Protesters accuse pope of hypocrisy over sex abuse

Pope Benedict reminded his Church today that its first priority was to provide a safe environment for children as the pontiff was met by the first substantial protest of his delicate visit to Britain.

Several hundred people whistled and shouted “Pope must resign” and “shame” as the papal motorcade entered a Catholic school complex in Twickenham, southwest London.

They held placards reading “Hypocrisy and lies” and “Catholic paedophile cover up”.

The shouting of the protesters duelled with the singing of hymns from inside the school, where the pope held what was dubbed “the big assembly” of several thousand Catholic schoolchildren from throughout Britain.

Pope Benedict waves to pilgrims as he arrives to attend a prayer service at St Mary’s University College Chapel at Twickenham in west London today, September 17, 2010.

Toddler's amazing escape: Youngster caught on camera crawling on to busy motorway

A relieved mother is counting her lucky stars today, after her young son had an amazing escape.

The curious toddler crawled out onto a busy highway in Turkey after waking up from a nap in a nearby park.

Video footage of the incident shows the child crawling at full speed into the busy road in Antalya, Southern Turkey, while traffic thunders past.

Close shave: A lorry passes just feet away from the boy who takes a moment to rest in the busy road

UK convicts two 11-year-olds of rape attempt

Two 11-year-old boys, convicted of trying to rape an eight-year-old girl near her home last year, were given supervision orders today.

The boys, believed to be the youngest children to stand trial for rape in Britain, were found guilty of assaulting the girl near her home in Hayes, west London, last October when they were just 10.

Prosecutors said the boys approached the girl when she was playing with a friend near her house. The girl was assaulted in a block of flats, a bin shed and a field.

Austrian churchgoers said to quit in record numbers

A record 100,000 Austrians are expected to leave the Roman Catholic Church this year after abuse scandals which have badly damaged its image, a newspaper reported today.

Some 57,000 quit the church in the first six months of the year, Austrian daily Der Standard reported, citing figures from local state authorities. This is already more than the full-year total for 2009 when 53,216 walked out.