RedHanded - Episode 65 - Witchcraft, “Muti” & Murder: The Case of Victoria Climbié

Episode Date: October 11, 2018

The murder of Victoria Climbié was the first case to drag the horrors of witchcraft ritual abuse in Britain into the public consciousness. In this week's episode the girls follow the story of 8 year old Victoria's journey to London from the Ivory Coast and how she met her end at the hands of an abusive man who claimed that she was possessed by the devil. In this disturbing episode Suruthi and Hannah also explore other notorious cases of ‘Muti murder’ right here in the UK - like that of the little boy “Adam” and the torso in the Thames...   See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can listen to Red Handed early and ad-free. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. They say Hollywood is where dreams are made. A seductive city where many flock to get rich, be adored, and capture America's heart. But when the spotlight turns off, fame, fortune, and lives can disappear in an instant. Follow Hollywood and Crime, The Cotton Club Murder on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Saruti.

I'm Hannah. And welcome to Red Handed. We are in week two of Halloween at Red Handed. And today we're staying close to home as we discuss the case of the murder of eight-year-old Victoria Klimbie. Just three years after Victoria came to Europe from her home in the Ivory Coast in search of a better life, there would be a national inquiry into her horrendous murder at the hands of her guardians. Now normally, we definitely try to consider those in social care, the police, the health service, and schools, basically all of

those agencies involved in protecting children, a fair chance. They are, of course, completely overwhelmed with potential cases. They're overworked and they're definitely underfunded. But in the words of the judge who heard this case in court, the child protection team's investigation into Victoria's abuse was, quote, blindingly incompetent. And it left a beautiful, vulnerable eight-year-old little girl dead, having suffered 128 separate injuries. And what's maybe like the most heartbreaking thing is that she wasn't abducted and killed by strangers. She was murdered in her own home by her own family. And their motives? They're completely unbelievable.

Victoria's death in 2000 was so significant. It led to some of the most radical reforms to child protection law here in the UK. And we'll go into these in a bit more detail later in the episode. But it was also the case that dragged the dark and hidden world of witchcraft-based abuse into the national consciousness. Victoria's life started as a happy one. She was born in November 1991, so she's only a year younger than me. I thought about that when I read that just now, that she would have been our age now. Yeah, she would be. Yeah, you're right. She'd be our age. So she was born to loving parents in a small village called Abobo in the Ivory Coast, which is West Africa.

She was described as a fun child. She had six brothers and sisters, but was seen as the joker of the family. She was well-loved and happy, but her parents knew that her opportunities in Abobo were limited. And like any parents, they wanted the world for Victoria. And in 1998, when she was seven, an opportunity to give it to her seemed to arise. The family received a visit from Marie-Therese Quall, Victoria's father's sister from France. Quall offered the family something they felt like they just couldn't refuse. She offered to take Victoria back to France with her, educate her and provide her with a better life. Qual had already offered this to another family to take their daughter Anna, but that family

had changed their minds and refused at the last minute. And maybe you're thinking, well, obviously, of course they did. You're not just going to hand over your child to a relative stranger. But you have to understand in this society, in this culture, the idea of informal fosterage is pretty common and Victoria was thrilled about the idea of a new life in France with the prospect of a good education and adventure and also you've got to remember in the Ivory Coast French is spoken everywhere so it's not like she would have had to learn a new language and Victoria's family felt that they knew Qual they'd

only met her a few times but she was Victoria's aunt after all. Qual also put herself across as a maternal, philanthropic, caring, and, crucially, an incredibly rich woman who just wanted to help. She just, like, floats in on the wind, like, I'm going to solve all your problems and give your daughter this beautiful life. However, in reality, none of this would be true. And in November 1998, Victoria left the Ivory Coast to join Qual in Paris. Victoria had to travel to France using the passport that had been made for Qual's original prospect, the little girl Anna, whose family had changed their minds.

Once in France, Victoria would have to continue to live as Anna, and it wouldn't be until her death that anyone would even learn of her true identity. In Paris, Qual, despite having claimed to be a very rich woman, was actually living in a council flat and claiming benefits. It's now that her real motivation for wanting Victoria started to become clear. With a child now under her care, she was entitled to additional benefits. And to begin with, appearances were really important. So Quall enrolled Victoria in school. But soon, by December, Quall was receiving warnings from the school because

Victoria was basically never there. And when Victoria was there, she was falling asleep in class, her clothes were dirty, her head had been shaved, and she was coming to school with a wig on. If you're looking for the signs of abuse and neglect in a child, ding, ding, ding, this is it. And by February 1999, social services became involved after the school issued a child at risk notification. Now the pressure was on for Qual. Social services were looking into her. She was being investigated for benefit fraud and she had fallen into serious housing arrears. So by the end of April 1999, she took Victoria and fled to Britain. In London, Victoria and Qual lived in hostels and bedsits for the first few months.

It's now here in Britain that Qual sought out a distant relative, Esther Ucker. Esther and her daughter immediately began to sense that something was very wrong. Esther took off Victoria's wig and was shocked by the sight of blisters covering the child's shaved head. Qual just tried to explain the marks away, saying that there had just been an accident. But a few weeks later, Esther ran into Qual and Victoria again, and this time she was absolutely sure that something sinister was happening. Victoria was tiny, frail and bruised. What's really apparent here is the total arrogance of Qual. She thinks she can just explain away all of these clear signs of abuse.

And I think it's probably because at this stage it's just her and Victoria. Qual's not working. So her main interaction is with this child that she has total control over. So that's probably how she entered all interactions. As if she was in total control and everyone's just going to agree with her. No one's going to question what she's saying because Victoria certainly wouldn't. But Esther is, I think Esther is genuinely a good person. She's a counsellor and she was a midwife.

She is, at the end of the day, she's a caregiver and she wasn't going to let this go. But also what you have to remember with Esther as well is that Quarles hurt family. Yeah. And calling the police on your family, no matter what they've done, it's quite difficult to do. So I do understand why she is initially quite hesitant.

