Two of gang convicted of sex abuse of teens

London: A gang of "sexual predators" cruised city streets for girls as young as 12, usually white, who were then plied with drink and drugs and raped or abused.

Up to 100 "vulnerable" girls may have been groomed, abused or supplied cocaine by married fathers Abid Saddique and Mohammad Liaqat, and their friends.

A court heard the pair used Liaqat's BMW saloon to trawl for victims, pulling up alongside girls outside shops or schools and chatting them up before a "campaign of calls and texts" to groom them.

Saddique, 27, and Liaqat, 28, plied the victims "most from broken homes" with vodka and cocaine before taking them to "parties" in hotels or flats with other gang members to rape or degrade them.

When girls refused their advances they were threatened with hammers or thrown out of cars.

Saddique and Liaqat, with an arranged marriage, faced years behind bars after being found guilty of a catalogue of sexual abuse over an 18-month period.

Reporting restrictions were lifted at the end of a third and final trial into the Derby gang's activities. Seven other guilty members of the gang have already been jailed.

Police swoop

One of 26 alleged victims concerned in the gang's trials was a 14-year-old straight-A student from a middle-class home.

Meanwhile, one victim was in care, a second was with council foster parents and others were known to social services.

Questions will now be asked about whether the various agencies worked well enough together to protect the girls. The inquiry began in late 2008 when Saddique and Liaqat, both fathers-of-one, were arrested for shoplifting and two young girls were discovered with alcohol in their car.

Police swooped in April 2009 when two teenagers came out of a flat officers were watching and reported they had been raped. The surveillance teams had not known the girls were there.

After Wednesday's verdicts at Leicester Crown Court, a senior officer warned that child exploitation and abuse was a "hidden" problem nationwide.

Detective Inspector Sean Dawson, of Derbyshire Police, said: "I would appeal to parents to monitor their children's phones ... and think about if they come home smelling of alcohol or clutching gifts. These are all signs that children could be being groomed."

He said that although all of the victims were white except for three mixed-race girls and two Asians, the men were "out for whatever sex they could get" and did not care what race their victims were. The oldest victim was 18 but most were aged between 14 and 16.