Ryan Chambers, 19, of Milton Keynes, amassed the names and numbers of more than 1,000 girls aged 12 to 15, Aylesbury Crown Court heard.

He had denied eight counts of sexual activity with a child but was convicted in March following a trial.

He admitted four counts of possessing indecent images of children.

Thames Valley Police said its inquiry involved contacting hundreds of girls in Milton Keynes and Northamptonshire and writing to 800 parents to establish whether their child had been in contact with Chambers.

His offending stemmed from summer 2010, but officers were first alerted a year later by a mother concerned her 14-year-old daughter was being groomed over the internet.

Facebook aliases

Chambers was arrested and lists featuring more than 1,000 girls' names and mobile numbers were found at his home in Akerlea Close, Netherfield.

He was released on bail, but two weeks later police went to his home and found a 14-year-old girl who had been reported missing. She was not one of his four victims, police said.

Another search of his home uncovered more names and numbers and four indecent images of children rated at level four, five being the most serious.

He was found to have had "prolific" contact with girls and had set up 11 profiles on Facebook under variations of his name, including "Ryan Onit" and "Ryan missesyou", as well as one alias.

Det Sgt Sally Kestin said: "Ryan Chambers is a very dangerous and predatory young man who desires to groom his victims in order to sexually abuse them.

"He would use a number of profiles set up on Facebook to contact girls and request they add him as a friend.

'Ultimate aim'

"If a girl accepted his friend request he would initiate conversations with them through Facebook as a ploy to obtain their phone numbers.

"His ultimate aim was to entice them around to his home where he would encourage them to have sex with him."

Chambers was also sentenced to a sex offence prevention order, banning him from contacting anyone under 18 and from accessing social media for six years.

A Facebook spokesman said: "We work hard at Facebook to keep people safe on our service and we have developed highly sophisticated security systems aimed at preventing people from making inappropriate contact with other users.

"Sadly, a small number of determined individuals will persist in behaving illegally when using online services.

"We take a zero tolerance approach and when such illegal behaviour is detected, Facebook will offer its full co-operation to the police to ensure that these people are brought to justice as we did in the case of Mr Chambers."

Source: BBC News

Britain was revealed as the gay rights capital of Europe, according to the first study of its kind to be published on Tuesday (15 May).

The European International Lesbian and Gay Association Europe (ILGA-Europe) index, which rates 49 countries on more than 40 categories, rated the UK as the top country for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people to exercise their legal rights.

Britain allows same-sex couples to obtain a civil partnership, apply for joint adoption, and discrimination based on sexual orientation is prohibited.

Russia was bottom of the list after legalising an anti-gay law in St Petersburg, effectively making people criminals if they discuss homosexuality in public.

Other countries to place near the end of the list were Moldova, Ukraine, Belarus, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Turkey, and Macedonia.

According to an ILGA-Europe spokesman, Scotland played a ‘leading role’ in the UK’s win. They said that hate crimes ‘aggravated’ by gender identity are explicitly recognised by Scottish law.

The Independent reports gay right’s charity Stonewall's head of policy, Sam Dick, hailed Britain as a ‘beacon of equality to 400 million gay people around the world’.

However, he added: ‘We must not underestimate how much work there is yet to do – not least in securing marriage equality and tackling the endemic levels of homophobic bullying in schools.’

The UK government was recently slammed by LGBT rights charities for not including gay marriage in the Queen’s Speech, adding to the worries David Cameron might be backing down on the issue.

In a Sunday Times interview published today (13 May) with senior Conservative ministers Philip Hammond and Tim Loughton, they agreed with Chancellor George Osborne that gay marriage is not ‘the number one priority’.

Hammond told the newspaper that equal marriage was ‘too controversial’ for the Government to tackle at the moment, suggesting it would be ‘difficult to push through’.

Fighting prejudice against sexuality and gender identity through education will be the theme of this year’s International Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia which will be commemorated by almost 40 countries on 17 May.

Source: Gay Star News

orth Wales Police, working with South Yorkshire Police, arrested four men in Sheffield on Tuesday, taking the total number of people arrested to 16.

