US varsity coach denies he is a paedophile

Jerry Sandusky, the former Penn State University assistant football coach charged with child sex abuse, said yesterday he is not a paedophile, but admitted he showered with young boys.

In a full-court media press across two television networks, Sandusky and his attorney, Joe Amendola, said they have answers for all 40 charges that Pennsylvania prosecutors have levelled.

“I am innocent of those charges,” Sandusky (picture) told NBC’s Bob Costas in a telephone interview with the television network yesterday.

'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

Miss Gould told Stafford Crown Court that the case was ‘not about race, religion, colour or creed’.

She said some of the seven alleged victims came from troubled backgrounds and their low self-esteem made them ‘highly vulnerable’ to the attentions of the men.

She added: ‘They do not value themselves and therefore have no expectation that they will be valued by others.

'Accordingly when they receive attention from others, particularly what they perhaps perceive to be somewhat exotic older males with money and cars, they soak it up, believing themselves to be the objects of genuine emotions and affections.

‘They believed themselves, and may still believe themselves, to be loved by and in love with some of these men.’

She said the alleged abusers would contact their victims by computer and mobile telephones ‘out of sight, sounds and control of even the most wary parent’.

Some of the girls first met the men in a churchyard in Telford, Shropshire, which had become a gathering place for ‘young Asian males’ who would smoke and drink there.

The court heard the Ali brothers would regularly present one of the girls for other men to have sex with. She was 16 at the time and didn’t realise at first that she was being sold for sex, Miss Gould added.

Men would pay between £20 and £40 and would either hand the money to her ‘pimps’ or pay her. She would then hand the money to them in exchange for mobile phone top-ups.

At one stage, she was 14 weeks pregnant but Mubarek Ali continued to sell her for sex, the jury heard. It is not known what happened to the baby.

After teachers and parents raised fears that the girls were being sexually abused, a police investigation named Operation Chalice began.

In December 2009, officers arrested most of the defendants and charged them with various offences related to child prostitution.

The men on trial – who all used Western nicknames – are Ahdel Ali, Mubarek Ali, Mohammed Ali Sultan, 24, Tanveer Ahmed, Mahroof Khan, 33, Noshad Hussain, 21, Mohammed Islam Choudhrey, 52, Mohammed Younis and Abdul Rouf.

They deny all charges. The trial continues.

Extensive operation: The trial, which is expected to last for several months, is taking place at Stafford Crown Court

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

Traffickers, wanting to cash in on the chaos, have been buying the children off their desperate parents, and some of them are grabbed in neighbouring Dominican Republic while they are scrounging for food.

A small amount of the children might manage to end up in the arms of loving and wealthy western families in Europe and America - who are none the wiser - but most are forced into more sinister jobs, such as prostitution and other criminal activities.

Parents, struggling to even feed - never mind educate - their young ones, are selling them on to the traffickers, who promise to hand their offspring a better chance in life.

Wanting to stop the problem at its source, a number of NGO officials have begun to pretend to be interested buyers, in the hope that they can stamp out the horrific problem.

Brigade de Protection des Mineurs (BPM), a group funded by Unisef and who work with the help of the police, monitor the camps and Haitian borders to look out for children who are vulnerable.

But it is difficult to keep track of all of the children - some of the camps contain over 80,000 families, and many of them do not have any identification.

38-year-old Melissa Nau, who gave birth to five children and suffers from disability, sold four of her young ones for only 50 Haitian gourdes (76 pence) each.

When a trafficker called Jacques offered the money for the four children, aged between four and eight, she made the deal.

While the money she gained lasted but a few months, the children have gone for ever.

Research by the BPM uncovered information that chilled the mother - her children were handed false records and then illegally adopted by European families via an international adoption agency.

A Unicef spokesman told the Daily Telegraph: 'Well-meaning parents in the U.S. and Europe have no idea that children are being kidnapped, stolen and bought from the displacement camps of Port-au-Prince.'

BPM officer Françoise Moise revealed that trafficking had been a long-term issue in Haiti but has grown increasingly worse in the last year.

Even before the earthquake, every year almost 2,000 Haitian children were kidnapped or trafficked. Now the figure is believed to have quadrupled.

'Since the earthquake in 2010, rates of trafficking into the Dominican Republic have increased incredibly and that is the reason why we are here,' the 46-year-old told the Telegraph.

'People are coming into the camps posing as NGOs, and foreigners that have come to help Haiti.

'They also pose as Haitians living abroad coming to help and sometimes even Haitians living here, pretending to be members of their family.

'Most of the children that are trafficked into the Dominican Republic have fallen victims of prostitution or these children are adopted illegally.

