Derbyshire Investigation: Award
2 August 2011, 06:20 | Updated: 30 March 2016, 13:50
A police team who worked on one of the UK's biggest child exploitation cases want an award nomination for their work to highlight the issue even further.
Operation Retriever was the biggest child abuse investigation Derbyshire Police has dealt with. It focussed on the sexual exploitation of girls in Derby.
Nine men were found guilty of 32 offences ranging from rape to drug offences and they were jailed from 18 months to 22 years. The two ringleaders got indeterminate sentences.
Highlighting Child Exploitation
Detective Chief Inspector Sean Dawson has been telling Capital he wants the nomination to highlight the issue of child exploitation:
"It was quite a traumatic experience at times, the levels of offending that we uncovered, that we found out about, really did get under your skin.
"It was quite upsetting at times.
"What's important here for me and I'm sure it's the same for everyone on this investigation, is this is again another opportunity to increase the profile around these vulnerable children who are being sexually exploited by people who abuse them."
The Operation Retriever team is one of five shortlisted from forces across the UK.
The public are being asked to vote for the team they think has had the biggest impact on their local community.