The arrests follow comments allegedly made after Wales and Sheffield United striker Ched Evans was jailed for raping a 19-year-old woman near Rhyl.

The men were released on bail and North Wales Police expect more arrests.

One man was arrested on Tuesday on suspicion of malicious communication, another on suspicion of malicious communication and under Section 5 of the Sexual Offences Amendments Act.

Two others were arrested on suspicion of attempting to pervert the course of justice.

The men, aged between 19 and 30, were questioned in Sheffield before being bailed to return to a police station in north Wales in July.

By law, rape victims are entitled to lifelong anonymity.

Gareth Pritchard, North Wales Police assistant chief constable, said the force would seek to ensure that the legal anonymity of victims in rape cases was protected.

"We wish to reassure victims of serious sexual offences of our continuing determination to support them."

The investigation has so far seen 17 arrests, although it is understood one person has been arrested twice.

Ched Evans was convicted of rape and jailed for five years at Caernarfon Crown Court on 20 April.

The 23-year-old footballer claimed the woman had consented to sex at a hotel in May 2011.

His lawyers have said he will appeal.

Source: BBC News

Prosecutors had told a jury that the men plied young, vulnerable girls — many of whom were white — with drugs and alcohol and then passed them around for sex. The girls — some as young as 13 years old — were assaulted, raped and sometimes forced to have sex with several men a day.

"The details of the offenses that we have heard in this trial in the last few weeks have shocked and appalled us all," said Nazi Afzal, Chief Crown Prosecutor for the North West Area. "No child should ever be exploited in the way these young victims were."

The race of the perpetrators and their victims was repeatedly brought to the fore. Of the men, several were born in Pakistan, one was born in Afghanistan, and all are of South Asian ethnicity. Their ages ranged from 22 to the 59-year-old alleged ringleader.

When the trial began Feb. 6, hundreds of supporters of the right-wing British National Party and English Defence League staged a protest outside the court. The case delayed by two weeks when two nonwhite barristers were attacked outside the court by far-right protesters and forced to quit the case.

After those incidents, police were forced to step up security outside of the courthouse.

But Greater Manchester Police Assistant Chief Constable Steve Heywood said authorities did not take race into account in deciding to pursue the case.

"This is about adults preying on vulnerable young children," he said.

Muslim groups also condemned the crime and praised the bravery of the victims for coming forward.

"These criminals have brought shame on themselves, their families and our community," said Mohammed Shafiq, chief executive of the Ramadhan Foundation.

Police told of victims forced to have sex with 20 men in one night while drunk, or one who was raped by two men while "so drunk she was vomiting over the side of the bed. Alcohol, food and money were often traded in return for the sex — but violence also was used, prosecutors said.

Tuesday's convictions included several for rape, sexual assault, sex trafficking and conspiracy.

The nine men — Kabeer Hassan, Abdul Aziz, Abdul Rauf, Mohammed Sajid, Adil Khan, Abdul Qayyum, Mohammed Amin, Hamid Safi and a 59-year-old man who cannot be named for legal reasons — were convicted following a 10-week trial.

Judge Gerald Clifton adjourned sentencing until Wednesday.

Source: AP

Ruth Rose, from Newhaven, has spent most of her life as James, a former RAF navigator, and said she has dreamed of being female since she was a child.

Ms Rose has been living as a woman for about three years, and has changed her name by deed poll.

She said her ex-wife and children had not reacted well to the news and it had been difficult for her family.

She said: "They are critical of it and would rather it hadn't happened. It concerns them.

"Naturally children like to feel that they have a dad and he's still there - well I'm still there, but it's not dad any more."

A spokeswoman from East Sussex Downs and Weald Primary Care Trust said gender reassignment surgery would only be considered after "completion of a long and robust process of diagnosis and assessments involving psychiatrists and other clinicians".

She added: "As in the case of all operations, this procedure is to meet clinical needs and would be carried out only if the patient is deemed fit enough.

