Cyril Smith & those who looked the other way!

Solicitors Seek Out Those Who Allowed Child Abuse To Continue

ALAN Collins of the firm of solicitors that is acting for seven of the alleged victims of Cyril Smith, the former MP for Rochdale, is now looking into how he got away with it, and why it was allowed to continue.  This case in which young lads were physically and sexually abused by Smith at Cambridge House and Knowl View in Rochdale, and includes one victim who was located by Northern Voices last year, is a civil case that is being run separately from the ongoing police investigation in the allegations of abuse. 

 

Mr. Collins who is one of the leading solicitors in the realm of child abuse law, and who has also acted in the Jimmy Savile case, told tomorrow's Rochdale Observer:

'We are acting on behalf of the Cyril Smith victims and we are now looking at those who might be responsible for knowing what Cyril Smith was up to and those who would have allowed him to have abused these children.  It is a civil case brought on behalf of the victims and is still at a quite an early stage.' 

 

Earlier this month a Dispatches program on Channel 4 revealed concerns that prosecutors had been leaned on and that a former friend of Cyril Smith, the then Labour MP for Rochdale, Jack McCann, may have intervened with the Director Public Prosecutions, when it was considering the evidence against Smith in 1970.  Another claim, also on the Dispatches program, was that the security agencies may have protected Smith at one stage. 

 

While insisting that the civil case is separate from the police investigation, a spokesman for Greater Manchester Police said:  'Greater Manchester Police's public protection division is continuing to investigate historic reports of physical and sexual abuse which occurred at Knowl View from the 1970s onwards.'

 

Smith died in September 2010 having been knighted in 1988, he was MP for Rochdale between 1972 and 1992. 
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The current printed issue of NORTHERN VOICES No.14, is now available for sale - see below. This issue N.V.14 has an in-depth and exclusive report by John Walker, a former editor of the Rochdale Alternative Paper (RAP) on the full history of Cyril Smith's antics with young lads. RAP was the first publication to go public on this in May 1979. You can obtain a copy by writing or contacting the people whose details are below:
Postal subscription: £5 for the next two issues (post included). Cheques made payable to 'Northern Voices' should be sent c/o 52, Todmorden Road, Burnley, Lancashire BB10 4AH.
Tel.: 0161 793 5122.
email: northernvoices@hotmail.com