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Underage care home girls groomed, plied with alcohol, raped by a group or travellers, a court heard.

The girls who were living in a home in the Wrexham area were sexually trafficked and passed around a group of men from the travelling community and sexually exploited in hotel rooms and in secluded public areas like car parks, prosecuting barrister John Philpotts told a jury Mold Crown Court.

The offences were alleged to have taken place between December 2011 and April 2012.

John James Purcell, John Anthony Delaney, John Michael McGrath and Todd James Wickens, deny all charges against them.

Opening the trial, which is expected to last four weeks, Mr Philpotts said the men sexually exploited one or more young girls who were, at the time, resident at a home for cared-for children.

'Her name was called out by loud-hailer'

A social worker warned staff at the home that one of the alleged victims, who was aged less than 16 years, was in the habit of associating with members of the travelling community from the Wrexham area.

Vehicles began to appear at the home and on one occasion, a van drove up the drive and her name was called out using a loud-hailer, the jury heard.

She began to abscond frequently, often in the company of other girls in care.

"The defendants well knew how old those girls were and, indeed, seemed to be excited by their extreme youth," Mr Philpotts said.

"They also knew that, though they submitted, those girls did not truly or genuinely consent to what was done to them,” he said.

'Used as a sexual resource'

Mr Philpotts told the jury: "These men used the girls as a sexual resource, for their own gratification and that of their associates."

(Image: Robert Parry Jones)

The jury was told associates Delaney and Purcell turned up at a hotel and engaged in sexual activity with two girls against their will.

Sometimes the girls would not wish to drink alcohol but they were told they were boring and would succumb, Mr Philpotts said.

Significantly, however, the men did not drink, it was claimed.

'Dirty and horrible'

They made the girls drunk in order to exploit them sexually because, once drunk, they "didn’t really know what they were doing" and the situation escalated, Mr Philpotts said.

The girls would be taken to a hotel, if the intention was for other men to attend.

It would be carefully selected on the basis that booking it did not require evidence of identification.

A room would be selected which was away from the hotel reception so that staff were not aware when a number of other men arrived.

Purcell would pay for the room, the court was told.

He would also pay for the alcohol and, sometimes, drugs, it was claimed.

On other occasions they would be taken to a secluded spot away from the public glare.

(Image: Daily Post Wales)

Sometimes the girls would be forcibly separated and told that if they engaged in sexual activity, they would be re-united.

At other times, the men would threaten to abandon them, lost and far from home.

'They forced themselves on me'

The men would harass the girls until they submitted and sexual activity would happen every time they met. Sometimes protection would be used, sometimes not, the court was told.

One of the girls told police that in retrospect, she felt "dirty and horrible" but at the time she saw it as an it was an "escape".

"She had, of course, been groomed. Often, the girls would be so intoxicated that they were powerless to resist whatever was happening to them," Mr Philpotts said.

The prosecutor described incidents at a Travelodge near Halkyn and in a hotel at the Dene Hotel, Chester.

He claimed Delaney and Purcell discussed which girl each was going to have and which bed they would use. One girl told how she was "paralytic" when sex took place.

The prosecutor said it was deliberate exploitation: "Those girls were driven to the Travelodge with the specific intention that they would there be sexually assaulted."

At the Dene Hotel it was alleged that other men were tipped off and six or seven others arrived.

'There was no saying no'

One girl was allegedly being raped, heard shouting, and saw another girl with her head dangling over the side of the bed.

She was being sick with four or five men were around her, engaged in sexual activity with her.

She intervened and told the men to stop what they were doing.

It was alleged the men turned their attention away to her and she told how "it was just like they forced themselves on me".

Mr Philpotts claimed Delaney and Purcell deliberately arranged for other men to be notified of the presence of the girls in a hotel and invited to attend and participate in the sexual assaults upon them.

One of the girls was taken to a secluded car park near where she had sex with a man not before the court in the back of a silver BMW.

She was scared because she did not know him and had not expected to have sex with him. He had never been identified.

However, by that point, sexual activity had "become the norm" for her and she felt "there was no saying no".

Mr Philpotts said that Wickens collected a girl from the home and McGrath would be with him.

It was alleged that Wickens had sexual intercourse with her from behind and when she turned and realised that McGrath had taken his place.

"She told him to stop but he persisted," Mr Philpotts he said.

Delaney, 33, of Ruthin Road Caravan Park, Wrexham, faces four counts of rape of a girl under 16, four counts of sex trafficking, the sexual assault of a girl aged under 16 years and arranging the commission of a child sex offence.

Purcell, 31, of Crescent Road in Ellesmere Port, faces three charges of rape, four charges of trafficking and one of arranging a child sex offence.

Wickens, 28, of Homestead Lane, Wrexham, faces two charges of raping a girl aged under 16 years, and one charge of sex trafficking.

McGrath, 27, of Bryn Hedd, Southsea, Wrexham, is charged with raping a girl aged under 16 years.

The trial before Judge Rhys Rowlands is proceeding.