But eventually, Esther becomes sufficiently concerned for Victoria's safety that she asks them, so she asks Victoria and Quarles to come and visit them at their home. After this visit, she immediately called Brent Social Services to raise her concerns. Brent is the borough of London that they were living in. And she told the social services that the house was filthy, the room was small, and Anna wasn't looking well. And she told them that they needed to investigate. She was told that someone would go to the address and follow up on her report urgently so I heard this week listening to a podcast about like weird jobs and this guy is a crime scene cleaner upper that's his job not

for the police but like for when maybe someone has bought an abandoned house and there's a body in it and you've got to get rid of it like that sort of thing and he said like the weirdest thing I've learned is that people live like absolute animals that he's i'm a clean freak obviously i'm a cleaner that's my job but i have been so shocked like bodies whatever i have been shocked and appalled by the way people live and i think that's probably how esther feels about this but that's another thing of how arrogant qual is she doesn't even feel embarrassed to let this woman into this house which is just squalid you're completely right. Esther wanted to be 100% sure before she made an accusation of something like child abuse against a member of her family. But she is one of the few people in this story

that absolutely does the right thing. Like you said, she called Brent Social Services, told them about all of her concerns. And like you said, they tell her, yeah, someone's going to go to the house and check it out. Don't worry about it. And Esther even called social services again a few days later to check on the progress of Victoria's case. And she was again told, assured that action was going to be taken. But in reality, absolutely nothing was done. When I first moved back to London after I was away, I lived in this, before the Poplar house that you came to, I lived in a different house on quite a rough estate and I could hear in the walls next door like someone like screaming at their child like really like horrible horrible horrible so I rang the property guardianship agency and I was like what do I do about this like do I need to report this to social

services because I've just heard it I haven't seen it like is that enough and she said that if you report it to social services they will only do something about it if there are two other reports. So if their school is worried and there's something, I don't know if that, but that's what she said to me. She was like, my phone call to social services, like, yes, I should do it. But that will not be enough for them to go around. They need other backup information. Wow. Yeah.

I mean, that's something. Yeah. And I can kind of get it from because you know me as a neighbor ringing up yeah i mean i think maybe like if you're a frontline worker with a child so like you're a teacher or a doctor or somebody like that then maybe if you get if you report it it's immediately like immediately action is taken but maybe you know if you're just a neighbor calling in and saying that maybe nothing is done. I mean, I don't know. But in this case, absolutely nothing was done, even though Esther called and didn't just call and leave it.

She followed through. She calls them again to ask. And it just really feels like here it starts. And just one by one, Victoria was failed by every agency that she came in contact with. Between April and July 1999, Qual visited Ealing Social Services, which is just another borough in London, 18 times for housing issues and financial reasons. Victoria accompanied her at least 10 of these times. And this just comes back again and again to the arrogance of Qual.

She's taking the child out that she's abusing with her to social services whenever she goes. That's insane. And the staff there even noted Victoria's appearance with one member of the staff, Deborah Gaunt, even stating that she thought Victoria looked like the child from an Action Aid advert. Good one, Deborah. Bit racist, isn't it? Deborah's a dick. Deborah's a dick. And because, again, nothing was done. Deborah just makes this little joke over, I imagine, like her cup of tea, but doesn't do anything about it.

Yeah, she looks like one of the African children on the telly. What a weird thing to say. Nothing was reported and no one escalated the situation. Again, she's taking her into a fucking social services office and still nobody does anything. And get this, because people like Deborah apparently thought that Victoria was being made to look like that and being brought into the offices in order to get authorities to hand over more benefits money. Even if that was the case, isn't that abuse in itself? Surely that needs another look.

Absolutely. Absolutely. No one even asked Victoria why she wasn't in school. Because bear in mind, social services offices are open during school hours and this is when fucking Koala's dragging her in there. No one was like, shouldn't that kid be in school? No, apparently not. The cynicism with which these people dealt with this situation in front of them, a case that was clearly abuse, is truly, truly shocking. With months of multiple failed opportunities by social services, in June 1999, Carl Manning entered Victoria's life and things got so much worse. Manning was a loner with few social skills and generally just a bit of

a weird guy. How many of those have we come across? How many times have we written that sentence? Loner with few social skills. So Manning is Qual's new man friend and Quall was... Toy boy. Yeah, she's a cougar. Because Manning was 20 years younger than Quall. And she definitely sees him as a weak man that she can manipulate. They met on the bus. And it's not like they were sitting on the bus. Manning is the bus driver.

That is some slick moves if you can pick up the bus driver while he's driving the bus. I want my bus driver fully focused on the road. Yeah. Not on the women on the bus hitting on him. Quall pulls it off because they very quickly started a relationship. I wonder if they started the relationship while she was still on the bus. That is a productive bus journey. Because after just a month, Victoria and Quall moved into Manning's oneroom flat in Tottenham to play happy families.

But this relationship and this move would ultimately result in the torture and death of Victoria. Manning was obsessed with Qual and he made it very clear, very quickly, that he did not want Victoria there. Qual, now having secured a man with a flat and a job, no longer felt she needed Victoria. So she took drastic and quite frankly, pretty stupid, incredibly stupid even, action to get rid of her. Qual had been working as a hospital cleaner for a few weeks and Victoria had been staying with some acquaintances, the Cameron family, whilst Qual was out. Victoria, by all accounts accounts loved being there. Mrs Cameron was caring and her two children treated Victoria like a sister. So Qual packed Victoria a bag and took her to the Camerons saying that her new boyfriend didn't like Victoria and could

they please take her in. She's not a fucking cat. Yeah literally that. That's how much it's just... Victoria is so disposable to her. If all she ever wanted was just a guy with a flat and a job, why didn't she go do that first before she dragged her ass all the way to the fucking Ivory Coast to grab a kid there and bring her back to Europe with her? These kids are so disposable to her. She's just like, I'm done. I've got a better option now.

They're currency. That's all it is. She didn't even bother to get Victoria her own passport. She was just like, a girl, please. This'll do. She just strolled up to the Cameron's house and is expecting to leave Victoria there like Paddington Bear. But Mrs Cameron said that she would have Victoria for the night, but made it clear that just turning up at her door to palm Victoria off on her was completely unacceptable.

This is like when you start to realise, like, not just is this completely immoral what she's doing, it's also so fucking stupid. Because when Qual left, the Camerons saw the injuries on Victoria. They were clearly from a fresh beating and Mrs Cameron had had enough. She took Victoria immediately to A&E and Middlesex Central Hospital. She explained to the nurses that she'd seen injuries on Victoria before and now she just didn't know what else to do. So a doctor at the hospital took two hours examining Victoria from head to toe and it's only

when the doctor removed Victoria's clothes that they saw the full extent of the horror that Victoria had been suffering. Victoria was covered in cigarette burns, strange marks, and the scars of sustained abuse. The doctor who carried out the examination, shocked by what she'd seen, decided to call social services. But the following morning, a senior consultant, Dr. Schwartz, re-diagnosed Victoria with scabies. Scabies is an infectious disease that leaves marks on the body. And this doctor was convinced, apparently, that the marks and the scars on Victoria were self-inflicted wounds from Victoria scratching herself. I think this doctor seems to think, oh, obviously this kid is living in not good circumstances. She's probably just caught scabies. But even still, just lets her

walk out the door. And this diagnosis, I mean, bear in mind, she's got cigarette marks on her. They're perfect circles. I'm guessing if you get scabies, they're not fucking perfect circles. And who scratches themselves and leaves marks on themselves in perfect circles? And also this diagnosis, regardless of how the scars or the marks look, this diagnosis was made without ever even speaking to Victoria alone. That's rule number one. Fuck off. And thanks to this Dr. Fucking Schwartz, who's really earning his fucking pay as a senior NHS consultant, the original diagnosis of non-accidental harm was overruled

and the police protection on Victoria was lifted. And another doctor even wrote to social services saying that there was no child protection issue here. I mean, how fucking thorough of you. It's baffling, baffling. And this directly undid what the original doctor had done, because the first doctor had called social services and Michelle Hine, a child protection officer at Brent Council, had planned to open an investigation into the case. However, the next day when she heard of Dr Schwartz's diagnosis, she trusted his judgment and downgraded the level of Victoria's care.

