ABSTRACT
Although internal (domestic) trafficking for child sexual exploitation has become virtually synonymous with ‘grooming gangs’ in the UK, little is known about the grooming process involved. This chapter focuses on six of the earliest and largest such human trafficking investigations in the UK, among them ones that fuelled national panic about so-called ‘Asian sex gangs’ (e.g. the Rochdale case). Its in-depth and primarily qualitative content analysis uses sensitive police data, including telecommunications evidence that offers unusually direct insights into victims’ and offenders’ interactions. Five common grooming techniques are identified: the provision of tangible commodities; affectionate exchanges; bullying and emotional abuse; threats and violence; and sexualised communications; and there were remarkable similarities between unconnected cases. Contrary to much thinking, the grooming process was not sophisticated and tightly ordered but largely crude, intuitive and adaptive. Victims were not passive objects either but rather active participants in a dynamic interchange – albeit ones whose choices were heavily constrained. Drawing on the diverse interactions identified here, a new model of grooming is proposed that better reflects the realities of this complex sex crime: alongside traditional offender–victim grooming, it also accommodates offender–offender grooming, victim–victim grooming and what is effectively ‘self-grooming’ by both parties.