'Whether at the airport, or the border, or the camps, we are trying to stop child trafficking from happening at all.'

The BPM stop cars at the borders of Haiti and check the travel documents of those under 18 years of age.

'The most difficult thing for us is when they have false documents for the children to cross the border because we don’t have the means of verifying whether these documents are fake or real,' Dieudonne Barnave, a BPM official, told the Telegraph.

Since last April the BPM has screened 7,000 children passing through the border and of those, 1,400 were found not to have the right paperwork.

In all, there have been 35 trafficking-related arrests but under current legislation in Haiti, there is no law against it.

 Help: Unicef and affiliate Brigade de Protection des Mineurs are trying to look after as many vulnerable children as possible

 Helpless: A child is saved by rescuers following the earthquake (left) and another gets used to life in a camp

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.



Police said she first took the child inside the salon, but was told she could not leave the baby while she had a tanning session.

She then took the child back out to her car, strapped her into the car seat and turned on the engine, before returning to the salon.

A witness called police after seeing the baby abandoned. The responding officer found the baby had almost pushed herself out of the seat and had been sick all over herself.

When confronted, Agerenza attacked the officer and was shot twice with a Taser before being arrested.

The baby was not harmed.

A post on Agerenza's Facebook page read: 'Wit my lil mama then i might go out for the first time yay! dk if I can leave her tho...

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

' We know who the father is, but we haven't decided what to do with him.

'We have other priorities, to raise the baby for one. We're going to be her parents.'

She delivered the 6lb baby by caesarean and is said to be making a good recovery.

Under Romanian law, having consensual sex with someone under age 14 is classified as child abuse.

Cases of very young mothers are not all that rare in Romania, with most pregnancies registered in Roma/Gypsy communities and in poor families.

In November last year, a girl from Bucharest aged just ten gave birth to a baby in Jerez, southern Spain.

Strangely, a Romanian woman is believed to be the world's oldest woman to give birth, at age 66.

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.





Anyone taking part can progress farther and faster if they buy credits as they go along.

In theory, purchases can only be made if the person playing the game enters a password.

But many have discovered to their cost that if they enter the password, for whatever reason, and hand the device to the child within 15 minutes, he or she can make payments without re-entering the password.

Angry parents say Apple failed to provide any advance warning of the payments at the time of download and say that young children do not understand the few notices about payments which do crop up as they play the games.

Adam Williams, of consumer watchdog Which? Mobile, said: ‘It is pretty underhand to have these extra charges in games that are aimed at children.’

One of the most lucrative games is The Smurfs’ Village, which was only introduced last month but which has already topped the download charts.

Players build a village for the Smurfs. To progress through the game they buy credits called Smurfberries, sold in quantities at prices ranging from £5.99 to £59.99.

At the start of the game players are told that it is free to play but there is an option to purchase extra credits.

There is no other reference to charges until players click on to the shop to make their purchases.

One furious father in London, who asked not to be named, has complained to Apple after his daughter ran up a bill of £90.

He said: ‘The first we knew about it was when my wife looked at her credit card bill and saw that she was being charged just under £90 by the Apple Store.

'At first we couldn’t work out what the charges were for. It only became clear when we spoke to our nine-year-old daughter.

‘She had run up the charges by buying extra Smurfberries. She thought she was just playing the game in the normal way and she had no idea she was spending any money.

'Clearly, Apple should have warned parents in advance about the charges and they should refund any bills run up in this way.’

Another British father vented his fury online after his child ran up a £110 bill.

He wrote: ‘The reason this game is out-grossing its rivals is because it is a rip-off and a fraud.’

In the US Kelly Rummelhart, 36, from California, ended up with a credit-card bill for $66 (£42) after her four-year-old son Sawyer used her iPad to play The Smurfs’ Village.

She said: ‘Never in my wildest dreams did I think they would be charging things on it.’

Capcom, which publishes The Smurfs’ Village, has pledged to increase the number of warnings in the game.

Zombie Farm, where players build up an army of warring zombies, is published by the California-based firm The Playforge.

But some players, who are encouraged to buy brain food in the advanced stages, have described it as a con.

A spokesman for The Playforge insisted that it was possible to play the game without making any additional purchases.

There has been similar criticism of Tap Zoo, in which players build up a zoo.

A spokesman for Apple said: ‘A password is required to purchase any goods on the App Store, including using in-app purchases.

'And parents can use our parental control settings to restrict app downloading and turn off in-app purchasing.’

PocketGems, the publisher of Tap Zoo, and Capcom, were unavailable for comment

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

McClendon, a social worker, said she had no idea her daughter was appearing on the show and disputed that she was a 'sex addict'.

