Broken and Betrayed

The True Story of the Rotherham Abuse Scandal by the Woman Who Fought to Expose It

For fourteen years, Jayne Senior tried to help girls from Rotherham who had been groomed, raped, tortured, pimped and threatened with violence by sex traffickers. As the manager of Risky Business, which was set up to work with vulnerable teens, she heard heartbreaking and shocking stories of abuse and assiduously kept notes and details of the perpetrators, passing information on to the authorities in the belief that they would do something. Eventually, when she lost hope that the authorities would take action against the gangs she had identified as the abusers, she became a whistleblower for The Times investigative reporter Andrew Norfolk.

Now, in her powerful memoir, she describes a life spent working to protect Rotherham’s girls, the pressure put on her to stop rocking the boat, and why she risked prison in the hope that she could help end the appalling child exploitation in the town.

Senior tells her story in a refreshingly down-to-earth style, the heartfelt details of her family’s joys and tribulations acting as a strangely moving counterpoint to the horrors perpetrated on the girls she was trying to save. It adds up to a compulsive read.

Bel Mooney, the Daily Mail.

One Friday evening I made the decision to find a ghost writer and discuss the possibility of writing a book; not a book that was full of drama and scandal but a book that would be read and people would recognise risks to children, act on those gut instincts, scrutinise their own practice and ask the question if its not good enough for my child its not good enough.

“I met with Tom Henry and immediately realised he was the person I wanted to take my words and put onto paper some of those horrifying stories of abuse and failure and create a journey that others could follow. Tom spent hours listening to my story, the stories of some of those abused and failed, read hundreds of documents and took the readers on a journey of tears, laughter, shock and more importantly an awareness and knowledge that this could be any town and anybody’s child.

“When it became difficult for me to continue Tom recognised those feelings and helped me get through it, for that I thank Tom for not judging, rushing, but for walking back through those horrific 12 years by my side and one step at a time.

Author of “Broken and Betrayed”