THE only Scottish victim of a notorious borstal rapist is urging the UK Government not to drag its heels over an inquiry into the horrendous catalogue of abuse at the detention centre.
John McCabe, from East Kilbride, was raped every night for almost six months by Neville Husband, a senior prison guard at Medomsley Detention Centre in County Durham during the 1970s and 80s.
Mr McCabe, 48, gave up his anonymity to pursue justice for himself and others whose abuse was not taken into account by a criminal trial which saw Husband jailed for 10 years.
He was released in 2009 and died a year later. Mr McCabe was also raped by another man, under Husband's supervision, while a woman looked on.
With the support of Michael McCann, MP for East Kilbride, Mr McCabe is demanding an inquiry.
When the Ministry of Justice (MOJ) was asked to comment after Mr McCann called on Justice Secretary Ken Clarke and Prime Minister David Cameron to launch an inquiry, an MOJ spokeswoman replied: "It would be inappropriate to comment while there is ongoing litigation."
The litigation refers to a compensation case by Husband's victims.
Mr McCabe said: "I'm not surprised they are hiding behind a reply of 'no comment'. All the victims want is for the police and Government to stop covering it up and apologise."
Mr McCann said: "I find the statement from the Ministry of Justice offensive and grossly insensitive. I have written to the Justice Secretary Ken Clarke and I have made a formal request that a full inquiry must take place."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article