Celtic face threat of multimillion pound compensation claim(The Times)

Here's hoping for justice for the victims and their families. Hoping but have no faith whatsoever in the justice and legal system in this country.Especially with an absolutely hopeless or even worse unqualified clown as minister of justice. Just cannot have any trust in this man doing his job. Maybe he'll be resigning soon.
 
In the current climate of the easily offended and social outrage WOKE generation, if this gets enough attention on all media platforms, then I believe the tim image can be fucked for a long long time, so for once I hope the self righteous high horse riding keyboard warriors do what they do best, which is to just be a complete fanny on social media but focus the aim at the tims, the club and their fans
 
BN94 said:
There is more media taking interest. We have been contacted by others also. There will be more to come.
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Some of them have serious questions to answer as they have known more than the general public and have said nothing.
That is being complicit in the abuse that has been covered up for decades.
Guilty by omission.
Scottish journalists know, and yet they stay silent.
Complicit in the cover up.
 
sydneybear said:
From the Guardian online Australian edition this morning.


Child abuse victims to sue Celtic FC in landmark case
Civil action claims Scottish club failed to protect them from paedophiles working around Celtic Boys’ Club

Henry McDonald



A view of the Jock Stein statue outside Celtic Park. Photograph: Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images

Victims of a number of paedophiles are to sue Celtic football club in a ground-breaking civil action amidst claims it failed to protect them from sex abusers working around Celtic Boys’ Club.
Three victim-survivors aim to use a civil trial to “knock down the defence wall” they say Celtic has erected in order to distance itself from the Boys’ Club, the Guardian has learnt.
The Glasgow-based team insist that Celtic Boys’ Club is a separate legal entity – a claim that those abused at the latter say only compounds the decades of hurt they have endured. The new Scottish Premiership champions have repeatedly made this claim in the Scottish media.
The victim-survivors hope their case will also shine light on the role played by a senior Celtic executive when one paedophile returned to the Boys’ Club after he had been allegedly sacked from it in 1974 by Jock Stein, the Glasgow side’s legendary European Cup winning manager.
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A Guardian investigation has also uncovered allegations of threats, intimidation, vandalism and social media attacks on the family of one victim of the Celtic Boys’ Club abusers. There is no suggestion these incidents are linked to anyone connected to Celtic FC or the Boys’ Club.
Several victim-survivors have criticised the Scottish government for failing to set up an independent public inquiry into the abuse scandal that has shaken Celtic and Scottish football.
A Scottish government spokesperson said it has already established a wide ranging review into child abuse across Scotland.
“The Scottish government, having listened to the views of survivors, established one of the widest ranging public inquiries that Scotland has ever seen, into the abuse of children in care, focusing on the systemic institutional failures which saw many of our most vulnerable children, including those in the care of the state, abused by the very individuals who were there to care for them. We want that inquiry to be able to undertake its work in a timescale that can address the issues raised by survivors, many of whom are elderly,” it said.
Patrick McGuire, one of the lawyers for the 21 victim-survivors, describes Celtic’s argument that it was and is a separate legal entity from the Boys’ Club and is therefore not corporately responsible for the paedophiles crimes as “absolute nonsense.”
McGuire, a senior partner in Glasgow law firm Thompsons which is taking the civil action later this year on behalf of the victim-survivors, said:
“There is loads of evidence of scouts at Celtic finding young stars and telling them the route into the parent club is first to join the Boys’ Club.
“We have a copy of ‘Celtic View’ (the club’s official newspaper) which talks about the players of that week going from the senior team best player all the way down to the Boys’ Club. Their in-house newspaper talks about the Boys’ Club being ‘part of the Celtic family’ and Davy Hay, a former manager, described the youth side as the ‘base of the pyramid’ of the entire club.”
The abusers connected with Celtic Boys’ include multi-millionaire businessman James Torbett who helped set up the club in the late 1960s. He was sentenced for six years in November 2018 after the trial judge said he “used the club as a front for child sexual abuse.” Torbett was also jailed in 1998 for abusing young players between 1967 and 1974.
Another prominent management figure in Celtic Boys’ Club was the team’s former kitman Jim McCafferty. Last year the 73-year-old was found guilty of 12 sex abuse charges in relation to ten boys. McCafferty’s crimes stretched from 1972 to 1996. He was sentenced to six years and nine months in prison after admitting to all 12 charges.
At the time of his conviction in May 2019 McCafferty was already serving a prison sentence for the sexual abuse of a boy in Belfast. Four out of his 12 victims played for the Boys’ Club but others included boys from other football youth teams he ran in North Lanarkshire.
Several of these men’s victims went on to become senior professional players at Celtic, other Scottish premier league teams and for Scotland.
One of Torbett’s victims who has spoken out, David Gordon, says Celtic’s position that it was and remains a separate legal entity flies in the face of facts.
“We trained at Barrowfield (their training centre) and we actually played at Parkhead. I remember running out there as a 14-year-old in the hooped jersey before a Celtic v Rangers game in front of an 80,000 plus crowd. I remember we even swopped jerseys with a young Rangers kid on the pitch. Was I playing for a separate legal entity back then? They even used to get us at the Boys’ Club to sell the programmes during big matches.”
Families who have spoken out in favour of the civil action against Celtic have received physical and on-line threats over recent months.
Michelle Gray’s late brother Andrew revealed before he died in Australia that Torbett had sexually abused him when the paedophile was allowed back into the club in the mid 1980s. Michelle Gray and her mother Helene say the threats started when they attended Torbett’s second trial in 2018.
“One big man among Torbett’s supporters outside the court room even said out loud that my mother and me were ‘dirty lying bastards.’ This was in October 2018,” she recalls.
“This was his second conviction and there were still people turning up to support Torbett.”
Michelle Gray says she heard one of them say that Andy was also a ‘dirty lying bastard’ even though her brother was already dead.
Even after Torbett’s second conviction the Gray family say the online torment, social ostracisation and even vandalism directed at Michelle’s car is ongoing.
“When we went public and said we were joining the civil action against Celtic I received a death threat on the phone. The level of abuse on social media over the last few months has also been appalling.”
Celtic did not address specific questions the Guardian sent to it in relation to the forthcoming civil action, instead referring to a statement it first issued in February in relation to the accusations.
The statement said: “Celtic Football Club is appalled by any form of historic abuse and has great sympathy for those who suffered abuse and for their families. The Club is very sorry that these events took place. The abuse of young people is an abhorrent crime. Unfortunately it has affected many areas of society.
“With regard to the allegations regarding historic abuse at Celtic Boys’ Club (which, so far as we have been made aware, relate to the period prior to 1997), although Celtic Football Club is a separate organisation, we take these extremely seriously because of the historic contacts between the two organisations. Police investigations were given support, so as to seek to ensure that those individuals who abused young people were brought to justice.”
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Oooooffttt....quite the piece if I do say so myself.....first time I've seen them mention the intimidation of the victims....well seeing it's not smsm
 
