Briton jailed in Ethiopia for child sex abuse

[QUANTUM LEAP]

Briton jailed in Ethiopia for child sex abuse

Audrey Gillan

Friday August 8, 2003

The Guardian

 

A British paedophile exposed by the Guardian for abusing orphans of the

Ethiopian famine was yesterday jailed for nine years with hard labour by a court

in

Addis Ababa after an apparent attempt to open another centre for children in

Zambia.

David Christie, 62, was found guilty of abusing boys under 15 and of

procuring boys for his friends. Originally from Bournemouth, Christie was the

subject

of a Guardian investigation in July 1999 which revealed that he had targeted a

village set up to house orphans of the famine.

Christie was sacked by the agency, Terre des Hommes Lausanne (Tdh), in 1997

after admitting an "improper sexual relationship" with one of the 300 children

in his care. Other children in the village also made allegations of abuse.

The first criminal bench of the high court in Addis Ababa said Christie had

also arranged for five boys to be abused by two of his friends, one of them a

Briton. The court declared that Christie had abused boys daily for several

weeks at a time. It said he lured the boys by giving them sweets and promising

them an education abroad.

Christie had been living in the UK when he was arrested on an international

warrant in Lusaka, the Zambian capital, and was in the process being flown to

the UK when he was arrested by Ethiopian authorities who took him off a transit

flight bound for London.

Officers with Scotland Yard's paedophile unit had been monitoring his

movements in London. After the Guardian allegations, Christie changed his name

by

deed poll to David Allen and obtained a passport. He could not be prosecuted

because his offences predated the 1997 Sex Offenders Act enabling British courts

to try UK nationals for such crimes.

But an associate of Christie's tipped officers off that he was planning to

flee to Zambia with the intention of working with children again.

Christie had been the head or "father" of Jari Children's Village, an

eight-hour drive from the capital. There he was responsible for the welfare of

more

than 300 children. His associates - some known paedophiles - would visit the

village and a number of allegations were made against them.

In 1999, a Guardian investigation discovered that it was not just in Jari

that children were abused. Christie had ready access to young boys in Addis

Ababa, where many children are forced to beg on the streets. At least a dozen

boys

were living at his house in the city. A number of these boys testified to the

Guardian that they had been involved in inappropriate relationships with

Christie and his friends.

One said: "Other kids can learn from what happened to us. The children in

Jari don't know good from bad, and they think people are good just because they

are white. Any white man to come was seen as a good man."

Det Supt Peter Spindler, head of Scotland Yard's child protection group,

said: "This case is an example of how British police routinely work with

international colleagues to arrest British paedophiles offending abroad. This

sends a

strong message to any British paedophile who chooses to go and offend in

countries where they think they are out of our grasp. They are not."

Colin Tucker, a spokesman for Tdh, said the organisation welcomed the verdict

as it had been trying to prevent Christie's attempts to abuse other children.

"The ongoing rehabilitation of the survivors of the abuse is of paramount

importance to the foundation," he said. "This verdict serves as an important

milestone for the children as they rebuild their lives. It will also act as a

serious deterrent to those who wish to exploit vulnerable children through their

money and power."

Christie's trial began in October 2001 but was postponed several times

because of his ill health. The three-judge tribunal "categorically rejected"

Christie's request that he be allowed to serve his sentence in Britain. His

lawyer

said that Christie would likely be released from prison on good behaviour in

2007 and that he would appeal the conviction.

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