A former children’s home worker has been convicted of sexually abusing two boys in his care.

Gerald ‘Gerry’ Raffell, 74, was in his 30s when he carried out the abuse at homes in Yarnton and near Wallingford in the 1980s.

One victim, who claimed to have been molested by Northern Ireland campaign veteran Raffell using a ‘rubber bullet’, told jurors that the abuse was ‘just brushed under the carpet and we were moved onto another home’.

READ MORE: Prosecution opens case in 1980s children's home 'sexual abuse' trial

He claimed his fellow residents suffered physical abuse at others’ hands. “They didn’t want to hear what we had to say back then,” he said of the authorities.

Raffell denied the abuse occurred, with his barrister Rishy Panesar chipping away at the testimony of the boys.

Closing his client’s case, he urged the jury to remember the ‘three Cs’ and find that the boys’ evidence was ‘not consistent, it’s not cogent and it’s not credible’. 

After around nine hours of deliberations, the jury convicted the defendant of four counts of indecent assault. He was acquitted of three other counts, while no verdicts could be reached on two more charges relating to another boy and the jury was discharged.

Two of the guilty verdicts – relating to allegations he performed sex acts on the second victim in a dormitory and a children’s home office – were by a majority of 10 jurors to two.

Judge Maria Lamb bailed Raffell, of West View Road, Hartlepool, until a mention hearing on December 16, when a date is expected to be fixed for his sentencing.

During the trial, prosecutor Richard Milne alleged that the defendant groomed the boys by offering them cigarettes and alcohol.

One boy said he had woken up to find Raffell sitting on his bed and performing a sex act on both himself and the boy.

Mr Milne told the jury: “He would comfort him and tell him everything was alright and this was natural and in due course it would help them with girls as they would then know what to do.

“In other words, as [an] adult spinning them a tale to try and cover up what he knew he was doing.”

READ MORE: Alleged children's home abuse victim gives evidence at trial

The boy – now a grown man who had previously been in trouble with the law himself – said he had repeatedly run away from the home. He was picked up by the police as far afield as Peterborough and Birmingham.

Another of the boys claimed that Raffell had grabbed his private parts from behind when he was changing in the Yarnton House dormitory.

Arrested in 2020, Raffell said in reply to the caution: “That’s all got sorted. I thought they were decent lads. I want to go up there and knock heads together.”

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This story was written by Tom Seaward. He joined the team in 2021 as Oxfordshire's court and crime reporter.  

To get in touch with him email: Tom.Seaward@newsquest.co.uk

Follow him on Twitter: @t_seaward