It clearly states in The Guardian article the abuse that the Gray family have received, not only online, but to their personal possessions.
You will also have seen a certain individual on Twitter with the constant barrage of abuse aimed towards all victims and not only the Grays.
This individual also needs to be dealt with in a court of law. We have every correspondence that this individual has put on social media abusing the victims and openly supporting the perpetrators at Celtic Football Club. All this correspondence will be handed to the police when required.
If you haven’t seen the abuse that this individual has dished out (who has more than one account on Twitter) then I urge you to take a look. It is absolutely disgusting that this individual chooses to support the perpetrators rather than the victims that wore the Celtic colours as innocent children.
There are Celtic supporters out there that are sickened by this individuals every move and have even contacted us to offer assistance.
We strongly believe that this individual has to face the full force of the law and we will assist in anyway we can.
 
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BN94 said:
It clearly states in The Guardian article the abuse that the Gray family have received, not only online, but to their personal possessions.
You will also have seen a certain individual on Twitter with the constant barrage of abuse pointed towards all victims and not only the Grays.
This individual also needs to be dealt with in a court of law. We have every correspondence that this individual has put on social media abusing the victims and openly supporting the perpetrators at Celtic Football Club. All this correspondence will be handed to the police when required.
If you haven’t seen the abuse that this individual has dished out (who has more than one account on Twitter) then I urge you to take a look. It is absolutely disgusting that this individual chooses to support the perpetrators rather than the victims that wore the famous Celtic colours as innocent children.
There are Celtic supporters out there that are sickened by this individuals every move and have even contacted us to offer assistance.
We strongly believe that this individual has to face the full force of the law and we will assist in anyway we can along with the decent Celtic supporters that also want to see the abuse of the victims to end.
Click to expand...
Astounded at the fortitude shown here. - goes way beyond bounds of any normality we all know & recognise. Please, please, please make this right & give them all what they deserve; recognition, acceptance & understanding, whatever the that means. By God, they deserve it
 
