A former police superintendent has been found guilty of sexually abusing boys in the 1980s at a Home Office attendance centre for young offenders and at a children’s home.

Gordon Anglesea, 79, becomes the highest-profile offender brought to justice through the National Crime Agency’s Operation Pallial, which has been investigating allegations of widespread and organised child abuse in north Wales.

Judge Geraint Walters gave Anglesea bail but made it clear he would be jailed when he is sentenced next month. Before leaving court, the judge said the defendant, a father of five, would have to sign the sex offenders’ register.

A man in the public gallery overlooking the court shouted: “This is a great day for British justice! Thirty years we’ve waited for this.”



Anglesea had faced claims for a quarter of a century that he preyed on young boys, and in the mid-90s was awarded £375,000 in damages after successfully suing news organisations that had linked him to abuse.



At that time he depicted himself as an old-fashioned north Wales police officer who had been inspired by the fictional neighbourhood policeman Dixon of Dock Green.

Over the past six weeks at Mold crown court in north Wales Anglesea has been accused of sexually abusing two boys aged 14 and 15. The first said he was assaulted by Anglesea in the shower and a changing room at the attendance centre he ran in Wrexham. Such centres were set up by the Home Office to provide an alternative to custody for youths and included physical training and woodwork.

Anglesea would “inspect” a military-style parade, make the youngsters do naked sit-ups and squat thrusts, then loiter around the showers “with a smirk on his face”, the court heard. The complainant – who described the centre as a “naughty boy school” and had been sent there for “petty” crimes – made allegations against Anglesea after receiving counselling.

He said of Anglesea: “You did what you were told because he was the boss … he used to hit everyone around the head … He was a powerful person. He’s wrecked my life.”

In the witness box, the complainant described Anglesea as “evil” and added: “I have got no respect for authority at all because of him. Since all this happened I haven’t had a life.”

The second victim lived at a children’s home called Bryn Estyn. He claimed he was taken from there to various addresses and passed around “like a handbag” to men including Anglesea.

He was accused of trying to win compensation from Anglesea. “I don’t want a penny, I don’t want a bean,” the complainant said in court. “All I want is justice, nothing else.”

Anglesea was convicted on Friday of four counts of indecent assault.

North Wales police apologised for Anglesea’s actions and said it had changed the way it investigates such offences.

Asst Ch Con Richard Debicki said: “The victims in this case have waited a long time for justice and I am pleased that today they have seen this done. Time has caught up with Gordon Anglesea. It is true to say that no occupation is immune from individuals who will exploit their position of authority and trust to abuse vulnerable victims, but people expect and deserve better from the police.

“I am saddened that a former NWP officer was one of these individuals and I would like to apologise on behalf of the force to those whose lives he so traumatically affected.

“Nothing anyone can do now will change the past, but I can assure people that the way in which we now investigate sexual abuse, the investment which goes into it and the significance it is given is considerably different to how it ways in the past.”

Ed Beltrami, chief crown prosecutor for the Crown Prosecution Service Wales, said: “Gordon Anglesea abused a position of power and authority in order to prey on very young and vulnerable victims. I would like to thank the victims, survivors and witnesses who had the courage to come forward and provide important evidence in this case.”

In 1994, Anglesea sued the Observer, Private Eye, the Independent on Sunday and the Welsh broadcaster HTV over allegations connecting him to abuse.



During libel hearings at the high court, Anglesea, then in his late 50s, was portrayed as a stalwart of the community, a freemason, rotarian, Methodist and a school governor. He described how the allegations had made him a “leper” in the small seaside community where he lived in north Wales.

The news organisations called evidence from three young men who claimed to have been Anglesea’s victims while they were teenagers at Bryn Estyn. Anglesea persuaded the jury of his innocence and was awarded damages. The papers and broadcaster were also left with a £1m legal bill.

In 2012, the National Crime Agency launched Operation Pallial at the height of the swirl of false allegations linking the Tory peer Lord McAlpine to child abuse in the Wrexham area.

Its mission was to look at the allegations of sexual abuse within the care system in north Wales that once again surfaced during the scandal, which was triggered by a Newsnight report.

More than 300 people made contact with the investigation, dozens have been arrested and scores of complaints are still being actively investigated.

It is no surprise that so many came forward. During the Sir Ronald Waterhouse inquiry in 1997, almost 300 men and women named 148 abusers including police officers, social workers, local authority executives, senior businessmen and politicians. Waterhouse ordered that they could not be identified by the media.

Among those who have been convicted through Pallial are care home owner John Allen, who was jailed for life, and a gang of five including a former professional wrestler, a radio presenter and a civil servant, who were found to be members of a predatory paedophile ring that abused vulnerable boys.