In a horrific finding, a report has revealed that a prison officer and caterer in a youth detention centre, who was referred to as the UK's worst sex offender, was allowed to rape and torture boys for three decades.
Neville Husband carried out at least 388 sexual offences against young men and boys between 1969 and 1985 while working at Medomsley detention centre in County Durham.
While the actual number is believed to be over 450, the abuse was "ignored and dismissed", the report shared, causing concerns and frustration all over the country.
Adrian Usher, the prisons and probation ombudsman (PPO) for England and Wales, has compiled a 202-page report on the conduct of staff at Medomsley from 1961 to 1987, in which he describes Husband as "possibly the most prolific sex offender in British history".
Husband, a former church minister and scout troop leader who died in 2010, is understood to have groomed and attacked hundreds of trainees in Medomsley's kitchens, where he worked.
Men and boys aged 17 to 21 who had been convicted of relatively minor crimes were subject to Husband's heinous crimes.
Usher said there was evidence that abuse was going on at Medomsley "from the day it opened its doors until the day those doors were closed", adding that the "knowledge of abuse by the Prison Service, the police, the Home Office and other organisations of authority was ignored and dismissed".
He described Husband as a "powerfully built man and an arch-manipulator" who "physically intimidated, and in some cases assaulted, other members of staff as well as trainees".
According to the report, Husband threatened to make his victims "disappear" if they report him and took advantage of the detention centre's isolated location.
The report found that detainees and their families who did report physical and sexual abuse at Medomsley to Durham police were largely dismissed, with some threatened with rearrest if they pushed their claims.
Neville Husband prison service career
Husband had entered the Prison Service in 1963, working at HMP Frankland until 1964, before he was transferred to Portland borstal.
In 1969 he transferred to Medomsley, where he was in charge of the kitchens, a position he used in order to exert his influence.
Usher said his "ability to provide or withdraw food gave him opportunities to punish and reward". Of the 549 documented cases of abuse at Medomsley, 388 were committed by Husband, mostly without the help of others.
Husband left Medomsley in 1985, returning to HMP Frankland to work as the senior baker before transferring to Deerbolt in 1987. Victim testimony indicates he continued to abuse inmates across both of these spells.
Husband retired from the Prison Service in 1990 and was awarded the Imperial Service Medal for meritorious duty. He began training as a minister in the Waddington Street United Reformed Church and was officially inducted as one in June 1994.
Things went downhill for him when in 1999 he was arrested as part of Operation Voice, a Metropolitan police-led UK-wide investigation into the distribution of child sexual abuse materials.
However, the case was later dismissed at court, and he was reinstated as a minister in June 2000.
Investigations into him began in 2002, and in 2003 he was convicted of 10 counts of indecent assault and one count of rape against five teenagers at Medomsley, initially being sentenced to eight years in prison.
He was subsequently charged with four further offences in 2005, and his sentence was extended to 10 years. The true horror of Husband's crimes only became apparent around this time.
