Abuse appeal hears evidence refuted

Social workers who interviewed children during the West Wales
child abuse case were motivated by ‘therapeutic’ rather than
investigative intentions, the Court of Appeal has been told.

The evidence of Dyfed social and project workers should not have
been admitted at the original trial of six men in Swansea last
year, the court heard.

Barrister Patrick Eccles, who is representing a man sentenced at
the trial to 15 years in prison for gross indecency and plotting to
commit indecent assaults, said the decision to admit the evidence
breeched guidelines introduced in the wake of the Cleveland child
abuse inquiry, and was unfair.

The six men are appealing against their convictions. They were
jailed for a total of 44 years for a variety of sexual
offences.

They claimed that the allegations made by the children were a
mixture of fantasy and fiction.

The appeal in London is expected to last another two weeks.