France has been shocked by the scale of abuse revealed at the Angers paedophile trial, where 65 adults were accused of sexually abusing 45 children.
It was the biggest criminal trial in recent French history.
The abused were aged from six months to 14 years, and some of them were prostituted and raped by their own parents and grandparents, in a poor district of the town in western France.
Sometimes they were offered to strangers in return for small amounts of money, food, alcohol or cigarettes.
The accused were mostly from deprived backgrounds and many of them were unemployed and had learning difficulties. Some were illiterate and appeared not to fully understand the charges they faced, defence lawyers said.
A number said they had been sexually abused themselves as children.
"These were people in difficulty, excluded from normal society, who found each other. And for them, everything was sexualised," said Brigitte Chirat, who covered the case for the local newspaper Le Courrier de l'Ouest.
Paedophile ring
At the trial - lasting more than four months and involving about 60 lawyers and 150 witnesses - a prosecutor described how some of the men would call each other and suggest "going for a coffee" as code for visiting one of the homes where the rapes and abuse would take place.
The videotaped testimony of the children provided most of the horrific details of abuse, which took place between 1999 and 2002.
At the centre of the paedophile ring were Franck, 36, and his former wife Patricia, 32, both sentenced to more than 15 years in prison. Their full names cannot be given so as to preserve the anonymity of the victims.
The charges stated that for years, Franck and his father Philippe, now 59, and two dozen others raped Franck's daughter Marine, aged seven at the time of the first attack.
Franck and Patricia prostituted Marine, her younger sister and their little brother. Another half-dozen children were abused in their home, on about 100 different occasions.
Philippe was sentenced to 28 years in prison.
"These were families with serious paedophile behaviour," prosecution spokesman Herve Lollic said.
Another of the alleged key players in the ring, identified as Eric, was described as an "ogre" and known to the children as "the fatty". He was found guilty of raping or abusing more than 10 children.
Eric's brother Jean-Marc was also found guilty of abuse.
The whole article:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4697747.stm
It was the biggest criminal trial in recent French history.
The abused were aged from six months to 14 years, and some of them were prostituted and raped by their own parents and grandparents, in a poor district of the town in western France.
Sometimes they were offered to strangers in return for small amounts of money, food, alcohol or cigarettes.
The accused were mostly from deprived backgrounds and many of them were unemployed and had learning difficulties. Some were illiterate and appeared not to fully understand the charges they faced, defence lawyers said.
A number said they had been sexually abused themselves as children.
"These were people in difficulty, excluded from normal society, who found each other. And for them, everything was sexualised," said Brigitte Chirat, who covered the case for the local newspaper Le Courrier de l'Ouest.
Paedophile ring
At the trial - lasting more than four months and involving about 60 lawyers and 150 witnesses - a prosecutor described how some of the men would call each other and suggest "going for a coffee" as code for visiting one of the homes where the rapes and abuse would take place.
The videotaped testimony of the children provided most of the horrific details of abuse, which took place between 1999 and 2002.
At the centre of the paedophile ring were Franck, 36, and his former wife Patricia, 32, both sentenced to more than 15 years in prison. Their full names cannot be given so as to preserve the anonymity of the victims.
The charges stated that for years, Franck and his father Philippe, now 59, and two dozen others raped Franck's daughter Marine, aged seven at the time of the first attack.
Franck and Patricia prostituted Marine, her younger sister and their little brother. Another half-dozen children were abused in their home, on about 100 different occasions.
Philippe was sentenced to 28 years in prison.
"These were families with serious paedophile behaviour," prosecution spokesman Herve Lollic said.
Another of the alleged key players in the ring, identified as Eric, was described as an "ogre" and known to the children as "the fatty". He was found guilty of raping or abusing more than 10 children.
Eric's brother Jean-Marc was also found guilty of abuse.
The whole article:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4697747.stm
