Telford child sex abuse: Blaze survivor says her mother was victim of CSE
A woman has spoken out about how her mother was a victim of child sexual exploitation in Telford and gave birth to her when she was 14.
Claims have been made that Tasnim Lowe’s mother Lucy Lowe was groomed by taxi driver Azhar Ali Mehmood, who was 10 years older than her. She became pregnant and gave birth to Tasnim.
Lucy was 16 and pregnant a second time by Mehmood when she died in a house blaze in Telford in 2000.
Mehmood was jailed for life in 2001 for murdering Lucy, her sister and mother. All three victims died in the blaze in Halifax Drive, Leegomery, in August 2000 after Mehmood, formerly of Manor Road, Hadley, used petrol to spark a fire.
He was also convicted of the attempted murder of Lucy’s father, George Lowe, who escaped the fire by climbing out of a bedroom window. But Mehmood was not prosecuted for sex crimes.
Tasnim, aged 18, survived the fire and grew up with her grandfather.
Speaking to the BBC about her experiences of growing up, she said: “All I knew is that I was different because I lived with my granddad but there was other people in primary school who lived with aunties or their nans so I didn’t think I was that unusual, but I knew something wasn’t right.
Difficult
“A lot of people would ask me questions. Being about for instance, seven or eight, when I could finally get to terms with it all, explaining that to other kids it was very difficult so I just used to be like, I don’t really know where my family are.
“It was difficult to explain it to other people.”
She was told Mehmood knew Tasnim was his child and Lucy was pregnant again. Speaking about what she was told about the fire, Tasnim said: “My dad came into the house before he did everything, took me out of my cot and placed me under an apple tree, and then did what he did.
“That’s how I’ve got a scar on my face, because I was caught in the fire a little bit. It affected mine and my granddad’s life dramatically. Not to mention there was an unborn baby involved.”
She said she is glad more child sexual exploitation victims are now coming forward to talk about what happened to them.
Tasnim said: “People are starting to understand the scale. There’s still so much we don’t know. There’s so many people who will not come forward. I want to get that point across that they can talk to somebody.
“Since all this has happened people have contacted me to share stories, they’ve done it openly and anonymously.”