Ms Rose said the surgeons told her it was not a difficult operation, and she would heal very quickly."We cannot and would not want to discriminate on grounds of age."

"I've converted myself over to living as a female completely, and what it [the surgery] is going to do is to remove a few awkward bits and allow me to develop something of a different shape which is more in keeping with the person I am."

She hopes to have the operation at Charing Cross Hospital in London in October 2013, when she will be 80 years old.

She said: "The operation is purely a tidying up arrangement. The true work is what I've done already. I have taken my life into a female gender completely."

Ms Rose said that jobs and responsibilities meant that she had not even considered gender reassignment until she was in her 40s.

"It posed a lot of problems before I was able to say: 'Yes this is definitely it' to a point where there is no going back.

"I have had no negative reactions, no-one being dismissive," she said.

In 2009, the NHS in England conducted 154 sex change operations and Ms Rose said hers will cost about £2,000.

Source: BBC News

The comments were allegedly made after Sheffield United and Wales striker Ched Evans was jailed for raping a 19-year-old woman near Rhyl, Denbighshire.

Rape victims are legally entitled to anonymity for life.

Five men and four women were arrested at various locations across north Wales. Three men arrested in Sheffield last week have been released on bail.

North Wales Police confirmed that three men and three women from the Rhyl, Prestatyn and Llanddulas areas were arrested in early morning raids on Tuesday and were being held at St Asaph police station.

They later arrested a woman in Broughton, Flintshire, and two men, in Colwyn Bay and Abergele.

Det Sgt Bob Halford said: "We continue to be proactive in this investigation and anticipate that further arrests will be made in the near future."

Three men arrested in Sheffield last week, two under Section 5 of the Sexual Offences Amendments Act and a third on suspicion of malicious communication, have been released on bail.

Ched Evans was convicted of rape and jailed for five years at Caernarfon Crown Court on 20 April.

The 23-year-old footballer claimed the woman had consented to sex at a hotel near Rhyl in May 2011.

His lawyers say he intends to appeal.

Source: BBC News

Brighton players Anton Rodgers, 19, Lewis Dunk, 20, and George Barker, 20, and former player Steve Cook, 21, were charged on Monday.

The charges relate to an incident alleged to have taken place in Brighton on 17 July last year.

All four have been bailed to appear before Brighton magistrates on 11 May.

They were among six players arrested in January by Sussex Police.

Fellow Brighton player Ben Sampayo, 19, has been informed that no further action will be taken against him.

Brighton defender Tommy Elphick, 24, was eliminated from the investigation in January.

Source: BBC News

A student at St Philomena’s Catholic High School for Girls in Carshalton voiced concerns to PinkNews.co.uk that pupils from 11 to 18 years of age had been “encouraged” to sign the anti-equality pledge by the school’s headmistress.

The Catholic Education Service confirmed to PinkNews.co.uk that it had written to at least 359 Catholic state secondary schools in England and Wales last month asking them to draw attention to a letter by senior archbishops which told Catholics of their “duty” to do “all we can to ensure that the true meaning of marriage is not lost for future generations”.

It also asked schools to “draw attention” to the Coalition for Marriage campaign and petition against civil marriage equality, which now has over 460,000 signatures.

Responding on the school’s behalf, the Catholic Education Service said St Philomena’s itself had designed the presentation which is said to have encouraged minors to add their names to that campaign.

It confirmed the presentations for all age groups had consisted of the Archbishops’ letter and ended with a slide displaying the Coalition for Marriage’s website and the words: “Sign the petition”.

Experts in the handling of gay and transgender issues in schools have today questioned whether the presentation may have breached equality laws.

Sixth form student Katherine told PinkNews.co.uk of her experience: “In our assembly for the whole Sixth Form you could feel people bristling as she explained parts of the letter and encouraged us to sign the petition.

“She said things about gay marriage and civil partnerships being unnatural. It was just a really out-dated, misjudged and heavily biased presentation.”

Katherine added that students had begun to respond: “A few of us in my year are buying Gay Pride badges to pin on our uniform and thought about staging a Stonewall coup by posting the ‘Some people are gay – get over it’ posters around school.”

