Growing up in a quiet, middle-class suburb outside of Amsterdam, childhood best friends Anna and Olivia had their whole lives ahead of them. But every parent's worst nightmare came true when the teenagers fell in with the wrong crowd. Eleven years their senior, Ricardo was charming and good-looking - and Anna and Olivia easy prey. Blind to his grooming, the girls were soon trapped in a terrifying cycle of sexual and physical abuse.But their nightmare was only just beginning.

Growing up in a quiet, middle-class suburb outside of Amsterdam, childhood best friends Anna and Olivia had their whole lives ahead of them. But every parent's worst nightmare came true when the teenagers fell in with the wrong crowd. Eleven years their senior, Ryan was charming and good-looking - and Anna and Oliva easy prey. Blind to his grooming, the girls were soon trapped in a terrifying cycle of sexual and physical abuse.But their nightmare was only just beginning.Tra...

By the age of thirteen, vulnerable Sheffield teenager Samantha Owens had fallen through the cracks in the care system. Bounced around numerous foster carers after her home life became too chaotic, Samantha thought she had found a friend in the streetwise Amanda Spencer. The older girl bought her clothes, styled her hair and found her places to stay. Samantha's welfare was the last thing on Spencer's mind, however, as in reality she was grooming the young girl for exploitation of the worst ...

When Zoe was taken into care at the age of 13, she thought she was finally going to escape from the cruel abuse she had suffered throughout her childhood. Then social services placed her in a residential unit known to be 'a target for prostitution', and suddenly Zoe's life was worse than it had ever been before.Abused and ostracized by her mother, humiliated by her father’s sexual innuendos, physically assaulted and bullied by her eldest brother, even as a young child Zoe thought s...

Stephen Smith is the boy who did not exist.Born out of wedlock in the early 1960s, Steve's parents hid him away from the world by locking him in the cellar...for thirteen years.Starved and beaten, the little boy's world was a darkened room that measured just eight feet by ten with a single makeshift bed, bare light bulb, and a solitary table. Steve would spend his days conjuring up an imaginary world full of monsters he would draw to try an...

‘Asperger’s made me a prisoner in my own home. When I finally entered the real world, evil was waiting.’A shocking true account of one girl’s harrowing journey to survival.Sophie Crockett spent most of her childhood suffering from crippling anxiety. Diagnosed with Asperger’s syndrome, she became a virtual prisoner in her own home, afraid to venture outside. After battling with depression, eating disorders and self-harm, Sophie had the courage to re...

From the age of 14, Caitlin was completely controlled, repeatedly raped, provided with alcohol, given drugs, sold and passed on to new gangs over and over again. The majority of her abusers were Pakistani men, who were blatant in their attacks upon her, often collecting her from school or home, to be taken to flats they owned, family homes, or hotels booked for the day, to be horrifically and systematically abused.At a time when the abuse ring realities of young white women in Roth...

‘Each time my mother laid a finger on me… it was another step into the jaws of hell. Her abuse, more so than any other, destroyed me. It was the ultimate betrayal.’Abused from the age of eight by her older brother and then her step-father, Maureen Wood quickly became numb to the constant suffering. But Maureen’s world crumbled when her own mother started to abuse her too…A Family Secret is the harrowing true story of how one little girl survived sickening ...

'1st November 2003 started so unremarkably that I wish I had appreciated the normality of it. Because I would never, ever know peace again.'Charlene Downes was 14 when she went missing in Blackpool's seedy underbelly. Once a happy-go-lucky schoolgirl, she had become a truant - hanging out with the wrong crowd by the takeaway shops and pier. But Charlene's mum, Karen, always knew her typical teenage daughter would come home.Until one day she didn't....

It's okay, lovely,' I soothed. 'You let it all out.' She sobbed and sobbed as all the fear came tumbling to the surface.Foster carer Maggie Hartley is finally enjoying a well-earned holiday from fostering, savouring time with her brand new baby granddaughter. One night, though, the peace and quiet is interrupted by an urgent call from Social Services. A man has been stabbed, and Social Services need to find an emergency placement for his little...

'My heart felt heavy with sadness for these two little girls.'Foster carer Maggie Hartley is used to all manner of children arriving on her doorstep, but nothing can prepare her for sisters Billy and Bo when they arrive at her home. It is clear from the moment she sets eyes on them four-year-old Bo and seven-year-old Billy have clearly been subjected to unimaginable neglect, and it takes all of Maggie's skills as a foster carer to try to connect with the volatile little girls, wh...

You're not going home. You're not going anywhere. You're mine now.Growing up in a deeply troubled family, fifteen-year-old Anna felt lost and alone in the world. So when a friendly taxi driver befriended her, Anna welcomed the attention, and agreed to go home with him to meet his family. She wouldn't escape for over a decade.Held captive by a sadistic pedophile, Anna was subjected to despicable levels of sexual abuse and torture. The unrelenting violence and degrad...