Rotherham police station. South Yorkshire police stresses that child sexual exploitation is now a key priority. Photograph: Will Oliver/EPA  While pressure mounts on South Yorkshire's police and crime commissioner, difficult questions remain for the force itself about how it failed up to 1,400 vulnerable children in Rotherham.  South Yorkshire police insists that the Independent Police Complaints Commission will be informed if there is any evidence that officers failed to properly investigate child sexual exploitation (CSE), or had covered up evidence.  According to Professor Alexis Jay's report, the failures of police leaders in Rotherham from 1997 to 2007 were "blatant". In recent days, victims have told the media that officers failed time and again to protect them from abuse.  Young, vulnerable women were treated with "contempt" by police, and sometimes even criminalised while their abusers walked free.  So far, not one officer has been disciplined for misconduct relating to the investigation of CSE in Rotherham in the past 17 years.  None are criticised by name in Jay's inquiry, but one of the district commanders who was in charge in Rotherham from 2006 to 2010 was defended by his new force this week.  Matt Jukes moved to South Wales to take up a post as assistant chief constable, and was later promoted to deputy chief constable.  He was backed this week by Alun Michael, police and crime commissioner for South Wales police, who said: "I am satisfied that there is no implication for South Wales in relation to DCC Matt Jukes, who has proved himself as an outstanding leader and someone who seeks to address problems upfront."  Christine Davies, who was Rotherham's district commander from 2001 to 2005, could not be reached for comment. Nor could Stephen Parry, who was chief superintendent from 2001-02. Both they and Jukes spoke to Jay's team, along with seven serving officers from South Yorkshire police and Richard Tweed, district commander 2010-12.  South Yorkshire police is at pains to stress that CSE is now a key force priority. Yet a report from Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary on Thursday criticised the South Yorkshire force for failing properly to report crimes relating to vulnerable victims between 1 November 2012 and 31 October 2013.  The force's public protection unit, which investigates child abuse, domestic violence and sex crimes, is accused by the inspectorate of spending too long trying to disprove the claims of victims rather than simply recording the potential crime and investigating afterwards. This approach "shows a disregard for victims and is unacceptable; it hides the true extent of the picture of crime from the force and is particularly concerning when the offences investigated by this unit are often of the most serious nature and victims are often the most vulnerable," said the inspectorate.  Attempts to manipulate the force's crime figures are not new. In her report, Jay said that despite key agencies in Rotherham monitoring "large numbers of children known to be involved in CSE", senior managers in police and children's social care "continued to think the extent of the problem, as described by youth workers, was exaggerated, and seemed intent on reducing the official numbers of children categorised as CSE".  As early as 1998, South Yorkshire police issued a paper entitled Protecting children who are being sexually exploited through prostitution. But Jay's inquiry found that the guidance in that report was often ignored.  "At an operational level, the police gave no priority to CSE, regarding many child victims with contempt and failing to act on their abuse as a crime," wrote Jay. She detailed how children as young as 11 were deemed by police to be having consensual sexual intercourse when in fact they were being raped and abused by adults. Their rapists were, at most, let off with police cautions, free to continue their abuse and to threaten victims' families.  Jay's team identified "very many historic cases where the operational response of the police fell far short of what could be expected." In response, the South Yorkshire force said on Wednesday that detectives were conducting a number of historic investigations that related to the period covered by the report.  Jay accused unnamed senior officers of effectively "suppressing" a report in 2002 on "runaway children" and the protection of children experiencing, or at risk of sexual exploitation. Some "senior officers disbelieved the data it contained", leading to suggestions of what Jay called "a cover-up".  One man who worked at Rotherham interchange bus station in the early 2000s told the inquiry that police refused to intervene when young girls who were thought to be victims of CSE were being beaten up and abused by perpetrators. According to him, the attitude of the police at that time seemed to be that they were all "undesirables" and that the young women were not worthy of police protection.
No officers charged over 'blatant' failures as force accused of attempting to disprove rather than report victims' allegations