Hackney Gazette, 12th June 1987 (ocr)

TWELVE homosexuals who preyed on young runaway boys were jailed for a total of 36 years and three months at the Old Bailey.

Judge Michael Underhill told them: "For the protection of the young it must be made absolutely clear that those who seek to abuse them for their own purposes will face heavy sentences."

The judge said: "Runaway boys have to be protected from their own folly and inexperience. You took advantage of their weakness to gratify your sexual desires. The shock consequence of that can lead to a victim becoming a male Prostitute or rent boy whose only prospect is one of degradation and misery."

The twelve men, who included the father of pop singer Adam Ant, pleaded guilty or were convicted of a variety of serious sexual offences against two boys aged 13, one of 11 and one aged 14.

Among the defendants were Leonard William Smith, 31, of Templemead House, Hackney; Sidney Charles Cooke, 59, of Oswalds Mead, Lindisfarne Way, Hackney; Simon Haeems, 35, of Victoria Road, Stoke Newington; Walter Ballantyne, 46, of Hathersage Court, Newington Green, Islington; Colin Byrne, 18, of the same address; Daniel Paine, 33, of Maiden Road, Kentish Town, and Roy Alan Morris, 26, of Crowndale Road, Camden.

Also in the dock were: Alfred Goddard, 58. of Victoria, the father of Adam Ant; John Thornton, 36, of New Addington, Surrey; John Stead, 23, also of New Addington, and Edward Talbot, 47, from Luton.

Ballantyne, with previous convictions for sex offences against hoys, was jailed for six years and three months. Byrne was put on probation for a year.

Smith and Morris were each jailed for 30 months; Turner and Stead for five years; Haeems, Paine and Goddard for two years; Thornton for eight years; Talbot for a year, and Cooke remanded on bail for reports.

Crown prosecutor Mr John Sevan told the court that between January 1984 and January last year the defendants procured and corrupted boys who had run away from home or from council care.

Boys were "hawked about" all over London, staying for a week or two at the homes of different men who passed them on when they got tired of the lads. To keep one step ahead of police, social workers or parents, the men hid the boys.

The victims were plied with drink and drugs including cannabis, amphetamines and LSD to weaken their resistance to sexual demands.

"This group of men had the wickedness to introduce boys to the so-called delights of drugs and unnatural sex," counsel said.

Ballantyne, a stallholder at Dalston Market, was one of the ringleaders of the network.