You couldn't just go meet her just to check. Yeah, you couldn't just go and have a look. And yeah, we know social services are overworked. We know, we know that. But this just seems like there were so many missed opportunities. So Victoria was kept in hospital for just one night and then discharged to Quarrel. Mrs Cameron was furious, but she felt totally helpless. The Camerons would never see Victoria alive ever again.

So now, social care had failed Victoria, the health service had failed her, and she once again found herself trapped, terrified and alone with Quarle and Manning. And the abuse escalated. A week later, Victoria was back in hospital with horrific burns to her face and head. Quarle claimed to the doctors that Victoria had scolded herself in an attempt to stop the itching caused by her scabies. Who, who, when they are itchy is like, do you know what I really need to do? Scold myself with boiling water. That's going to fix it. Literally, who would? No one. Absolutely no one. That's not a thing. And also, it's not a thing that Victoria had scabies because the hospital found absolutely no evidence of it.

And also, this is the thing that Schwartz doctor who says, oh, no, this isn't abuse. This is scabies because the hospital found absolutely no evidence of it. And also, this is the thing, that Schwartz doctor who says, oh no, this isn't abuse, this is scabies. I'm pretty sure you can fucking test for scabies. And when they test her now, she has no scabies because she never had it. But Victoria spent a few more days in hospital when nurses described her as a little ray of sunshine. But they all noted her withdrawn nature on the rare occasions when Qual would visit. The nurses' notes included fears around the relationship between Qual and Victoria, saying that it seemed more like a master-servant relationship than a mother-daughter one. Nurses had even recorded an incident when Qual had scared Victoria to the point that Victoria had wet herself. However, still, nothing was done. Despite abuse being strongly suspected i mean these people

anybody on the front lines dealing with children are trained to spot abuse and trained to know how to respond what the fuck were they playing at i just i really don't understand do you think there might have been an element of they're not from here maybe this is just what it's like on the ivory coast potentially maybe this is just what it's like on the ivory coast potentially maybe this is just what the relationship between parents and children are can we comment on it can we get involved maybe that's a really good this is a cultural difference that's a really good point yeah for sure i think there's always the element of like oh immigrant parents are always going to be tougher on their kids so you know and it's just their culture so if they give them a smack or if

they speak to them a bit abruptly that's just their culture. So if they give them a smack or if they speak to them a bit abruptly, that's just their culture. That's a really good point. But I think it's like we talked about last week. Fuck that. Yeah. There's got to be a line somewhere. Yeah. And when Victoria had recovered, consultant Mary Rossiter felt she was indeed being abused, but still wrote able to discharge on Victoria's notes. According to Maureen Ann Meats, another doctor at the hospital,

when Rossiter had written that note, she had noted that Victoria was exhibiting signs of neglect, emotional abuse and physical abuse. Rossiter later explained that by writing able to discharge on Victoria's notes, she didn't mean that she wanted Victoria to go home, but simply just that she was physically fit enough to leave hospital. Oh, well, maybe she should have written that down then. Yeah.

Maybe you want to fucking write that down. That's ass covering. That's not true. And she said that she just expected police and social services to follow up on the case. But did you fucking raise your concerns with them? Or did you just allow an eight-year-old girl you suspected of being abused to return home to her abusers and hope that someone would follow up. Hope's not really good enough when it comes to child abuse, isn't it?

No. I think the problem we see with this whole thing is someone else will deal with it. Absolutely. It's so obvious that something is wrong here that someone else will see it and deal with it, but it's not going to be me. No one wants to take that burden. It's that shirking of responsibility, that passing of the buck, pushing it down the line for someone else to deal with bullshit that really pisses me off.

And I know it's not easy. I totally get that this isn't an easy job. They're overwhelmed, they're underfunded, like everything like that. But every individual who came into contact with Victoria owed her a duty of care to report, to escalate and to persist until action was taken. But they just didn't do it. And this abject failure of those in power to do anything absolutely led to her death. And to be honest, the lack of responsibility taken by those who should have protected her is completely appalling.

In the winter of 1999, Victoria's abuse escalated again. She was now being forced to sleep in the bath by Manning because she kept wetting the sofa. She's eight years old. Eight-year-olds piss the bed. They just do. A social worker called Lisa Arthurworry was assigned to the case. She had been a social worker for just 18 months, so she was extremely inexperienced. And this was a complex case. And predictably, that combination did not go well. Arthurworry conducted home visits to Manning's flat and said in the inquiry that she was under the impression that Klimbie seemed happy.

Literally how? I do wonder with the whole social care system, social workers, is there an element of, I mean, not with Arthur Worry maybe because she's only been doing it for 18 months, but you must be seeing so much really grim stuff every day constantly on a loop is it possible you might just get a bit desensitized to it i think you'd have to be to be able to do the job maybe i don't know i think there is an element of hardening to it or becoming desensitized but if anything you should be your senses should be sharper if you see that kind of thing again and again and again we look for patterns

that's what we do as humans you should be able to recognize the see that kind of thing again and again and again, we look for patterns. That's what we do as humans. You should be able to recognise the patterns of abuse and you should know how to fucking spot it. It should almost become instinctive. And she's not hiding it, is she? She's not being deceptive.

And again, I think it comes down to just how they investigate it. So Arthur Worry and Victoria met on four occasions where they were together for a total of less than 30 minutes, barely speaking to each other. How was that investigating it? But apparently, for Arthur Worry, that was enough.

Enough to assess the entire situation. Literally, how is that investigating or assessing the situation? It's not like a kid's life hangs in the balance here. Like, can you not give it 45? Come on. And speak to her on her own. You cannot speak to a potential abuse victim in front of their fucking abuser or their suspected abuser she's not gonna sit there and tell you the truth she

doesn't know who you are where's the like trust building the relationship building tell making that child feel like they can tell you and make a disclosure of abuse none of that is ever done here so regardless of the ineptitude with which everyone dealt with this, Quall was very aware that the net was now closing in. Quall kept Victoria away from hospitals and instead turned to churches. She started to tell pastors that she was Victoria's mother and that demons were inside her daughter. Quall convinced them that Victoria's injuries were a result of demonic possession. The pastor at the mission ensemble, Poor Christ, Pascal Orome,

offered prayers for the little girl to cast out the devil. On another occasion, Quall took Climbier to a church run by the Universal Church of the Kingdom of God, where the pastor, Alvaro Lima, suspected that she was being abused. But again, he also took absolutely no action. He said in the inquiry that Victoria told him that Satan had told her to burn herself. And he also said that he didn't know if she was really possessed or if it was abuse.

