The sprawling, ugly bus station in Rotherham town centre brings back horrific memories for Emma Jackson. Nearby, on wasteland, and at the age of just 13, she was savagely raped by a man called Tarik as his laughing friends took photos on their mobile phones.

It was a brutal end to pretty Emma’s innocent childhood. By 15, she had been sexually assaulted by 54 more men: her body sold time and again by Tarik to his friends, relatives and acquaintances, in the backs of cars, in terrace houses and even in the undergrowth of the magnificent Victorian park at the centre of this once proud South Yorkshire town.

When Emma — whose hard-working, middle-class parents ran a grocery store — finally plucked up the courage to tell her family, her horrified mother reported the multiple rapes to the local police and social services.

They expected Tarik, 24 at the time, to be caught, tried and sent to prison for a long time. But in an appalling failure of the police system, it was not to be.

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Victim: 'Emma' in Rotherham town centre. When she was 13 she was raped; by aged 15, she had been sexually assaulted by 54 more men

Today, Tarik and other men who so vilely abused Emma and hundreds of other young girls, are still walking the streets of Rotherham, in what is surely the biggest child protection scandal of modern times.

As Emma told me this week: ‘Tarik is free and so are the rest of them. I saw one of his friends, a sexual predator called “Lanky” who I know raped girls, standing outside a takeaway restaurant this week.

‘They are all over the town. Sexual exploitation of girls like me is a way of life for some men in Rotherham, and has been for years.’

I drove Emma — who uses an alias to protect her identity — into Rotherham on Thursday night this week to find out what is still going on in the town. Within minutes, she pointed out ‘Mal’, a man in his early 30s standing beside a parked black Mercedes.

‘He raped me twice, and so did his brother. There were plenty of other girls, too,’ she said. ‘I gave the police the name of Mal, but he is still about.’

Emma then showed me to the places where she was abused by Tarik and his pals: the bus station, a dark alley near Boots the chemist, the room at the back of a town-centre pub, where the landlord handed out ecstasy tablets to relax the girls before they were raped again and again by paying customers, and the rambling Clifton Park.

‘The men would take the girls anywhere in Rotherham to have sex with them, even the church graveyard, and they do the same now,’ she said.

If this was an atrocity that had happened to one girl, it would be bad enough. Yet a damning independent report, written by Professor Alexis Jay, revealed this week that 1,400 girls ‘at a conservative estimate’ have been lured into sex slavery in the small town of 250,000 people over the past 16 years.

A second worrying report from Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary has savaged police in South Yorkshire, including Rotherham, for trying to disprove the allegations of hundreds of young rape victims, and not treating the attacks as crimes.

As a furore rages over who in authority knew what about the extent of the scandal, pressure is growing on a number of senior figures to resign. At things stand, the crime commissioner is refusing to go, and the social services chief is clinging to her post.

The official line from the town’s authorities appears to be that this systematic abuse of young girls, some only nine and still in primary school, is all in the past: mistakes were made, they are sorry, but that’s that. David Cameron is sending inspectors in to have a look, and there the matter rests for the moment.

He raped me twice and so did his brother

But is it really that simple? Up to now, only eight men have faced trial — with only five convicted — for sex attacks on young girls. And yet the official report says vast numbers were abused.

This week, Emma told me that she and her family believe at least 90 other child sex attackers in Rotherham escaped justice.

Two of the handful convicted are already back in town: Mohsin Khan, 26, was given a four-year sentence for grooming a 13-year-old girl for sex; and Umar Razaq, 27, was imprisoned for less than a year for having sex with a 12-year-old girl, because he had spent time on remand.

Emma says today: ‘Tarik was never arrested. Three of his brothers, who were doing the same thing to girls, were not either. Most of the men who sexually exploited me are running taxi firms, takeaways, or car washes in town.’

She adds chillingly: ‘It is more dangerous in Rotherham today than ever. The sex assaults are still going on, yet the girls are afraid to go to the social workers in case they are put in care. They refuse to go to the police because they do not trust them to arrest the culprits. No one is protecting them.’

One of the devious methods the gangs employ to entice girls is simple enough. They get their younger brothers of ten, 11 or 12 to befriend them in the streets, or even at school.

The junior siblings, sometimes unwittingly, then invite the girls to meet their older brothers.

‘It is a trick used often,’ according to a youth worker who has watched the Rotherham sex predators operate.

As furore rages over who at the council knew what about the extent of the scandal, pressure is growing on a number of senior figures to resign

He bravely alerted the council in 2010 about the growing stranglehold of the sex gangs and the number of girls caught in their clutches — and was ignored.

The girls are getting younger, and so are their abusers.

‘By befriending the girls, the younger brothers move on the fringes of the gangs. They see what is happening and they soon want to do it, too,’ he said yesterday.

While the Tariks, Lankys and Mals are still sexually exploiting girls, their younger brothers and cousins are now trading Rotherham girls for sex. They see it as normal behaviour which brings them gratification, and money for the lifestyle they aspire to.

