By Elliott West
“Someone will believe you”.
Poppy
Introduction
Sexual abuse is a taboo subject, especially among children. Poppy has waived her right to anonymity and made the brave decision to speak out about the sexual abuse inflicted on her by her paternal grandfather. Acts that occurred since she was a toddler. This form of abuse is usually hidden with many victims continuing to live in silence. In the year up to March, there were 105,542 sexual offences recorded against children with a 57% increase in recorded offences over six years. Child sexual abuse within a family environment accounts for nearly half of these cases. Victims of child abuse are often groomed and the abuse is committed behind closed doors. The victim begins to believe that this behaviour is normal, imprisoned in the chains of fear and living in a daily hell with emotional scars that can last a lifetime.
The Emotional Journey
“I was so desperate to fight my own corner. In some ways, there was a good amount of anger behind me, so telling my side of the story was incredibly important.”
Poppy
We join Poppy on a hot Summer’s day at a busy airfield in Kent. She is here to do a sponsored skydive in aid of a charity that helped her in the aftermath of her sexual abuse. A jump that occurred four days after finishing her A-levels and a week before her 18th birthday. Poppy is carrying out the leap not just to raise money for the charity but to also show that the leap compares to the scary decision to tell someone about the abuse. In her case, she confided in her parents, Miranda and David. A decision that was made even more difficult because the abuser was David’s father John, Poppy’s grandfather.
Poppy was groomed by her grandfather and such was her shame that she even felt the need to protect him. Despite trying to have a nervous conversation about the acts inflicted on her when she was with her parents on a trip to Lego Land, aged five, it only emerged then that her grandfather was having a shower and she may have seen him naked. When David approached his father about the incident, he said that Poppy must have seen him changing and promised that it wouldn’t happen again. The abuse stopped after that but as Poppy grew up so her anxiety increased. When the full extent of the abuse was eventually fully revealed by the 11-year-old Poppy, David reported his father to the police.
John raped his granddaughter on multiple occasions but despite being interviewed by the police, never admitted what he had done. A man who abused Poppy and then pretended nothing had happened by having a cosy chat and cup of tea with her parents. It took 18 months for the case to go to trial and during it, Poppy’s recorded statement was played in the courtroom. A courageous act for a 13-year-old girl. A statement that the judge describes as “ heart-rendering” and “utterly compelling”. Even to the end, John said Poppy had been making it up and described it as “quite absurd”.
In 2018 John was sentenced to 13-and-a-half years in prison but died in prison in 2022. A hidden crime that he never really was fully punished for, especially as he never admitted that he was guilty. Despite this horrific ordeal, Poppy has managed to rebuild her life and has raised a staggering £70,000 to date for a helpline that supports abuse survivors.