Really, Mr. Lima, did you really think that? Was that your actual thought process? Could be demons or it could be abuse maybe you just want to have a big old think about which of those is more likely i wonder with marie qual i wonder whether they're may a part of what she gets out of this abuse is i think she gets off on getting away with it because she's constantly presenting victoria to people and getting away with it she's not keeping her locked in the bathroom she's taking her out they're going to the shops they're going to hospital they're going to social services and now they're going to church because

she needs people to see it i think that's her whole thing absolutely that's a really really good point and actually um when we were reading about this i was like it almost starts to feel like a touch of munchausen by proxy like she's not poisoning her but she's beating her she's abusing her she's telling her she's possessed as we see like it gets really dark what we're about to talk about and then she takes her to these churches and telling her oh i'm the mother this is my daughter she's possessed by demons like what why is she drawing if this is just straight forward cut and shut abuse exploitation she wanted her for money then she didn't need her.

She just wants to get rid of her. Why all of this, like you say, parading her around in front of people, in front of authority figures? If she wants to get rid of her, why doesn't she just kill her? She's not going to school. Who's going to miss her? I don't know. And this is why it turns into something weirder than just that. This is the weirdness.

The weirdness begins now, guys. The number of cases of religious or ritualistic abuse of children reported to Scotland Yard has increased year on year over the past 10 years. And that's still given how much of a hidden crime it is. So this is just scratching the surface of what's really happening. This is so underreported. To be honest, the only person who I've ever heard talk about it is you. Oh, really? Yeah. The reason I guess I was aware of it, and this case, Victoria's case, did really, really, like we said at the start, bring this into the national consciousness to any level.

And the police, I have to give them credit. They do a fantastic job now. They have a thing called Project Violet, which aims to kind of tackle these kind of culturally sensitive issues like ritualistic abuse. And the reason I know about it is because I basically used to produce conferences for teachers, for headteachers. And one of the ones I did was around child protection. And every year you did the research fresh. So I would speak to hundreds of them to understand what the issues were that they were facing right now. And the first year I started doing it, nobody talked about FGM. Nobody talked about forced marriages. Nobody talked about witchcraft, ritual abuse. Second year, started to sneak in. I had one session on it in a track. Third year I was doing it, it was an entire stream in the day. That's how much year on year in a really quantifiable way that I would do the research

every six months for that conference. That's how much it stepped up and fell into the consciousness. What would those speakers be saying? Would they be saying, this is how you spot it? So I would have a mixture of people. So I had police officers speaking, I had healthcare professionals speaking, I had other sort of education professionals and consultants. They know what they're doing. It was about, this is how you spot the signs. This is what the signs look like of a child that's going through this. And to be honest, also, these are the communities in which this happens. Just so you understand, this isn't about, you know, racial profiling. This is about understanding where this is likely to be happening and also understanding what you need

to do to report it. Because you must report it. You absolutely have a duty of care to report it. And for forced marriage, it was really interesting. One of the ways you can tell your children about it, especially if you're a teacher, was a lot of these kids would get taken away back to sort of their countries that their parents had come from over the summer holidays. And as they got older and older, things would become concerns like FGM, forced marriage, maybe even, you know, witchcraft, ritual abuse. And what they told them was if these kids were worried, but they didn't want to report it, they would say, put a spoon in your underwear when you're going through airport security. The spoon will set off the metal detectors. And airport security in this country has been trained

that if you find a child with a spoon in their underwear to take them away from their parents immediately and call the police. I don't think I'd have the balls to do that as a kid. It's terrifying. It's exactly why this kind of crime is so hidden because the perpetrators are the family members. And how do you as a child understand that this is abuse and that this isn't just normal? And how do you then also go the next step to telling on your parents

and knowing that they could go to jail for what they've done or what they're planning to do? And when you're that young, I mean, obviously, like the moment you realise that your parents are just people is something that happens probably in your late teens. But you don't know that when you're eight, Your parents are like these perfect beings. It's incredibly brave for these children to do anything. And that's why, you know, they won't tell their teachers what's going on. They won't tell anybody what's going on. So all they could do was tell them,

if you're worried that this is going to happen, this is something you can do, or this is a number you can call. It's really difficult. So these referrals that have been going through to Scotland Yard increasingly over the past 10 years, they have mainly come from African Christian churches, and they're mainly in big cities across the UK. And in these communities, if someone, a child most likely, is branded a witch,

the violence can escalate extremely quickly. They are no longer seen as a child, but as someone that can inflict harm on others. One minute the child is a loved child, then someone in the community can blame that child for a misfortune and say that that child is a witch possessed by evil spirits. If this happens, then the parent may no longer even see that child as theirs, but as an evil spirit that needs to be released. I think it's the Karawa tribe in papua new guinea they are quite famous for they live in really tall tree houses and they're quite famous for cannibalism but if you interview them like anthropologists have interviewed them they say oh no we we don't eat

people we kooka and then they're like what's that they're like oh no they're demons so when a person becomes possessed by a demon they're no longer a person. It's cool to eat them. Wow. Yeah. Well, everything is just perception, isn't it? Yeah. So I think it's a really interesting thing how quickly you can become not a human.

Yeah, absolutely. That's a really, really good point. And it's that flip of a switch. This isn't just people deciding that they're going to abuse their children. They don't see them as their child anymore. They see them as a demon. As far as they're concerned, either that child is gone or they think that they need to exorcise that demon or the devil from them. And deliverances or exorcisms can involve extreme physical violence. A child is starved or put in a cage so that they can't pass the spirit

on to other children because that's really important. It's super infectious. And survivors of such abuse that I read their testimonies, I read interviews with them, books that they've written. These are just like some of the things that they explain, which really help you understand how this happens. They say, quote, children who have gone through this don't see this as abuse. They believe that it's normal. If your mother tells you every day that you're ugly, then you're ugly. I believe that I was a witch.

And it's kind of like we talked about last week you're being told that this is true yeah and you know it's gonna hurt but you're being told that this happens to happen to save your soul to save the family to save the community the people who've created your whole world are telling you this so you're going to believe that you are but it is really important to say that it's not always through the church the church isn't always involved in this because it does seem that much of this kind of abuse does seem to stem from like rogue pastors just like preaching absolute nonsense. It's not always sort of like sanctioned officially. But these kind of crimes, hidden crimes as they're called, like we said, are massively underreported because no victim is going to say it's abuse. They just think it's normal.

No one is going to come forward from the community because people don't want to speak out. And pastors in this community, whether they're rogue or not, are incredibly powerful people. And Victoria's experience in being labelled as possessed and tortured and killed is sadly not unique. And not unique in this country. That's the terrifying thing. There are several cases. The cases of Child B, the case of the little boy known only as Adam, and of Kirsty Bamu. They are all noted examples of such deaths in this country. They were all victims of ritual sacrifice and all of them were here from Africa. In the case of the little boy Adam, Adam was actually just the name given to him by police and all they ever found of him was the torso of a young boy in the Thames in September 2001. I remember that. I remember it happening and thinking that can't be real.

