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*Shakes head* Everton again.

Fugitive

By Fugitive,
in FF - Football Forum

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My dad died yesterday morning (he was 83 and had been ill). It’s very sad to see the utter hatred these cunts have now. Wall pushing gestures etc. My dad was a blue. He wouldn’t have condoned that sor

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Okay guys I’ve shit out of full nude so this will have to do....

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Section_31 Grand Master

Section_31

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"I can confirm that we have offered a friendly match at Goodison Park to Dynamo Kyiv to raise additional funds to support the Ukrainians – details of this will be made available soon."

 

 

"The half season ticket for Christmas? What is this thing?

 

"The fuck, we need rocket launchers not a B&M patio set and a copy of American Ninja 5 from Cash Converters."

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Bjornebye Grand Master

Bjornebye

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4 minutes ago, Carra_is_legend said:

Richie la has apparently informed them he wants to leave. 

 

Let the fuuuuummmmmmmmmmmeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee start. Fucking Rafa!

Apparently Chelsea are one of the clubs he’s picked as a destination. He’s crap! 

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TD_LFC Grand Master

TD_LFC

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The case of the unnamed footballer being investigated for child-sex offences

Daniel Taylor
Jun 9, 2022
 

It does not need long, heading down his pretty tree-lined road, to understand what attracted him to the area. The streets are broad and elegant, the houses opulent, the rental agreements of a level only the wealthy could afford. Big walls, imposing gates, security cameras outside and enough high-powered cars to confirm this is a footballers’ enclave.

It was here, one day last summer, when the detectives knocked on his door as part of their investigation into alleged child-sex offences involving a professional footballer.

 

These days, the footballer in question is living elsewhere in what has been described by various media outlets as a “safe house”.

He is not involved when his team-mates go for a game of golf on one of the nearby courses, or when they stop for a coffee on the way back from training. He has been moved to a secret location while the police continue their investigation into allegations he had unlawful sexual activity with a girl under 16.

 

His laptop has been taken from him. There have even been suggestions that the skylights at his new house were taped over to eliminate any risk of drones filming from above. His club, it is said, helped arrange the move.

Nobody at the club wants to talk about it, though. And, outside a very small circle, nobody has the details anyway.

 

All they can do is wait, and wait, to find out whether the police investigation will eventually result in the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) issuing criminal charges. It has, after all, been almost a year. The next date for him to answer bail — July 16 — will be 12 months exactly since the day of his arrest.

 

It has been a long and drawn-out process already and, if you are wondering why you have not read more about the player in question, it is because the legalities mean his name cannot be reported, along with any details — his age, his nationality, his club, family circumstances and so on — that could identify him as the alleged offender.

 

The reality of football is that it is exceedingly difficult for anything of this nature to remain confidential, particularly in the era of social media. But there are rules in place. Any media outlet that disregards them faces the possibility of legal action. The footballer cannot be named unless he is charged with an offence, or decides to go public himself.

What can be reported is that he has been placed on police bail on five separate occasions over the last 11 months.

 

The first time, after his arrest, was until October 19. That was first extended to January 16 and then, again, by another three days. The next extension was until April 17, and on that last occasion, the police had to make a special application to magistrates. More questions will follow next month. “He will now be asked to answer bail on Saturday, July 16, as enquiries continue,” reads a police statement.

 

At his club, meanwhile, they are trying their best to carry on as normal and keep everything away from the rest of the players as much as they can.

The news broke last summer during pre-season and the players were brought together for a meeting in which they were told what was being alleged. Although the specifics of the case were not explained, many were shaken by what they heard. The first they knew was when their team-mate failed to show for training on the Friday morning he was arrested.

Footballers tend to be a resilient bunch but, according to people with knowledge of this situation, this has been one occasion when they have found it hard to know how to react. Few mention it but they all know that, at some point, it will be big news again.

 

The club’s player-liaison department helped find the footballer a new place to live, away from the photographers and other media who had pinned down his existing address. Staff knew he could not stay in a hotel while something this serious was hanging over him.

 

No club, however, is fully prepared for this kind of issue and perhaps it was inevitable there would be some difficult moments when his employers quickly had to learn about crisis management.

 

One player was horrified to find people wrongly speculating on the internet about him being the alleged offender.

 

Inside the club, there were discussions in the first few weeks about whether or not it was appropriate to post photographs of their players laughing or smiling during training sessions. Nobody wanted to be seen as insensitive, bearing in mind the seriousness of what was being alleged.

