“Hopeless, worthless, used.” A victim of child sexual abuse speaks out after her abusers were jailed

A woman has spoken of the horrific impact being sexually abused as a child has had on her, after her perpetrators were jailed last month

Emdadul Lukman, 47 of Waldegrave Street, Hastings, East Sussex and Jakhir Hussain, 37, of Keymer Court, Burgess Hill, West Sussex, were sentenced on 20 February to a total of 36 years after being found guilty by a unanimous jury of multiple counts of rape and causing/inciting a girl under 13 to engage in sexual activity.

Although the abuse took place almost two decades ago, she found the courage to report it in February 2018 after telling her mother and husband what had happened to her.

An investigation was subsequently launched by Bedfordshire Police’s Child and Vulnerable Adult Abuse (CAVAA) team, which resulted in Lukman being jailed for 16 years and Hussain for 20 years.

Since being a special constable I’ve been able to see what I’m capable of

Kirsty is a mum of two and joined Bedfordshire Police as a special constable to help make Bedfordshire safe for her young children.

I have lived in Bedfordshire my whole life. I have had some difficult personal life experiences and wanted to be able to turn those negative experiences into something positive through volunteering as an officer. To be able to help others who might have experienced something similar to me and those who are in need of support is important to me.

Women’s History Month – 13 years of volunteering

Tracey Bateman is one of our longest serving female special constables. She has been with us for almost 13 years and in that has been to a variety of jobs and helped a multitude of different people.

She was inspired to join by a talk from one of our officers when she worked in a retail store and started her volunteering journey with Bedfordshire Police in 2008.

The Specials Chief Officer at the time came to do a presentation at a shopping centre retailer meeting when I was working in Debenhams.