September 2015 Interview with child abuse victim who helped jail her abuser A young woman abused at the hands of a sex offender for four years during her childhood has spoken out after her stepping forward secured his conviction. The victim said that she ‘does not regret reporting it for a second’ and she can ‘finally move on’ now her abuser is behind bars. Amar Patel, 35, of Wood Lane End, Hemel Hempstead, was handed the five-year jail term on Wednesday, July 29 following a ten-day trial at St Albans Crown Court. Patel was aged between 15 and 20 when the offences were carried out in the 1990s. One victim was aged between 5 and 7, another was 4 and a third was aged between 6 and 10. The abuse of the woman, who remains anonymous for legal reasons, began when she was six and went on until she was 10. Recalling what happened, she said Patel would pretend what he was doing was just ‘play’. She said: “Whenever he was finished with me he would always say: “Don’t tell anyone, it’s our little secret.” “After getting the talk from my mother about the birds and the bees at a slightly early age, I realised what he was doing was wrong. “I, being young and still not fully understanding sexual intercourse, thought I was pregnant. “I was having nightmares and constant night terrors, waking up crying and having to sleep in my mum’s bed without her understanding what was wrong with me or what had happened. “I found it very hard to sleep.” The victim, who gave evidence during the court case, remembers she put a stop to the abuse when Patel wanted to “play” again one day. She said: “I said I didn’t want to do it anymore. “He tried to get me to change my mind and told me not to worry, but I must have said something to scare him, because he said something like ‘okay, okay – we won’t.’ After that day, she said Patel never touched her again and never spoke to her about what happened The victim kept the abuse a secret until 2011, when she broke down and told her sister. She said: “I had bottled it up for years, too scared to tell anyone because I was scared he might hurt me or my family. “I literally blocked it out of my head.” After receiving counselling to deal with depression, the woman was referred to a group which helps victims of abuse. It was this support that helped her make the brave decision to report Patel in 2013. She said: “The biggest pushing point for me was when he got married very quickly to someone he just met. “I couldn’t have lived with myself if anything happened to any children they might have and I had done nothing to help prevent it.” Patel was arrested and charged, and following a thorough police investigation he was found guilty of all seven counts of indecent assault against three young girls. One of his victims was aged between five and seven at the time of the abuse, and the other was four years old. In the wake of Patel’s conviction, the woman – Patel’s third victim – said: “The court case was one of the most emotionally toughest things I’ve had to do, but I don’t regret reporting it for a second. “It’s a step in the right direction to closing that chapter of my life now that the truth has finally come out and move on. “I felt closure in the fact that he was found guilty of all seven accounts of assault, although I am still upset that he has shown no remorse.”