Yeah, I didn't think it was real. But it is. And it was actually the first true investigation of a ritual killing in Britain. But at first, Scotland Yard just thought that it was a murder linked to a sex crime or a domestic case, or maybe even just an accident and that the body had been dismembered to hide the victim's identity. But then two weeks after Adam's torso was found they discovered the remnants of what they thought to be an African ritual on the shore of the Thames two miles upstream from where Adam was found. In Chelsea they found a Nigerian name written on a sheet

and carved into seven half-burnt candles. They suspected Muti. So what is Muti? The term itself derives from Umuti, which is the Zulu word for tree, which has become a byword for any kind of traditional medicine, good or bad. It's perhaps more correct to refer to what we're discussing as a medicine murder because muti killings are not human sacrifice in a religious sense but rather they involve the murder of someone in order to excise body parts for incorporation as ingredients into medicine and potions used in witchcraft. It's important to note at this point that much of Mutti is innocent. Its everyday form consists mainly of potions made from herbs and plants to cure common ailments.

And it legit works. Like a pharmaceutical company even signed a deal a few years ago with the African National Healers Association to package up some of these Mutti recipes and sell them. That makes sense. Like aspirin and stuff, like what comes from willow, you can just chew on some of that. I mean, probably best just taking a couple of pills, but you know what I'm saying. Would you rather chew on a tree or go to Boots and get some aspirin for 60p? It's up to you.

You know, it's important to say most practitioners of mootie stop here. They stop with plant recipes. But there are some of those who believe that more complex illnesses or challenges can be cured or dealt with, with animal parts. And some of the ones they use are things like crocodile fat, hawk wings, monkey heads, or dried puff adders. I never thought of crocodiles as having that much fat on them. But maybe if they're in the water all the time, then they're probably quite cold. Maybe they do need quite a thick layer of fat, like seals. Maybe. But even if they have a little bit, I guess scarcity denotes value, doesn't it? Like hen's teeth. Someone's got a master's in economics.

I made a connection there to hen's teeth. Do hens have teeth or is that just a saying? No, because if you say something that's like as rare as hen's teeth, it's because hens don't have teeth. Oh, anyway, I don't have a I don't have a degree in animal biology. He was hip hop's biggest mogul, the man who redefined fame, fortune and the music industry. The first male rapper to be honored on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, Sean Diddy Combs. Diddy built an empire and lived a life most people only dream about. Everybody know ain't no party like a Diddy party, so.

Yeah, that's what's up. But just as quickly as his empire rose, it came crashing down. Today I'm announcing the unsealing of a three-count indictment, charging Sean Combs with racketeering conspiracy, sex trafficking, interstate transportation for prostitution. I was f***ed up. I hit rock bottom, but I made no excuses. I'm disgusted. I'm so sorry. Until you're wearing an orange jumpsuit, it's not real. Now it's real. From his meteoric rise to his shocking fall from grace,

from law and crime, this is The Rise and Fall of Diddy. Listen to The Rise and fall of Diddy exclusively with Wondery Plus. I'm Jake Warren, and in our first season of Finding, I set out on a very personal quest to find the woman who saved my mom's life. You can listen to Finding Natasha right now exclusively on Wondery Plus. In season two, I found myself caught up in a new journey to help someone I've never even met. But a couple of years ago I came across a social media post by a person named Loti.

It read in part Three years ago today that I attempted to jump off this bridge but this wasn't my time to go. A gentleman named Andy saved my life. I still haven't found him. This is a story that I came across purely by chance but it instantly moved me.

And it's taken me to a place where I've had to consider some deeper issues around mental health. This is season two of Finding. And this time, if all goes to plan, we'll be finding Andy. You can listen to Finding Andy and Finding Natasha exclusively and ad-free on Wondery+. Join Wondery in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify.

You don't believe in ghosts? I get it. Lots of people don't. I didn't either, until I came face to face with them. Ever since that moment, hauntings, spirits, and the unexplained have consumed my entire life. I'm Nadine Bailey. I've been a ghost tour guide for the past 20 years. I've taken people along with me into the shadows, uncovering the macabre tales that linger in the darkness, and inside some of the most haunted houses, hospitals, prisons, and more.

Join me every week on my podcast, Haunted Canada, as we journey through terrifying and bone-chilling stories of the unexplained. Search for Haunted Canada on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or wherever you find your favourite podcasts. Basically the only people that don't take part in the World Cup very extensively. Oh no, they do try. They just don't qualify always. Their women's team's good though. Maybe they should have tried this because we're talking about the Football World Cup. They've somehow fucking got the next World Cup, didn't they? Not the next one, the one after. And Mexico. I'm like, Mexico, okay.

Mexico's fine, yeah. I'll allow that. They're desperately trying to make it big, make football big in the US. There's so much money. There's so much money. That's what it is. When I was in New York last week, I went to go watch a hockey game. Wow. So much money. Everything. I bought a Coke. Guess how much my Coke cost? Your Coke? Yeah. In the stadium?

Yeah. And I mean like tap Coke. $8. Oh, bang on. $8. Was it? $8 for a fucking Coke. What is going on? Are you on crack? $8 for a Coke. What's that? About six quid? For a Coke. Fuck me. Was it like a pint? Yeah, it was like a pint.

But still, that's like two quid. Not eight. That's outrageous. I refused to pay for a Coke in a pub because they were going to charge me £2.40 for it. Yeah. And the two guys I was with got two beers. $27 for two beers. I was like like I'll just

have a Coke. I went to a an American I went to a Patriots game when I was in Boston at the Gillette Stadium and they stopped selling beer at half time and I was like what what's going on and my mate was like yeah everyone's got to drive home and I was like 45 minutes is gonna make no difference if you have been tailgating all day. Wow that's that's something that is a stadium covering its ass for all the inevitable accidents that are about to happen. Is that how you're combating drink driving? Yeah. Honestly, it was just money, money, money everywhere. I think that's why they want to make it big there.

And maybe, you know, if the US team just can't qualify, maybe they need to give this a try. Because before the last World Cup qualifiers, a hippo, a lion, an elephant and a hyena were all slaughtered to make a potion for the Swaziland team to give their footballers extra strength and get them through. Didn't work though, did it? They just had four dead animals and an unsuccessful, unqualified Swaziland team. Maybe if they'd done two hippos, they would have been all right. They really believe in this. They really believe in this. And this is like the national team. It wasn't just like... No, it's not some kids like kicking around.

Who's making them a fucking mooty potion with four? Yeah. I don't know. But the thing is, okay, so you have the people who believe in plants. You have the people that take it to the next step with animals. But when things get really fucked up is when it moves into the idea of human sacrifice. And I really feel like it's almost like each stage of this is like a gateway drug to the next potentially not obviously for everybody

some people most people stop at plants but if your mentality is well plants work and then animals maybe kind of work imagine what we could do with people scotland yard when they found adam and full credit here for some absolutely incredible policing, focused on the Yoruba tribe because of the oranges... Oranges. Oranges. Because of the origins... Oranges.