“Most importantly though, there are several people in my year who aren’t heterosexual – myself included – and I for one was appalled and actually disgusted by what they were encouraging.

“After all, that’s discrimination they were urging impressionable people to engage in, which is unacceptable.”

Greg Pope, the Deputy Director of the Catholic Education Service told PinkNews.co.uk: “We wrote to Catholic secondary schools to let them know of the archbishops’ letter on the government’s gay marriage proposals. We’ve asked them to draw attention generally to the Coalition for Marriage petition which is an open petition that people of all ages can sign.

“We have been aiming this towards older pupils and parents. The archbishop’s letter is a positive statement of the Church’s support for marriage, rather than negative comments about gay marriage.”

The Coalition for Marriage themselves pointed out that the petition is not open to people “of all ages” as the Service suggested, but only to those aged 16 and above.

When alerted to this, Mr Pope said today that the Catholic Education Service would be clear in any future correspondence with schools that the Coalition for Marriage petition had an age restriction, but that it was not planning to contact schools again on the subject.

The Coalition for Marriage confirmed the age restriction on its petition yesterday but has not made any further comment on the story this morning.

On the particular claims made by the student that the headmistress had called gay marriages “unnatural”, Mr Pope said: “All pupils deserve to be treated with respect and tolerance.

“If a pupil or parent feels the school has not lived up to that, all schools have complaints procedures which meet the Department for Education requirements.”

Conor Marron, who set up the Coalition for Equal Marriage to build grass roots support for equality and oppose the campaign of the Coalition for Marriage, told PinkNews.co.uk: “This is incredibly worrying.

“These children are shamelessly being used and manipulated to further the goals of the religious right, most likely without the knowledge or permission of their parents.

“With children as young as 11 being drawn into this without being adequately equipped with maturity and an understanding of the issues at hand is nothing less than abusive scaremongering.

“They claim that one of their reasons to campaign against same-sex marriage is to try to protect children.

“This just goes to show how untrue that is, and that they will use any tool and stoop to any low to get what they want.

“They are the ones who are a threat to children, and this is a shining example as to the dangers of faith schools.”

Concerns have been raised that the school may have breached its public sector equality duty to have “due regard to the need to advance equality of opportunity” and “foster good relations” between “persons who share a relevant protected characteristic [including sexual orientation] and persons who do not share it” in decision-making.

Sue Sanders, co-chair of Schools Out, told PinkNews.co.uk: “The Public Duty of the Equality Act requires schools to amongst, other things, foster good relations across all characteristics. I hardly think telling people to sign a petition that limits LGB people their human rights is either appropriate or legal.”

The Catholic Education Service said in response today that the school is permitted by the Act to teach sex and relationship education in accordance with the teachings of the Catholic Church, but that it would not be allowed to discriminate or permit discrimination against pupils on the grounds of sexual orientation.

New regulations mean that by 6 April, schools should have published information showing how they are complying with the equality duty aims of eliminating unlawful discrimination, advancing equal opportunity and fostering good relations.

PinkNews.co.uk has requested the school’s information through the Catholic Education Service (CES).

In a statement, the British Humanist Association said: “Pink News’s article highlights that the CES’s actions likely broke the Equality Act 2010, which prohibits discrimination against pupils based on their sexual orientation. The BHA believe the CES’s actions likely break sections 406-7 of the Education Act 1996, which forbids ‘the promotion of partisan political views in the teaching of any subject in the school’, and requires balanced treatment of political issues. This law was successfully used in 2007 to stop schools showing Al Gore’s climate change film, An Inconvenient Truth, without also explaining scientific errors in the film.”

BHA Faith Schools Campaigner Richy Thompson added: “This action by the Catholic Education Service is absolutely outrageous. Not only might this break equalities legislation, it also breaks laws against political partisanship.

“If any pupil at one of the schools concerned is interested in taking a legal case forward on this, we urge them to get in touch with us.”

