High-placed pedophiles...?

We have yet another allegation of a VIP pedophile ring in the UK.

This must be the touchiest subject matter imaginable, because the very thought of pedophilia makes most people feel sick. Worse, any attempt to investigate the possibility of a protected pedophile ring -- a ring run by and for powerful people -- can induce another sort of sickness: Paranoia. That's what happened to an acquaintance of mine recently: A investigative writer, one of the more level-headed people I know, started to investigate a missing child case, and now he's jumping at shadows.

Can we blame him? This is icky, scary stuff, and it'll get to you if you're not ultra-careful.

To prove the point, run your eyeballs over the following account in the UK's Mirror. The operation discussed here has no connection to the case referenced above (at least, no connection that I know about). But if the following doesn't give you the parapolitical heebie-jeebies, your heart, brain and soul must be made of concrete.

Paedophile politicians at Westminster murdered young boys at sex orgies, say two former Scotland Yard detectives, writes Mark Conrad and Keir Mudie in the Sunday People.

The retired officers who first investigated the allegations more than 30 years ago have provided explosive testimony to the Yard’s new probe.

The pair have made written statements to the Met Police about the VIP network which they claim was known as The Untouchables because they were too powerful to bring to justice.

It is believed the ex-cops – one of them Special Branch – told the current inquiry that they were ­ordered NOT to investigate the group.

Their dramatic new evidence appears to corroborate claims by a victim known as Nick that he witnessed a young boy being ­murdered by an MP.

Here's the Sunday story about that alleged killing:

Today the Sunday People and Exaro investigations agency expose the full extent of shocking events the witness, known as Nick, has described to the Metropolitan Police paedophile unit.

Nick claims the first death was of a boy aged ten or 11 who was ­deliberately run down by a car.

Another chilling allegation is that he was in the same room in the 1980s when a 12-year-old boy was strangled by a Tory MP.

Nick said: “I watched while that happened. I am not sure how I got out of that. Whether I will ever know why I survived, I am not sure.”

Eighteen months later, he claims a third boy was killed by two unknown men in front of another MP.

Nick told of his terror as he and the strangling victim were driven to an orgy.

In a follow-up story, we learn that the ring operated out of Dolphin Square, a block of luxury apartments for MPs and others of that ilk.

I'd like to think that Nick is a fantasist. Maybe he is. Maybe the cops will one day regret taking his claims seriously.

Still, we've encountered allegations of this sort before, in both the UK and the US.

In the past, I've urged caution in assessing pedophilia charges. For example, In the great contretemps between Woody Allen and Mia Farrow, I favor Allen's side, mostly because I don't have much faith in Mia Farrow's credibility (for reasons given here). Of course, a he-said, she-said dispute between a famous couple is very different from the kind of charges now being investigated by Scotland Yard.

A more relevant example would be the Kincora case, which I wrote about here.

These allegations were first aired around 1980, when a man named Colin Wallace helped to expose the abuses at the Kincora boys home in Belfast. Shortly thereafter, Wallace was framed for a murder he did not commit; although he was convicted, he was ultimately cleared of the crime. This horrifying story -- too complex to detail here -- is well-known in the U.K. and Ireland, yet remains untold in this country. Interested readers should seek out the excellent book Who Framed Colin Wallace?

That's a damned fine book, and I wish someone would either re-issue it properly or put an unsanctioned version online (or at least get more copies circulating in the US library system), because one way or the other, that work deserves to be read. Incidentally, Colin Wallace has been completely exonerated by the UK courts and has received respectful treatment in a BBC interview.

This next bit is also relevant...

Over 100 files pertinent to high-level child abuse have gone missing:

One of Britain's most senior civil servants said on Tuesday he did not know who, if anyone, had authorised the removal of over 100 missing government files that could shed light on allegations that well-known politicians abused children in the 1980s.

The disclosure, by Mark Sedwill, the top civil servant in Britain's Home Office (interior ministry), is likely to fuel a media furore in Britain over the allegations, which have not yet been substantiated.

Child protection campaigners have said that at least 10 and possibly more than 20 public figures, including current and former politicians, should be investigated over allegations that they abused young children.

The "Nick" accusations made above may relate to a series of allegations which gave rise to this 2012 post:

There's a politically-tinged sex abuse case case brewing in the U.K. No, I'm not talking about entertainer Jimmy Saville. A man named Steven Messham claims that years ago, when he was growing up in a Welsh children's home, he was "rented" out to a senior Tory political figure who became quite familiar to the British public during the Thatcher era. Apparently, the pedophile ring also supplied children to other British VIPs.

Normally, I would take a somewhat cautious attitude toward Messham's claims. However:

During the 1970s and 1980s almost 40 children’s homes in North Wales were the scene of horrific child abuse in which youngsters were raped and abused by the very people who were paid to look after them.

In the early 1990s, allegations of the abuse started to surface and in March 1994 Clwyd County Council commissioned an independent inquiry into claims of widespread abuse across North Wales.

Professor Jane Tunstill, who was on that inquiry panel told the BBC in 2000 that along with a ‘litany of abusive practices going on in the home on the part of the care staff’ there were rumours that people outside the care system were also involved in the abuse.

However, the inquiry’s report was never published and the copies were pulped to ensure that the local authority was able to maintain its insurance cover.

That post engendered some very heated commentary from readers on the other side of the pond. In the end, I was not able to determine who was telling the truth.