Are you having a stroke? I think I'm having a stroke. Someone call me an ambulance. Because of the origins of the name written on the sheet that they had found and for those of you who've listened to our episode on the silent twins from way back in the olden times of yore it's still on the patreon page if you want to listen to it you will remember that the Yoruba are native to southwest Nigeria so given what the Scotland Yard had found and what had happened to Adam which we will talk about in a bit, so please be prepared,

the police thought that this murder was linked to an ancient fertility ritual practiced by Yoruba people who live in the Ivory Coast, the same place that Victoria was from. Scotland Yard needed support with this case. It wasn't like anything they had ever dealt with before. So they requested the help of Professor Hendrik Schultz from Johannesburg. He's a South African pathologist who also happens to be an expert in muti killings. Unbelievably, the candles and the sheets and stuff that they had found in Chelsea turned out to be totally unrelated to Adam's death.

What the fuck is going on in Chelsea? What? I think there are a lot of things going on in Chelsea that we know nothing about. I think that's a bunch of fucking trust fund cokeheads that done that. Yeah, that's trust fund cokeheads like trying to reach the other side. That's what that is.

What are the fucking chances? They found it two miles away from where they found Adam's torso. And they were like, it's totally unrelated. But it fucking still, like, what? Like, what's going on on the shores of the Thames? That this random, and it wasn't just like a sheet with a name.

It was like a sheet with a name and seven carved, half-burnt candles on the shores of the Thames. What the fuck? And it had nothing to do with this. That is some real trustafarian work, I think. I think that is some real trustafarian work i think i think that is like you know they were like smoking a big old joint yeah carving up some candles yeah yeah writing nigerian names on sheets yeah the campaign against carbon footprints and then fly to their loft in manhattan every

weekend like they're the worst kind of people like my uni is like an absolute mecca for those kind of people i've done my time in the field with them and i just they ever try to lure you to the shores They're the worst kind of people. My uni is like an absolute mecca for those kind of people. I've done my time in the field with them and I just... They ever try and lure you to the shores of the Thames to do an ancient Yoruba fertility ritual? No, because you needed a trust fund to be invited, which I do not have. Oh, burn. That's deep.

I know. Womp womp. The worst one that I came into contact with, anyone who went to uni with me who was listening will know exactly who I'm talking about. But I'm not going to say her name because I'm a professional. She, so everyone would go out and be really hungover in the kitchen the next day. And her favourite thing to talk about was how there have been virgin births in Africa. She would just make this shit up, right?

And then just like do this. She's white, right? Yeah. Oh, she white she would talk about all of this sort of spiritual stuff which when you're hung over on a sunday that's the last thing i want to hear about i mean i just have no time for it i think i've told you the story but like when i went to nepal obviously the himalayas is touted as being a very spiritual majestic healing mountain didn't fucking heal me broke me almost died i was there climbing this mountain met this girl in the hostel before we started the hike and she was like can i come i was like

yeah sure like why not more the merrier she comes she doesn't have a proper backpack so i've got like a decent backpack on and i felt sorry for her after a couple of days because her back was like getting fucking raw from that backpack and you know i was like putting up with her she was very hippie dippy like i couldn't cope she's a girl who spent too long in as know i was like putting up with her she was very hippie dippy like i couldn't cope she's a girl who spent too long in asia i was like look love go home seriously you're full you're all asian out i'm afraid i as the asian say that you need to go home absolutely get the fuck out it's when people start talking to me about hinduism i'm not a believer but i know don't fucking tell me don't tell me about yoga god india's literally most obnoxious export but anyway like so i feel sorry for her i feel sorry

for her right so i'm like oh my gosh i'm so like let's swap backpacks oh that's really nice so let's swap backpacks carrying it for like i know i'm a nice person i also just couldn't listen to her fucking moan anymore so i'm carrying this backpack and i'm like fuck me this is heavy what have you got in here she had it full of fucking rocks that she'd been picking up on the way up no she didn't she thought they were healing rocks oh my god did you push her off the mountain i think i would have pushed her off the mountain and the body would have sunk because all of them rocks no because they were on my back they were on my fucking back i dropped the bag on the floor and i was like look you either take the rocks out right now or you give me my backpack back so what she

what she was gonna go to the airport and be like yes uh i need to take these rocks with me back to uh my house i don't don't know what the plan was don't know what the plan was with those like where was she going with these don't know she hated me after that she absolutely hated me she thought i was a soulless bitch i was like i carried your bat hat for you i carried a bunch of fucking rocks for half a day up that mountain yeah it was weird it was weird i cut down on the number of pants i carried up that mountain she was just carrying rocks you were like the pants have gotta go i don't need i can wash them every day it's fine turn. Turn them inside out. It's fine. Jeez.

Yeah. At least two wears out of a pair of pants. Yeah. Anyway. That's factual. Factual information. So basically, even though it was nothing related, it had still completely bizarrely like pointed them in the right direction towards this South African pathologist.

And this professor came to England and carried out a second post-mortem on Adam's remains. And this is when we're going to talk about what happened to Adam. So, you know, just be prepared. Adam's throat had been cut. All of the blood had been drained from his body. And most significantly, his first vertebra, so the one between his neck and spine, had been removed. And this is known in Africa as the Atlas bone,

named after the bone on which the mythical giant Atlas carried the world. In Muti, it's believed to be the centre of the body, where all of the nerve and blood vessels meet, and therefore where all of the power is concentrated. And obviously, as they only ever found Adam's torso, his head and arms had been removed. But they hadn't been hacked off. They had been cleanly removed, quote, by an expert butcher. To Professor Hendrick, it was clear. Mutti had come to Britain. Mutti killers tend to remove the genitals, the breasts, the placentas, arms, legs, and heads of their victims. And this is what's truly horrific. They always do this whilst the victim is still alive. Because the victim's

screams release the magic of the internal organs for the potions. And the more the victim is still alive because the victim's screams release the magic of the internal organs for the potions and the more the victim suffers the more potent the magic is we never really had a satanic panic in this country in the way that the states did but this is it this is it but no one's talking about it no one is knows it's happening and it's often children who are attacked due to a belief that they are purer than adults. The genitalia of virgins are some of the most prized ingredients. And you hear that all the time, like in fairy tales and stuff. Well, not fairy tales, like scary, like all the blood of a virgin and like all of this sort of stuff. It's such

a, that's cross-cultural, I think. Oh, 100%. The idea behind Mutti, as we understood it, and I'm sure anyone listening who knows more about this than we do, please, please, please correct us if we're wrong. But as we understand it, the idea is that practitioners believe there is only so much luck in the world and each person has a limited supply of it. So very young children have not yet used all of their luck, which can be transferred to whoever takes the medicine derived from their remains. Mutti, like voodoo, is generally completely innocent,

but it does become disturbing when the ideology is extended to the notion that human body parts can be used to heal or bestow special powers. Mutti is not just medicine, it's metaphysics. So the police now knew, thanks to Dr Hendrick, that this was a Muti killing. But what next? How would they be able to catch the people who had done this? Well, and this is when I was like, wow, this is amazing.

