THE ringleader of a Rotherham grooming gang has admitted raping a 13-year-old girl in a sickening campaign of abuse.
Mohammed Imran Ali Akhtar, 42, plied the girl with alcohol and drugs before driving her to different locations to attack her.
PA:Press AssociationMohammed Imran Ali Akhtar raped a 13-year-old girl[/caption]
If she refused, the fiend threatened to leave her stranded in the middle of nowhere.
On one occasion she was forced to walk for hours after Akhtar kicked her out the car in the early hours of the morning when she said no.
Sickeningly, Akhtar groomed the young girl into believing she was in a relationship with him.
He has now pleaded guilty to two counts of rape and two counts of indecent assault between August 2001 and July 2002.
Akhtar has been remanded into custody to be sentenced on December 18 at Sheffield Crown Court.
Akhtar is currently serving a 23-year prison sentence for a string of previous sex offences against young girls.
He was jailed in November 2018 for his role as a “ringleader” in a seven-man Asian grooming gang in Rotherham.
The predators subjected the girls to “acts of degrading and violent nature”.
One victim had sex with “at least 100 Asian men” by the time she was 16, while another was gang-raped in a forest and threatened with being abandoned.
Akhtar and the gang were the first to be prosecuted under Operation Stovewood – the National Crime Agency’s (NCA) inquiry into historical child sexual exploitation in Rotherham.
The large-scale probe has identified more than 1,500 victims and was set up in 2014 in the wake of the damning Jay Report that exposed the shocking scale of exploitation between 1997 and 2013.
Zoe Becker, Legal Manager for the CPS, said: “Mohammed Imran Ali Akhtar targeted the young victim and used drugs and alcohol to groom her for sex.
“The lifelong physical and emotional trauma caused to victims by men like Akhtar cannot be understated.
“We would like to thank the victim in this case for coming forward and reporting this devastating crime. I hope this conviction sends a clear message that the CPS, working alongside the NCA, will continue to relentlessly pursue justice and prosecute those who sexually exploit children, whenever that abuse took place.
“Last year, to deal with some of the more complex and challenging child sexual abuse cases, we established our dedicated Organised Child Sexual Abuse Unit to share specialist understanding, build strong cases and increase the amount of successful prosecutions.
“I encourage any victims of child sexual abuse and sexual violence to report the crimes committed against them to the police. You are not alone and there is always help available.”
Akhtar was the ringleader of a gang of men convicted in 2018 for previous sex crimesPA:Press Association Published: [#item_custom_pubDate]