It just makes your blood boil that they still try to deny culpability. It is nearly as bad as the fact they allowed it to happen in the first place. Do they care nothing about the lives that have been ruined in their name? Celtic, Celtic Athletic Co., Pacific Shelf, it doesnt matter what they were called, the bottom line is those young men were put in a position of danger because of their attraction to the idea of playing at Parkhead in green and white hoops. It is astonishing that the Scottish Press, Scottish Parliament, and Scottish Police have done nothing about this for so long. After all, this is not one boy who was abused, it was not even one abuser, it was repeated abuse on a number of people over a considerable number of years.

I know i'm biased and I acknowledge I hate them from the core of my being, but putting that aside for a second, if there is any justice here it will be to close that institution down forever. Any organization that allows such crimes to happen repeatedly, under their name, simply does not deserve to continue to operate. The actions of those who try to intimidate and hurt the victims proves it is in the public interest to do so.
 
bigbluebomber said:
I would just like one journalist with any integrity to explain why they have not reported this. Why have they sold their souls for the filths coin ?
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We all know that they are supporters of the filth, part of the Roman cult or if they have any integrity and want to do well within their journalistic careers they will need to remove themselves from this cesspit of a country, as the previous posts state, they get inTIMidated by the hordes of plastic paddies
 
BN94 said:
It clearly states in The Guardian article the abuse that the Gray family have received, not only online, but to their personal possessions.
You will also have seen a certain individual on Twitter with the constant barrage of abuse pointed towards all victims and not only the Grays.
This individual also needs to be dealt with in a court of law. We have every correspondence that this individual has put on social media abusing the victims and openly supporting the perpetrators at Celtic Football Club. All this correspondence will be handed to the police when required.
If you haven’t seen the abuse that this individual has dished out (who has more than one account on Twitter) then I urge you to take a look. It is absolutely disgusting that this individual chooses to support the perpetrators rather than the victims that wore the Celtic colours as innocent children.
There are Celtic supporters out there that are sickened by this individuals every move and have even contacted us to offer assistance.
We strongly believe that this individual has to face the full force of the law and we will assist in anyway we can.
Click to expand...
Maybe that person has issues of their own or is a deviant themselves, what is surprising to me in your post is that not all Celtic supporters are bitter twisted mentally challengeds and want what’s right for the victims across the whole spectrum of Scottish football and that they’ve been in touch with you, kudos to those Celtic supporters for having the ability to know what’s right and to act on it
 
Noddy said:
Hopefully this puts an end to all the negative posts on here. It was never going to happen overnight and now we can all see the first trickle of water coming through the dam. And once a wee bit of water gets through a dam........
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It’s an issue that we were beginning to get annoyed at. The negative posts are being seen by victims who have been relying on this thread and it was upsetting them to say the least.
We are now starting to see movement with other media outlets taking notice and there will be more to follow. This is a good day for the victims and families but there is still a battle ahead that we’re ready for.
 
BN94 said:
It’s an issue that we were beginning to get annoyed at. The negative posts are being seen by victims who have been relying on this thread and it was upsetting them to say the least.
We are now starting to see movement with other media outlets taking notice and there will be more to follow. This is a good day for the victims and families but there is still a battle ahead that we’re ready for.
Click to expand...
I'll say it again, the work you and others have put into this is outstanding. There's natural pessimists in all walks of life but with this news maybe even they will take a back seat and let justice take its course.
 
The floodgates have just been jemmied open, there’s no way of stopping this now.
Well done to all those involved in playing a part in making this happen.
Those victims and their families deserve some sort of justice after all the years this has been suppressed, it’s just a pity it comes too late for some.
 
BSPECIAL said:
Here's hoping for justice for the victims and their families. Hoping but have no faith whatsoever in the justice and legal system in this country.Especially with an absolutely hopeless or even worse unqualified clown as minister of justice. Just cannot have any trust in this man doing his job. Maybe he'll be resigning soon.
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That wee worm is devious
 
Bowery Boy said:
The article in the Guardian is particularly eye opening. The Gray family have received a death threat.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1275940455386152960
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As I said BB a week ago.

One of the 5 who was in the Boston Airport pact was forced to sign silence on it was threatened for years after it.

Tyres slashed, excrement shoved through his letterbox and Death Threats all because he had a conscience and wanted to speak out and tell the truth of what happened.
 
