One victim described her abusers as ‘monsters’
The leader of a Bolton grooming gang who raped and sexually assaulted vulnerable under-age girls has been jailed for 15 years. Ashley Darbyshire admitted a string of 19 offences involving five girls – including one of raping a naked 15-year-old girl after tying her up and before another defendant also raped her.
Darbyshire, now 28, who had a specific sexual interest in young teenage girls, had deliberately groomed her and repeatedly sexually abused her from the age of 13. The offences largely occurred in the Blackrod area near Bolton, often in a “party house” where she was plied with alcohol, cannabis and cocaine by members of the gang who also engaged in sexual activity with her.
In a moving victim impact statement, she described her abusers as “monsters” and said that even six years after the abuse she is still haunted by the abuse.
“This is my story of how these individuals destroyed my life forever,” she said. “I thought nothing could hurt me as it did but I am still terrified of everything and everyone around me.
“I suffered every form of abuse from each of these individual and they continue to haunt me every day.
“I would rather be dead most days… I can’t even shower properly anymore because I just sit and scrub my skin till I bleed.”
“Ashley saw me as a fetish and something to play with,” she added, “but what he was playing with was my life, he ruined my life.”
She said she was a child at the time and is still dealing with the aftermath as an adult of what “these monsters did to me.”
“I have died over and over again. I was manipulated and conditioned to conform to their abuse and accept it.
“I thought it was normal. Ashley destroyed me in every way he possibly could. He took everything from me.”
The woman said that initially she thought she loved him but he knew exactly how to “work me. He had a hold over me.”
She concluded, “He saw me as a fetish and something to play with but he ruined my life.”
Derbyshire, of Bolton Road, Westhoughton, appeared in the dock at Liverpool Crown Court along with nine other defendants.
One of them had pleaded guilty to two offences of sexual activity with that girl. The other defendants were all convicted of various sex offences, including rape, after a three month trial.
Ben Lawrence, prosecuting, told how the main victim was groomed and to lessen any objections, “she was plied with alcohol, cannabis and cocaine.
“At various times she considered herself to be in relationship with a number of the defendants. However, the feeling wasn’t mutual. Defendants committed both consensual and non-consensual offences against her.
“They were, of course, content if she consented to sexual activity. However, if she didn’t consent they would do it anyway.”
He said that the defendants were part of “a malign friendship group, which sought to prey on her once it became clear that another man had been able to have sex with her repeatedly.”
The offences came to light after the complainant was involved in a car crash in 2018 and revealed what had been happening.
Jailing him Judge Simon Medland told Darbyshire, who has suffered a brain haemorrhage since the offending, said he had manipulated her to his ways.
“In time you introduced her to your friends and acquaintances and the community of drug takers, drinkers and wastrels at the Vicarage Road West address of Cory Barrett which had become a lawless den of iniquity,” he said, “a filthy hovel in which sexual offending, drug taking and drinking took place.”
He said he had groomed, cajoled and threatened the girl. “To you she was simply a sexual object, a human sexual commodity which you consumed as and when you wished to the extent that you wished.
“Your treatment of her was coldly sexualised with no hint of warmth or affection and with no thought about the fact it would have on her. You missed the imbalance of power between you arising from a significant difference in age.”The judge praised the victim for her courage and fortitude in going through the ordeal of an investigation and giving evidence in court and said it was in stark contrast with the defendants’ evidence.Mr Lawrence had told how Darbyshire met the main complainant when she was 13 and he was 19 and he abused her over a two year period.
He had previously groomed another 13-year-old after initially contacting her on Facebook and went on to rape her when she was 15.
The prosecutor said that Darbyshire also used Facebook to later contact the main complainant and asked her whether she had “ever done stuff with a lad” and kept asking her to send photos of her body.”
He pestered her into meeting him and they began having sexual activity in bushes near to Blackrod community centre. He told her ‘you’re gonna do it one day, you might as well just do it now.’
Darbyshire, who spoke of liking ‘knife play’, fostered an infatuation in the girl.
“Their messages show that she was often keen to meet him and to have sex with him. It is equally clear from their messages that he had no genuine affection for her.
“Rather, he would choose to string her along in order that she would meet him and so he could satisfy his sexual urges for young teenagers.”
By the summer of 2017, they began to have sexual intercourse – while she was in her school uniform – and their sexual relationship stopped about two months before the car crash in 2018 that led to the police getting involved.
Mr Lawrence said that on one occasion while they were having sex Darbyshire snorted cocaine off the end of a house key, brought in by a man, before continuing having sex.
On another occasion he slapped her bottom at the party house in Vicarage Road West and “joked to others ‘does anyone want to buy her’ reflecting his attitude towards her.”
On a different date while she was performing oral sex on him he held her shoulders down while another member of the group, Cory Barrett, had sex with her from behind.
The rape when he tied her up with the string from a JD sports bag was the next incident during which she was extremely scared, partially because he spoke of having a knife and liking punching people.
He took a video and photographs of her during the rape and then left and she was raped by Barrett who had refused to untie her.
On a later occasion while having sex with Darbyshire, another man, Elliott Turner, briefly joined in and she later agreed to have sex with him.
“The fact that Darbyshire was quite willing to share her with a friend of his, and even direct their sexual activity for his own convenience, shows the callous regard he had for,” said Mr Lawrence.
The next day while in a car along with Turner in Adlington Darbyshire said, ‘let me attend to may bitch’ and began insisting on sex which she eventually gave in to.
Darbyshire admitted two offences of raping the main victim and ten offences of sexual activity with her.
He also admitted raping his first victim and inciting her to engage in sexual activity; inciting another 13-year-old girl to engage in sexual activity and two offences of sexual activity with a girl, aged 15, and inciting her to engage in sexual activity.
He also pleaded guilty to making indecent images of a child involving another 15-year-old girl.
Brandon Jacob Harwood, 25, a cocaine supplier, of Queen Street, Bolton, who was convicted of attempted rape and sexual activity was jailed for ten years.
Harvie Aspen, 25, of Radcliffe, Bury who was found guilty of two counts of sexual activity with a child was
Ross Corley, of Station Road, Blackrod, who admitted two offences of sexual activity with that girl, was jailed for 28 months imprisonment.
Harvie Aspen, 25, of Radcliffe, Bury who was found guilty of two counts of sexual activity with a child was given a 15 month jail sentence suspended for two years and ordered to carry out 200 hours unpaid work.
They all have to sign on the Sex Offenders Register. The other defendants are to be sentenced tomorrow (April 29).