 

Nor was it the smartest move for one player to “like” a post from one of Twitter’s many amateur detectives who was pointing an accusatory finger at one of his team-mates.

 

The club took legal advice and the gist of it was to say as little as possible, pull down the shutters and not be drawn into any speculation or off-the-record briefings.

 

The case was deemed too important, too sensitive, for the club to be providing updates.

 

Journalists do not tend to ask about it at news conferences because they know there is nothing more the club is willing to say, and nothing that can be reported anyway. It is a police investigation, not a club one, and there is not much the club can do other than let the relevant people get on with it.

That has taken nearly a year so far — a full season, in football terms — and it is also worth keeping in mind that if the CPS does press charges, it could be a long time yet before it is settled in court. 

 

Just consider the delays surrounding Ryan Giggs’ trial over allegations that the Wales national team manager — not involved when they qualified for the World Cup at the weekend — assaulted his former partner and used controlling or coercive behaviour towards her over a three-year period.

Giggs, who denies the offences, was charged in April 2021 and initially given a trial date for January this year. Then, a few days before the case was due to begin, the most decorated player in Manchester United’s history found out it was being put back by seven months because there was no courtroom available.

 

The judge said she was aware of the “upset and uncertainty“ the decision would cause. “Unfortunately, due to the large backlog of cases for trial, which has been exacerbated by the pandemic, this is a daily reality for the criminal courts,” she added.

 

In the case of Benjamin Mendy, the Manchester City player will stand trial at Chester crown court in July, 20 months after he was arrested. Mendy is charged with eight counts of rape, one of sexual assault and one of attempted rape, relating to seven young women.

Then consider how long it took for Tyrrell Robinson’s case to reach its conclusion before he was sent to prison on a charge of having sexual activity with a girl of 14.

 

Robinson was arrested in Bradford City’s changing room before they played a Carabao Cup tie at Macclesfield Town in August 2018. Yet it was not until January 2021 — almost two and a half years later — that the former Arsenal trainee learned his punishment. He was sentenced to three and a half years.

Every case is different, of course, and there is no real formula to understand when everything might come to a head in the case of the unnamed footballer. Legal experts, however, make the point that a lot of cases in COVID-19 times have taken longer to go through the system because of stretched resources and a backlog in the courts.

 

A parallel can be drawn, perhaps, with the case of Adam Johnson, then at Sunderland, who was sentenced in 2016 to six years in prison for having sexual activity with a girl of 15. Johnson, a former England international who also had spells at Manchester City and Middlesbrough, was charged within a month of his arrest. The entire case was concluded within a year.

“The delay by the criminal justice system to investigate crimes is of concern to all involved, whether that be complainants or defendants,” says Dino Nocivelli, a partner at Leigh Day solicitors who specialises in cases of alleged abuse. “Sadly, this is becoming an increasingly common and worsening problem.”

 

Plainly, this is a difficult issue when, on the one hand, everyone would agree that allegations of this nature have to be investigated properly. On the other hand, it suits nobody for a case to drag on this way.

Nocivelli speaks from experience as one of the solicitors who represented victims of Barry Bennell, the paedophile coach who is serving a 36-year prison sentence for abusing boys in the junior systems at Crewe Alexandra and Manchester City in the 1980s and 1990s.

 

Bennell’s last criminal case took so long to go through the system that several complainants dropped out because they found it so stressful. One detective explained that it was a lack of manpower at a time when they were also dealing with an unusually high number of murder cases.

“I believe that justice delayed is often justice denied,” Nocivelli says. “The impact on alleged victims can be very damaging. It means they cannot obtain the full therapy they need. They cannot try to move forward with their lives while a (potential) court case hangs over them and their wait for justice and closure continues. I appreciate that this delay can also affect defendants as well.”

 

In the meantime, the unnamed footballer’s profile is still on his club’s website and he is still being paid as normal.

Another intriguing side issue relates to whether he’ll still be under contract to his club if — and it is still only “if” at this stage — he is charged and the matter goes to court.

 

If his deal expires before then, it seems almost implausible that his current employers would give him a new one.

Would another club take him on? Most people would think that unlikely, in the extreme, for as long as he is under investigation.

Though don’t forget that in 2010, Bradford signed a player, Gavin Grant, who was facing a murder trial.

 

Millwall had previously used Grant, as did non-League Grays Athletic, while he was charged with conspiracy to commit murder relating to a separate gangland killing.

 

Grant, who played with an ankle tag, is now serving 25 years.

His story is a reminder, perhaps, that football does not always operate in the same way as other industries.

 

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