As has been said previously the dam is beginning to creak with a trickle of water coming through. We must remain patient and keep behind the team from FF in their endeavours. The victims have suffered for decades and we must help them remain strong in the run in to truth of their suffering being made known to the world.
The dignity of all the victims throughout their ordeal has been inspiring, especially in the face of the attacks on them by people who couldn't spell dignity.
I like many others on here feel I should be doing something to help in the fight but I just wouldn't know where to start. The people who come on here saying things like "nothing will happen" should just keep it to themselves. We must be patient and remember we are fighting for justice for the victims and part of that is protecting them and helping them stay strong now we are nearing the moment they hopefully find peace.
Keep up the fantastic work you are all doing
Justice for Celtics victims
 
sydneybear said:
From the Guardian online Australian edition this morning.


Child abuse victims to sue Celtic FC in landmark case
Civil action claims Scottish club failed to protect them from paedophiles working around Celtic Boys’ Club

Henry McDonald
Fvcking B O O O O O OM,
Think they better put a hold on that SFA Enquiry Document cause its gonna make them look rather silly if their gonna try and go with that


A view of the Jock Stein statue outside Celtic Park. Photograph: Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images

Victims of a number of paedophiles are to sue Celtic football club in a ground-breaking civil action amidst claims it failed to protect them from sex abusers working around Celtic Boys’ Club.
Three victim-survivors aim to use a civil trial to “knock down the defence wall” they say Celtic has erected in order to distance itself from the Boys’ Club, the Guardian has learnt.
The Glasgow-based team insist that Celtic Boys’ Club is a separate legal entity – a claim that those abused at the latter say only compounds the decades of hurt they have endured. The new Scottish Premiership champions have repeatedly made this claim in the Scottish media.
The victim-survivors hope their case will also shine light on the role played by a senior Celtic executive when one paedophile returned to the Boys’ Club after he had been allegedly sacked from it in 1974 by Jock Stein, the Glasgow side’s legendary European Cup winning manager.
Advertisement

A Guardian investigation has also uncovered allegations of threats, intimidation, vandalism and social media attacks on the family of one victim of the Celtic Boys’ Club abusers. There is no suggestion these incidents are linked to anyone connected to Celtic FC or the Boys’ Club.
Several victim-survivors have criticised the Scottish government for failing to set up an independent public inquiry into the abuse scandal that has shaken Celtic and Scottish football.
A Scottish government spokesperson said it has already established a wide ranging review into child abuse across Scotland.
“The Scottish government, having listened to the views of survivors, established one of the widest ranging public inquiries that Scotland has ever seen, into the abuse of children in care, focusing on the systemic institutional failures which saw many of our most vulnerable children, including those in the care of the state, abused by the very individuals who were there to care for them. We want that inquiry to be able to undertake its work in a timescale that can address the issues raised by survivors, many of whom are elderly,” it said.
Patrick McGuire, one of the lawyers for the 21 victim-survivors, describes Celtic’s argument that it was and is a separate legal entity from the Boys’ Club and is therefore not corporately responsible for the paedophiles crimes as “absolute nonsense.”
McGuire, a senior partner in Glasgow law firm Thompsons which is taking the civil action later this year on behalf of the victim-survivors, said:
“There is loads of evidence of scouts at Celtic finding young stars and telling them the route into the parent club is first to join the Boys’ Club.
“We have a copy of ‘Celtic View’ (the club’s official newspaper) which talks about the players of that week going from the senior team best player all the way down to the Boys’ Club. Their in-house newspaper talks about the Boys’ Club being ‘part of the Celtic family’ and Davy Hay, a former manager, described the youth side as the ‘base of the pyramid’ of the entire club.”
The abusers connected with Celtic Boys’ include multi-millionaire businessman James Torbett who helped set up the club in the late 1960s. He was sentenced for six years in November 2018 after the trial judge said he “used the club as a front for child sexual abuse.” Torbett was also jailed in 1998 for abusing young players between 1967 and 1974.
Another prominent management figure in Celtic Boys’ Club was the team’s former kitman Jim McCafferty. Last year the 73-year-old was found guilty of 12 sex abuse charges in relation to ten boys. McCafferty’s crimes stretched from 1972 to 1996. He was sentenced to six years and nine months in prison after admitting to all 12 charges.
At the time of his conviction in May 2019 McCafferty was already serving a prison sentence for the sexual abuse of a boy in Belfast. Four out of his 12 victims played for the Boys’ Club but others included boys from other football youth teams he ran in North Lanarkshire.
Several of these men’s victims went on to become senior professional players at Celtic, other Scottish premier league teams and for Scotland.
One of Torbett’s victims who has spoken out, David Gordon, says Celtic’s position that it was and remains a separate legal entity flies in the face of facts.
“We trained at Barrowfield (their training centre) and we actually played at Parkhead. I remember running out there as a 14-year-old in the hooped jersey before a Celtic v Rangers game in front of an 80,000 plus crowd. I remember we even swopped jerseys with a young Rangers kid on the pitch. Was I playing for a separate legal entity back then? They even used to get us at the Boys’ Club to sell the programmes during big matches.”
Families who have spoken out in favour of the civil action against Celtic have received physical and on-line threats over recent months.
Michelle Gray’s late brother Andrew revealed before he died in Australia that Torbett had sexually abused him when the paedophile was allowed back into the club in the mid 1980s. Michelle Gray and her mother Helene say the threats started when they attended Torbett’s second trial in 2018.
“One big man among Torbett’s supporters outside the court room even said out loud that my mother and me were ‘dirty lying bastards.’ This was in October 2018,” she recalls.
“This was his second conviction and there were still people turning up to support Torbett.”
Michelle Gray says she heard one of them say that Andy was also a ‘dirty lying bastard’ even though her brother was already dead.
Even after Torbett’s second conviction the Gray family say the online torment, social ostracisation and even vandalism directed at Michelle’s car is ongoing.
“When we went public and said we were joining the civil action against Celtic I received a death threat on the phone. The level of abuse on social media over the last few months has also been appalling.”
Celtic did not address specific questions the Guardian sent to it in relation to the forthcoming civil action, instead referring to a statement it first issued in February in relation to the accusations.
The statement said: “Celtic Football Club is appalled by any form of historic abuse and has great sympathy for those who suffered abuse and for their families. The Club is very sorry that these events took place. The abuse of young people is an abhorrent crime. Unfortunately it has affected many areas of society.
“With regard to the allegations regarding historic abuse at Celtic Boys’ Club (which, so far as we have been made aware, relate to the period prior to 1997), although Celtic Football Club is a separate organisation, we take these extremely seriously because of the historic contacts between the two organisations. Police investigations were given support, so as to seek to ensure that those individuals who abused young people were brought to justice.”
Click to expand...
 