Adam's DNA and the mineral levels in his bones told Scotland Yard a lot about what they needed to know. Analysts were able to establish that Adam had spent his life in a hundred mile corridor in the southwest of Nigeria between Ibadan and Benin city. That's so interesting. I find that absolutely fascinating. And forensic examination of the contents of his stomach showed that Adam had been fed a muti potion of mixed bone, clay and gold. And there was more. Analysis of the pollen found in Adam's stomach

showed that he had been alive when he had come to London. It is thought that he was brought across from Northern Europe, possibly via Germany, because he was found wearing like some horrible, lurid, like orange shorts. And they had come from Germany. So they're able to like really trace where he was born how he was trafficked here and the fact that he was alive when he arrived in London. Detective Inspector Will O'Reilly who led the Adam inquiry was able to use this information

to supplement their ongoing investigations and track down a child trafficking network that was bringing children in from Africa to Europe to be sold into sexual slavery or such mutty killings. Inspector O'Reilly was convinced that Adam was a victim of child trafficking and the prime motive for his murder was to bring good fortune. So he was killed to bring his traffickers luck. 22 people were arrested for the murder of Adam and they were mostly from Benin City, just as Scotland Yard had suspected right from the start. So after that sidetrack into what is probably the most famous case, I would say, or infamous, I should say, case of ritual witchcraft abuse in this country. But let's get back to Victoria. So whilst dragging poor Victoria from pastor to

pastor, accusing her of being possessed by demons, Qual was still about that grifter life. And in November 1999, Qual, who had been trying to get a council house for months, made a rather alarming accusation. She told Lisa Arthurworry, our hapless social worker, that Manning had been sexually abusing Victoria. Whether this was true or not, we don't actually know. This is what she accuses him of. It's like she thought if Victoria was seen as high risk, she would get a house and she could, what, just move Manning in after? Her brain just makes no sense to me. Like the way she comes to conclusions, oh, well, obviously I can just say this and then this will happen and then i can just go back to the way things were of course and again how quick

is she to just disposable how quick is she to just throw people under the bus manning as well is totally disposable to her she's like how can i use you oh i can tell people that you've been sexually abusing victoria and we can get ourselves a council fat oh and also i'm like what you think that's going to make victoria high risk You've been fucking beating her black and blue and dragging her around social care and they've still not done anything. Good luck. But, you know, she was on to something because immediately as soon as she made this accusation, a meeting was called by social services. And bizarrely and stupidly, Kwa went to the meeting and took Manning with her. OK, how? So what does she do? And stupidly, Quar went to the meeting and took Manning with her.

Okay, how? So what does she do? She just walks into this meeting and she's like, he's sexually abusing her, do something about it. And he's just sitting there like, yeah, I am actually. So, Quar had the implications of this accusation explained to her. So that's potential prison time for Manning and invasive examinations for Victoria. And when Quar realised the extra attention and the danger of all of this, she withdrew the accusation. Why are they explaining the implications to her? Why are they like, oh, but are you really sure you want to do this though? Because this could mean this, this, this. If she's saying he's sexually abusing her,

do something about it. It's kind of like they've just been like, are you sure though? Because that's kind of quite a lot of paperwork for us. do you really want to do it though i'm just saying that it might be quite difficult that's what it blows my mind why are you fucking explaining anything to her it's it makes no sense makes no sense even though the accusation was withdrawn it seems insane that once again victoria was allowed to return to live with Manning but that is exactly what happened what do you even say Eve so okay let's say nothing nothing else has happened except this isolated situation where Qual has accused Manning of sexually abusing Victoria even if that claim is false that is still grounds for investigation surely it has to be you're not

going to accuse someone of sexual assault or sexual abuse of a child, of an eight-year-old child, if everything is just, like, great, you know? Absolutely. And they never got to the point of saying if it was false or not. They never investigated because it was just withdrawn. I just feel like sexual abuse is one of those things, like, you don't need to go press charges for it.

It should just be investigated on your behalf. Yeah. So, you know investigated on your behalf. Yeah. So, you know, they let her go home. But in the meantime, social workers decided they were going to put together a plan of action. And 15 actions were decided upon for Lisa Arthur-Wurry to carry out. So she tried contacting Qual to discuss what needed to happen next. But she received no reply and no action was immediately taken. Then, between December 1999 and January 2000, Lisa Arthur-Wurry would make three visits to the flat,

but each time she received no answer. She then took this to mean that no one was there. But in reality, there was a tiny, fragile, abused little girl, eight-year-old little girl, tied up in the bath on the other side of that door. So she suggested to her supervisor, Carol Baptiste, that they must have just returned to France, that the family must have just gone, even though there was zero evidence that this had happened. Nevertheless, her supervisor wrote on Victoria's file that they had left the area, basically making it no longer their issue. On the 18th of February 2000, they wrote to Qual,

so social services write to Qual saying that if they did not receive any contact from her, that they would close the case. So, good. So what you're saying is that if I don't get back to you, I don't have to be investigated for a horrible crime? Bit of a no-brainer, really, isn't it? Yeah. In that case, I think I'll just not get back to you, thanks. Like, bye? Like, what?

Yeah. I don't understand so much of this case. And during this time that Lisa Arthur-Warry was just knocking on the door and running back to social services, Victoria was weakening and the abuse was increasing. They kept her tied up, she was completely starved and the beatings were constant. A week later, on the 25th of February 2000, social services closed the case and closed the door on what was probably the last chance to save Victoria's life. And that same day, eight-year-old Victoria Climbier died. After months of abuse and torture in the middle of the biggest city in Europe,

having been in contact with social services and doctors and religious leaders, Victoria died of hypothermia, multiple organ failure and malnutrition. The ambulance crew who drove her to St Mary's described how although Quall had kept saying, my baby, my baby, her concern seemed not quite enough and that Manning seemed almost as if he weren't there. Victoria had 128 injuries all over her body. Not one part of her had been spared. The Home Office pathologist who later examined her corpse described the case as the worst case of child abuse he had ever seen. Quar was arrested on the day that Victoria died. Manning was arrested the following day. Quall continued to deny the charges, telling police, it's terrible. I've just lost my child. Everything about her still thinks that she

can manipulate this situation. On the 20th of November 2000 at the Old Bailey, the trial into Victoria's death was opened. Quall denied all charges, but Manning pleaded guilty to charges of cruelty and manslaughter. How he's getting off with manslaughter is beyond me. The court heard about the horrendous abuse Victoria had suffered and listened as Manning's disgusting diary was read out and he repeatedly described Victoria as Satan. This diary was damning evidence. Manning had gone on to write in the book that no matter how hard he hit Victoria, she'd never cry or show signs that she was hurt. And this, to him, bolstered the idea that she was not a child, but a demon. Quick question, if you are murdering people slowly over periods of years, why are you keeping a diary about it? Like he has to be...