Source: Pink News

In February, Andrew Mundy, 19, from Irwin Crescent in east Belfast, was convicted of sexually assaulting the girl on 9 September 2009.

The judge said had he been convicted of the original rape charge, Mundy would have faced between five and eight years in jail. Mundy was also ordered to sign the sex offenders register for 10 years.

Belfast Crown Court Judge Patrick Lynch said Mundy had behaved in a "callous and totally inhumane way" towards his victim and that he had "taken advantage of" a naive and vulnerable person.

"You dealt with her as a sexual object on this afternoon, you took advantage of the position she was in and then you simply ignored her," he said.

"That says little about you as an individual and a person irrespective of the criminality you have been convicted of."

The jury, however, was unable to agree on an allegation that Mundy had raped the woman and the charge has since been "left on the books".

During the week-long hearing, Mundy's 20-year-old victim told the court how she met him through an internet chat room before meeting him in person for the first time on 7 September when they walked around Victoria Park in the east of the city.

At that time, Mundy told her: "I bring people in here and rape them" but later said it was just a joke.

The jury heard that when the woman met Mundy again two days later, he sexually assaulted her before having sex with her.

The woman claimed Mundy had raped her, but in giving evidence on his own behalf, Mundy said she had consented to sex.

Judge Lynch said on Monday that he was only sentencing on the offence which Mundy had been convicted of and also that he accepted the teenager was "not a sexual predator" who posed a danger to other females.

Passing sentence the judge told Mundy that he could not afford to get on the wrong side of the law for the rest of his life.

Source: BBC News

Muslim leaders in Scotland’s biggest city say gay marriage is an ‘attack’ on Islam.

The Council of Glasgow Imams issued a ‘resolution opposing same-sex marriage’ at the city's Central Mosque, which claimed the main purpose of marriage is ‘the procreation of children’.

They added that the government’s plans were an ‘attack’ on their faith and fundamental beliefs.

The message, which is aimed at all Muslims in Scotland, urged people in the community not to vote for any candidate who supports gay marriage in upcoming council elections.

‘It's totally against not just our faith but most of the faiths. So the Government would be forcing the groups to break their faith to go against it,’ spokesman Bashir Maan told the Press Association.

However, the plans would only allow same-sex couples to tie the knot in a registry office or other civil ceremony and religions would not be forced to hold weddings, even if they wanted to.

Tim Hopkins from Scottish gay rights group the Equality Network said that despite opposition from both Glasgow’s imams and leaders in the Catholic Church, the majority of Scots support same-sex marriage.

‘I think it’s clear that many Scottish Muslims will not agree with everything the council of Imams does and says,’ he told Gay Star News.

Hopkins added: ‘I think the Scottish government will go ahead with the equal marriage bill because although cardinals and bishops in the Catholic Church and now imams oppose it, we are talking about a minority opinion.

‘The key point is that Scotland is multi-cultural and there are some religions which disagree with same-sex marriage but there are some religions which agree with it, like the Quakers, liberal Jews and so on.

‘In a free country, religious groups should be allowed to decide for themselves whether to do same-sex marriage, but it should be available for those who want it.

‘Nobody is going to be forced to do it. People are entirely free to say no. For that reason, I think the Scottish government will go ahead with it.’

Colin Macfarlane, director of Stonewall Scotland, a branch of Britain's largest gay campaign organization, told Gay Star News: ‘It is disappointing that Council of Imams are trying to sway the democratic right of Scottish Muslims by suggesting that they shouldn’t vote for candidates that support equal marriage.

‘The truth is, councillors will have no say in legislating for equal marriage and Scottish Muslims will be voting for candidates who will deliver the best local services for their communities. The majority of Scots across all faiths support equal marriage and the Council of Imams are clearly out of step with public opinion.’

A public consultation on whether to legalize gay marriage in Scotland closed on the 9 December, attracting over 70,000 responses, making it the biggest consultation in the history of the Scottish Parliament.

The Scottish government is expected to take a decision on whether to move forward with legislation soon.

Source: Gay Star News