The offence was unsupported and unsupportable and took place on 26 August 2009
The Parents: Neil (50), Ruth (51)
The Children: Sarah (18/19), Alice(17), Clare (10);
The incidence of abuse lasted for 17hrs 40mins. We have found photographic evidence of the physical scars but we will need longer to assess the lasting damage inflicted on the children. They appear to be convinced that they have all become witches.
Conditions were wet and windy throughout; The party were aware that winds from Hurricane Bill were forecast to arrive soon after the planned start but this seems to have been ignored. The only person who knew of their whereabouts was Don Brown, Neil’s father, who calls himself a Doctor of Dolefulness, seems complicit in the family abuse and frankly lost his marbles many years ago.
According to the parents, Clare developed bad blisters around Hasty Bank. Better parents might have checked she had her walking socks on but these had been left behind in a suitcase. The party had no reserve plan in place and insisted that Clare continue to the finish, now only thirty one miles away. Clare offered to find new parents.
Sarah was given a cheese sandwich to celebrate her 19th birthday at 11.08 sheltering in a flooded ditch near Rosedale Head.
Following further trouble in the Rosedale bogs, the parents belatedy inspected Clare’s feet. The party’s entire medical pack consisted of two plasters. The first plaster slipped off in the rain and all the other blisters were too big anyway. After seeing Clare’s feet, no-one else felt much like taking their boots off. Sarah was suffering from a torn muscle in her hip and Alicewas oozing bodily fluids from rubbing sores on her legs. The parents’ insensitivity to their suffering seems criminal.
Therafter it appears family relations deteriorated. Much of the remaining twenty miles involved existential discussions as whether it was possible to put one foot in front of the other, what was the point of the walk, whether death was better than Wheeldale Beck. Despite extensive family counselling, these matters remain unresolved.
We are awaiting psychologist’s reports on the alleged sighting by all three girls of a ‘blue man in the moss’ around 25 miles into the walk. The suspicion of abuse is strong but the children’s drawings of the Blue Man are primitive and we are having to tread carefully if their evidence is to stand up in court.
The father lost the only compass the party had in Fylingdales Beck. No reasons were given for this, though irresponsibility and incompetence come to mind.
After many hours of careful investigation we believe we have found the root causes of this abuse. Under police interrogation, the father cracked and admitted his own father had once left him for many hours in the night somewhere in the depths of Jugger Howe when he was only seven. Having now spoken to the father we find this entirely credible.
This is clearly how cycles of abuse get perpetuated over generations, The mother has said she had always wanted to do the walk, shows no remorse and appears to be equally culpable.
We recommend the Parents are locked up for a very long time as there is a clear risk of re-offending. It may be too late to save these children, but more worryingly we are hearing reports that there are others involved in this ‘club’, apparently communicating over the internet and using a variety of pagan badges and symbols to identify with each other. There have been rumours that they occasionally congregate to celebrate acts of abuse. Undercover officers dressed as monks in climbing boots have attempted to infiltrate but so far without success.
We are investigating with local police forces and our file remains open.
Neil Brown, Herts.
August 2009.