He's not okay. And I wonder, like I did think this, like why is you keeping a diary about it like he has to be he's not okay and i wonder like i did think this like why is he keeping a fucking diary but as you read it yeah i mean he thinks maybe that he's beating the devil out of victoria and maybe he thinks he needs to keep like a record of this genuinely he wrote things no matter how hard i hit her today she didn't cry he catalogued the abuse that he carried out against her. Like it was a fucking experiment. Like someone was going to read it and be like, oh, this is how you get rid of a demon. Yeah. Wow. On the 12th of January 2001, both Quall and Manning were found guilty and sentenced to life. The judge's closing remarks

to the pair were what Victoria endured was truly unimaginable. She died at both of your hands, And Victoria's death led to a national and public inquiry. The findings were that this was a gross failure of the system rather than failings of individual staff. You basically see that every single time. They close ranks, they will just say this was a failing of the system, this isn't down to one person. Yes, but also all of you that were involved should be fucking held accountable for what you did if we didn't do our jobs properly no child is gonna die but we would be held responsible yeah absolutely after this happened harringay's child protection services the child protection services that was responsible for victoria was put into special measures but But sadly, this is the local authority under which Baby P,

the other very, very incredibly notorious case of child abuse in this country, would die seven years later in 2007. So how much really fucking changed? It's the same council. Yeah, same council. And the thing with the Baby P case, if you're not British, you might not have heard of it, but it's incredibly famous. Very similar case, it's just repetitive failings of the system in exactly the same way that happened to victoria so being put into special

measures didn't change jack shit didn't change shit same mistakes seven years later absolutely and one of the things that lisa arthur worry comes out and says is that she was incredibly overwhelmed she was incredibly inexperienced she had too many cases on her plate and with the baby p case i've read the um serious case review that came out of Baby P. And one of the key things that came out of that was that the social worker that was put in charge of Baby P that missed all of the signs had double the number of cases that she should have been assigned. So yes, you can blame these individual social workers. But if you gave me twice the amount of work to do in the same amount of time that I was capable of doing, of course all of it would be shitly done. Yeah,

of course. And this is the problem. So they were put into special measures and absolutely nothing changed. But Victoria's case did, however, lead to dramatic changes to child protection policy in this country. The government published a green paper entitled Every Child Matters and consequently passed the Children Act 2004. The purpose was to improve multi-agency working. So basically make sure that information was collected, logged robustly and shared correctly between the various agencies like social care, health service, education and police, all so that they can effectively basically stop children slipping through the gaps. But this absolutely remains one of the greatest challenges and we see it time and time again in cases of child abuse. In this country now, if a child dies

from anything like this, any kind of domestic abuse, anything like this, immediately there has to be a serious case review published and it's open to the public. You can go read these. It's always the same finding, but they cannot fix it or they just don't know how. Because most serious case reviews yes absolutely cite the failure of individuals to follow up the failure of separate agencies to work together effectively and deliver that kind of joined up approach and all that happens is children fall through the gaps and ultimately end up paying with their lives and we don't learn any lessons and don't get me wrong for every child like this that does die social work and police

and schools do do an amazing job and save thousands but it's still sad that this happens it makes me think of did you hear about it might have been last year or possibly this year in hackney the little boy autistic totally non-verbal just stopped showing up to school and people went around his house but he lived in a tower block with uh like the buzzers at the door so they couldn't get past the front door. They go to the flat about three times. On the third time, I think it's about a week he hasn't been at school, they call the police.

The police break into the flat, and what had happened was his mum had had an aneurysm, died on the kitchen floor, and they found him starved to death, hugging her legs. Jesus. If they'd have got in, if they'd have got in the building, they would have saved him. So what they've done now is in Hackney, it might be London wide, I'm not sure, they have to have three contact numbers for every child. Wow. That is so sad.

Yeah, isn't it? It's heartbreaking. And this is the thing, there's no easy answer to cases like this and we understand that. And since Victoria's death, the guidelines have once again been rewritten because they recognised that it was always multi-agency working that was failing and now agencies use a piece of guidance called Working Together to Safeguard Children and the name fits exactly what needs to happen and all of these agencies do safeguard children. Like we said they work in difficult situations and the majority of them do care and are deeply committed but the problem is that cases like Victoria's just aren't quite rare enough that is the incredibly harrowing

tale of Victoria Klimbie yeah good job guys you made it you made it through it was still there you made it the last two weeks have been quite full-on in terms of like also being quite linked to like cultural sensitivity and challenges like this and stuff. Both of them were like family members doing it as well, which was very troubling. Next week. Should we tell them what we're doing next week? Yeah, we've got a curveball next week. Should we tell them what we're doing next week?

You can tell them. So next week, we are covering the case of Nathaniel Bar-Jonah. And he's a cannibal. Yeah. Full-on cannibal. And made other people do some cannibalism without their knowledge. Yeah, nothing like a bit of unknown cannibalism. Surprise cannibalism.

Surprise cannibalism. So that's going to be a very interesting one. Yeah, so make sure you join us next week. And so after Nathaniel Bar-Jonah, we have two weeks of story swaps like we did last year. So we don't know what the other person is doing for the next two weeks after that. So it's going to be all a big surprise, a big scary surprise, hopefully. I'm scared already. Me too.

It's going to be good. As usual, guys, come follow us on social media at RedHandedThePod, on Twitter, on Instagram, and on the Facebook group. And also, we haven't talked about this in a while but i was thinking about it today go check out the merch shop yeah get some merch get some sweet merch absolutely it's great and um so many of you've been buying them sharing pictures with us it's really exciting and um yeah go check that out and if you'd like to you know go even further than that and help support the show you can do so as ever at patreon.com slash redhanded. And we will see you next week for episode three of the Halloween extravaganza.

See you then. Bye bye. Harvard is the oldest and richest university in America. But when a social media-fueled fight over Harvard and its new president broke out last fall, that was no protection. Claudian Gay is now gone. We've exposed the DEI regime, and there's much more to come. This is The Harvard Plan, a special series from the Boston Globe and WNYC's On the Media.

To listen, subscribe to On the Media wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, I'm Lindsey Graham, the host of Wondery Show American Scandal. We bring to light some of the biggest controversies in U.S. history. Presidential lies, environmental disasters, corporate fraud. In our latest series, NASA embarks on an ambitious program to reinvent space exploration with the launch of its first reusable vehicle, the Space Shuttle. And in 1985, they announced they're sending teacher Krista McAuliffe into space aboard the Space Shuttle Challenger, along with six other astronauts. But less than two minutes after liftoff, the Challenger explodes. And in the tragedy's

aftermath, investigators uncover a series of preventable failures by NASA and its contractors Thank you.