Outcry as council seeks to make man who faced child abuse trial a family guardian

David (not his real name) and his wife have been foster carers for the children for the past few years, after they were taken from their mother. The couple were chosen by the council because they were known to the family.

A decade ago, David was put on trial after being accused by a woman of indecently assaulting and raping her from the age of 12. He was found not guilty on all counts.

However, campaigners and the police have raised concerns about him being allowed to foster the children and the prospect of him becoming their guardian, regardless of the fact he was not convicted. A decision will be made about whether to give him permanent guardianship at a family court hearingnext month.

The case has raised alarm bells about Herefordshire council’s handling of child safeguarding. In 2022, the council’s children’s services were given the lowest rating of inadequate by Ofsted, with the inspection report saying the council was not keeping children safe from harm.

Eleanor Brazil, the commissioner appointed to monitor the council’s improvement, reported in December that “there has been some positive progress, although too little to make the degree of change needed”.

Campaigners say the case involving David is proof the council can’t be left to reform itself. Two members of the committee which scrutinises Herefordshire’s children’s services have resigned in protest at the inability to hold officials to account.

Sam Pratley, chief executive of the diocese of Hereford, who left in January after five years on the committee, said he had been “horrified” by some families’ concerns. In his resignation letter, he said he was “absolutely sick” of the way the scrutiny committee operated.

Luke Clements, Cerebra professor of law and social justice at Leeds University, who lives in Hereford, said: “As with other failing councils, there is a bunker mentality here. The council has just stopped listening to families. When they make a mistake they double down.”

Campaigners argue that the fact that the Crown Prosecution Service considered the evidence against David compelling enough to bring to court means the council is taking an unacceptable risk in placing vulnerable children with him. In 2015, one in four rape cases involving a child victim resulted in prosecution.

Terry James, leader of the Liberal Democrats in Herefordshire, said placing the children with David made him very uncomfortable. “When you are dealing with children you’ve got to be extra cautious,” he said.

Families Alliance for Change (FAC), a local group of parents pushing for urgent reform of children’s services in Herefordshire, claim the initial foster placement with David and his wife was done in a rush. When the children were initially placed with David, it was a time of crisis for the council. Shortly beforehand, family court judge Michael Keehan had published a judgment concluding that Herefordshire had “utterly failed” a family of four children they placed in foster care over many years, ignoring external advice. “In the whole of my professional life I have rarely encountered such egregious and long-standing failures of a local authority,” he said.

In 2022, a BBC Panorama investigation found a number of cases where the council had separated families. Herefordshire issued an apology for its “very serious failings”. Around this time, the mother of the children who are now in David’s care was given two hours’ notice, while she was at work, of a court hearing in which the council sought to take them away from her. Hannah Currie, a spokesperson for the campaign group FAC, said this kind of last-minute bombshell is known locally as “the Hereford way”.

The children were collected from school and taken to stay with David and his wife. An initial safety plan stipulated that David would “not undertake any personal care for the children and will not be left alone with them at any time”.

However, extracts of a second care plan, written in 2022 after the judge had agreed a temporary foster placement with David and his wife show David was permitted to take the children back to their bedrooms at night.

FAC believes the foster review panel “was not informed about the full scale and gravity of the historic charges”.

Ellie (not her real name), the woman who accused David in court of raping and abusing her from the age of 12, said: “I am powerless to stop this as they won’t listen.”

Ellie said she has tried numerous times to raise her concerns with the council. “Social services are saying that when he is a permanent guardian they will no longer be involved. That terrifies me.”

She said she did not feel able to press charges against David until she was an adult, so the case came to court years after her alleged abuse, with no medical evidence. She says she recalls the defence barrister showing the jury a photograph of her smiling as a teenager and asking if she looked like she was being abused, during cross-examination.

Earlier this month, she saw David walking down the street with the children. “He was holding [one child’s] hand at the traffic lights. I was nearly sick in my car. I am so worried.”

The Observer has also seen emails which show that West Mercia police, which originally investigated and charged David with child abuse, were not consulted by the council about using him as a foster carer.

The half-page plan, which took more than four months for the council to produce, focused on giving the children opportunities to raise any concerns with social workers or staff at school. It also said the children would undertake “keep safe and healthy relationship work” with their social worker, who would also support the children “to create their own safety plans”. Currie described this as “ludicrously inadequate”, pointing out that, at that point, one of the children couldn’t yet read or write.

When the police were sent a copy of the plan they made a second safeguarding referral to their own Protecting Vulnerable People unit.

Clements, who has called for a public inquiry into Herefordshire’s children’s services, described the outlook as “seriously bleak”.

“The reality is there isn’t that much you can do once a council falls into this level of incompetence and lack of accountability,” he said.

Deborah McMillan, the new government-appointed commissioner for Herefordshire’s children’s services, responded to an FAC open letter on about David’s case saying the current director of children’s services “has reviewed the case extensively”.and “the routes to raise the issue have been used to a full extent.”

The council declined to comment on the case because it is subject to live court action. However, a spokesperson said: “We received feedback from over 100 families with recent experience in 2024-25. 80% reported being well supported and having their voices heard.”

She added: “The improvement journey of Herefordshire children’s services is monitored through the multi-agency improvement board, supported by regular Ofsted monitoring visits and with independent scrutiny by the Department for Education commissioner and safeguarding partnership scrutineer.”

Photographs by Alamy