Bowery Boy said:
That is that Ronnie O'Connor lunatic I believe. He's completely unhinged, and an enabler.
Click to expand...
That odious creep turns up everywhere! I am sure it is him on the Scottish sun comments pages too. No one in full time employment could spend as much time as he does on social media. An abusive and disgusting little paedo excuser hiding behind his keyboard!
 
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Read the Guardian article this morning made me sick that people fighting for justice against that sick and perverted organization are openly threatened outside court buildings, can you even imagine standing shouting out in support of child abuser's it is unbelievable. I wish all the families well and stay strong in the face of monstrous and outrageous intimidation.
 
Broxmeister said:
As has been said previously the dam is beginning to creak with a trickle of water coming through. We must remain patient and keep behind the team from FF in their endeavours. The victims have suffered for decades and we must help them remain strong in the run in to truth of their suffering being made known to the world.
The dignity of all the victims throughout their ordeal has been inspiring, especially in the face of the attacks on them by people who couldn't spell dignity.
I like many others on here feel I should be doing something to help in the fight but I just wouldn't know where to start. The people who come on here saying things like "nothing will happen" should just keep it to themselves. We must be patient and remember we are fighting for justice for the victims and part of that is protecting them and helping them stay strong now we are nearing the moment they hopefully find peace.
Keep up the fantastic work you are all doing
Justice for Celtics victims
Click to expand...
Exactly, people who say this have no idea the work put into this with no journalistic background, no access to certain material, Not 1 piece of help from The Scottish Government or files just digging away day by day
There are professional and decorated media people out there who should be ashamed to look in the mirror too late now I'm afraid "Silence is no longer an option" you along with certain MP's in this country will be named and shamed when the time is right.
 
Simon McMurray said:
25000 replies, you peepul are sick in the head. What an incredible lesson in psychology this site has been for me. A real eye opener into the dregs if society. Not all but most of you.
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I'm not sure I've replied. Raping kids is pretty obscene wouldn't you say? Or is a clubs "reputation" to take precedence over what is essentially a grooming gang?
 
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