In the lawsuit McClendon claims by allowing her daughter to talk about her sex addiction she had now made her vulnerable.

'This show was undoubtedly watched by sexual deviants, perverts and paedophiles alike,' McClendon said.

In a 14-page lawsuit filed in Atlanta, Georgia, McClendon said her daughter had answered an 'open call' on The Tyra Banks show webpage for teens to talk about sex addiction.

The lawsuit says producers of the show arranged a flight from Atlanta to New York for the teen and put her up in a hotel prior to her appearance in November 2009.

McClendon said she had no idea where her daughter was and filed a missing person's report with the police.

As well as seeking $3m in damages she has also demanded that the clip featuring her daughter is removed from the show's website and YouTube.

McClendon said the only reason her daughter was on the show was to boost ratings.

'The sole intent of the Defendants was to exploit the minor to increase ratings. The tag for the show advertised "15-year-old-sex addict".'

McClendon claims her daughter has never been diagnosed as a sex addict.

'The defendants actions were fraudulent, showed a wantonness and evidenced an entire want of care which raises a presumption of conscious indifference to the consequences of their actions.'

The lawsuit also claims that producers of the show knew the teenager did not have parental permission to appear on the popular TV show.

In the U.S. parents of minors have to sign a release form allowing their appearance on TV shows.

McClendon has asked for a jury trial to decide on the $3m demand for damages.

As well as Banks, the show's producers are named in the lawsuit.

Former catwalk model Tyra, 36, has established herself as one of the most popular daytime chat show hosts.

She is also the host and creator of the reality show 'America's Next Top Model'.

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






‘It just happened so quickly, from realising she had anorexia to her passing away,’ said Anna’s mother Christine

Gibson, 52, from Wimbledon, south-west London. ‘We just didn’t have time to learn how to help her.’

Anna, a pupil at £12,000-a-year Wimbledon High School, was 15 when she began watching her weight in January last year.

‘She was never fat,’ said Mrs Gibson, who is divorced from Anna’s 62-year-old father Paul Wood. ‘She had a bit of puppy fat, but all girls that age do and it would have disappeared naturally.

‘After five or six weeks I stopped dieting but she just carried on reducing her food intake.’

In February teachers contacted Anna’s mother when a swimming coach reported her dieting to a school nurse.

Mrs Gibson, an accounts administrator, said: ‘We thought they were over-reacting at first. But we didn’t know Anna had started to take drastic measures.

‘She made it look like she was eating, but really she was eating far less than she should have been. She became deceptive and sneaky.

‘She would hide food up her sleeve and throw it away when I wasn’t looking.
‘She’d also been making herself sick.’

By May Anna was clearly unwell and her mother took her to see her GP, who agreed to monitor her health. She also had regular meetings with a psychologist.

But nothing anyone said could persuade her to eat properly and in August the teenager was admitted to hospital.

‘When her GCSE results came out I phoned her to tell her she had got ten A*s and one A,’ said Mrs Gibson. ‘But there was no reaction. She was withdrawn and down, like her fire had gone out.’

By then Anna, who was 5ft 7in, weighed six and a half stone and had so little body fat that she could not keep warm. Her skin also became rough and would flare up – a typical symptom of anorexia.

The teenager, who had ambitions to become an architect, managed to put on two stone and after four months of treatment doctors allowed her home in time for Christmas.

Unable to resume her studies until the next academic year, she took on a part-time job three miles from home. On February 11 this year she collapsed on the way to work and was taken to hospital.

Her parents realised she had been walking the six-mile round trip and not eating the packed lunch she took with her. Anna went home but within days she was back in hospital. Tests revealed she had a perforated ulcer.

Doctors warned her parents that she needed surgery but was so weak she was unlikely to survive.

Although she came through the operation, the teenager’s body was so ravaged by the anorexia that it was unable to heal itself.

Her major organs began failing. She suffered brain damage, paralysis, a collapsed lung and could not breathe without a ventilator. On March 26, she died of a heart attack.

‘Everything after that is a blur,’ added Mrs Gibson, who also has a 20-year-old son, Matthew, with her ex-husband. ‘We were heartbroken.’

The couple want other parents to hear their story in the hope that they might realise the dangers of eating disorders before it is too late.

Mr Wood, a structural engineer, added: ‘Until Anna was admitted to hospital we had no idea how bad it was.

‘I just wish there was more help out there for parents trying to deal with a child with the disease. We just felt so helpless.’

An inquest into Anna’s death is due to be held in November.

Heartbroken: Anna's parents have said they had no idea how bad her disorder was until she was admitted to hospital