‘There are lots of the younger predators out there who believe girls from non-Muslim backgrounds are “up for it” and deserve what they get,’ added the youth worker.

‘It is a dangerous mindset. After years of letting the problem grow, how will it ever be rooted out?’

For as with similar outrages in Rochdale, Derby, Oxford and Telford — all places where street grooming gangs targeting children and young girls have been convicted — there is an elephant in the room.

If the perpetrators played the race card, then the police, the social services, they melted away

The predators in this type of sex crime are mainly of South Asian heritage (in Rotherham they are from the Muslim Pakistani community, as the Jay Report explicitly points out) and the victims are generally white, mixed race or Roma girls.

Of course, people of all races, religions and creeds are capable of evil, and all decent-minded Muslims will be appalled by this week’s revelations about a minority who flout the law so egregiously.

Meanwhile, the cry has gone up from Rotherham’s Pakistani community that they had simply no idea of the horrors going on under their noses. But it is not just a question of race that makes this scandal so disturbing.

One of the wicked myths perpetuated by the local instututions in Rotherham (and many other towns and cities where sex gangs roam today) is that abused girls are the progeny of feckless parents, or are sexually precocious youngsters in the care system.

This is far from the truth: the majority come from decent, loving homes. Under a third of the 1,400 girls attacked in Rotherham were in care (many placed there at the desperate request of their parents to protect them from the gangs, which then, sickeningly, traced their victims through Facebook or mobile phones, and sold them for sex again).

Shockingly, this week’s Jay Report says that such sexual exploitation now offers ‘career and financial opportunities’ to young south Asian men in Britain.

Trading girls is a far more lucrative organised crime than trading drugs. Scotland Yard says one victim can generate £300,000 a year for those exploiting her.

Another disturbing aspect of the Jay Report is the ‘prominent role’ of taxi drivers in the Rotherham scandal. Indeed, another youth worker in the town told me recently that some of the men who abuse the young girls ‘drive into Rotherham from all over England — Manchester, Derby, Birmingham, and even further away — often in their own taxis’.

Two of the handful convicted are already back in town: Mohsin Khan, 26, left, was given a four-year sentence for grooming a girl, 13, for sex while Umar Razaq, 27, right was jailed for less than a year for having sex with a 12-year-old girl

The minutes of a Rotherham Council child safeguarding meeting in 2010 — a year when hundreds of girls were attacked by gangs — recorded that several victims had spoken of abduction or sex attacks by taxi drivers. Other girls, in other years, told the council similar terrifying tales.

Yet only four drivers, all from different firms, have had licences revoked by the council since 2009 in connection with child sexual exploitation.

Just one was arrested for sex offences and supplying drugs to a 15-year-old girl, but he was never charged by police.

Professor Jay says she interviewed 24 Rotherham girls, now aged 14 to 25, and they ‘all avoided taxis if possible’.

‘The girls described how on occasions they would be [driven] the longest, darkest route home,’ wrote Professor Jay. ‘One said the driver’s first question would always be: “How old are you, love?” All talked about the conversation quickly turning flirtatious or suggestive, with references to sex.’

So why were licences of the suspected drivers never removed by the authorities, and why did the police not arrest them?

There are lots of the younger predators out there who believe girls from non-Muslim backgrounds are “up for it” and deserve what they get

The Jay Report confirms that the police, social workers and council leaders ‘tiptoed’ round predatory gangs, even as their behaviour grew more blatant. Was this because of political correctness and a fear of being called a racist?

And Emma Jackson, who is now 25, tells a revealing story about what happened to her when she was 13 and out with Tarik, plus his sidekicks, at the Rotherham shopping centre.

It was near closing time, about six at night, too late, one might think, for a 13-year-old to be on the streets with a group of men ten years her senior.

‘A couple of beat bobbies came up to us and asked me for my name, my age, and my address,’ she recalled this week. ‘I had been taught to tell the truth by my parents, so I didn’t make up anything. I gave them the correct details.’

What happened next was extraordinary. Tarik began to take charge. He told the two policemen to arrest him or stop bothering Emma and his group of friends. He said if they did not ‘p*** off’, he would take their badge numbers and make a complaint for racial harassment against them.

Emma says: ‘The policemen just walked away. They did not drive me home, they did not contact my parents, they did nothing to protect me. I never heard anything from them.

‘It was always the same. If the perpetrators played the race card, then the police, the social services, they melted away.

‘It meant Tarik and these other men grew arrogant. They acted with complete impunity. They believed they were above any law.

‘When I was with them, they openly boasted they would never be arrested, and girls I help now tell me the men who sexually exploit them boast the same thing today.’

She adds: ‘The men doing these dreadful things to girls and children think they are more powerful than God. A blind eye was turned by the authorities over many years. It is close to a deliberate cover-up, which has put hundreds of girls in danger. They are still in danger today.’