UNITED KINGDOM
National Secular Society
Posted: Thu, 14 Jul 2016
Cruelty was normalised at Church of England children’s home, says report
An independent review into Kendall house, a children’s home run by the Church of England, has reported “harrowing” findings where girls were sedated and abused.
Children as young as 11 were given powerful drugs, without any medical need and the report found “disclosures of unlawful sexual intercourse, to sexual assault and in a small number of cases, rape.”
David Greenwood, the solicitor who represented 15 survivors of abuse at Kendall House, said: “I have been truly shocked at the way in which staff at Kendall House handed our heavy doses of drugs designed to treat schizophrenia to young teenaged girls. Many of the ladies I have represented have suffered poor quality lives as a result of this treatment. Many have been sexually assaulted and most were physically abused. It was only when the Home Office inspectors advised the church to alter the way they deal with drugs that this treatment was brought to an end.”
In 2015 Teresa Cooper, an abuse survivor who pushed for the Church of England to launch an investigation, said that the health problems her own children have suffered can all be traced back to the drugs forcibly administered to her at Kendall house.
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