July 2002 He was a clever, cunning pervert Ann Jones* is a jobless, disabled, single mother living near Bournemouth. She always believed she had a close enough relationship with her son, Sam*, for him to be able to confide anything to her. She also believed she could spot a pervert a mile off. In both cases she was wrong. This is her story… “I got to know Rod Smith through his former wife. I was helping her with something and we got chatting, like you do,” says Ann, lighting up the first of many cigarettes she smokes during our interview. Rodney Smith, 58, of Fenton Road, Southbourne, was well-dressed, clean shaven and there was no dirty raincoat in sight. He was, he told her, a former foster carer in Surrey where he had lived, and claimed he ran cleaning contracts in libraries in Corfe Mullen and Christchurch, in local youth clubs and at a local comprehensive school. “He even told me he’d cleaned the social services offices, for God’s sake,” says Ann, bitterly. “But if you’d met him you’d have thought what a smashing bloke, what a good husband he’d make, that kind of thing. I now realise that me being a single mother made me a prime target for him, but then it just seemed as though there was this nice man, who took an interest in my kids.” Smith was actually only interested in one child, Sam, then aged 12. He quickly embarked on the paedophile’s infamous “grooming”, or softening-up process, on him. “He offered to take him fishing. He’d ring up and say ‘I’ll take him out’. I thought ‘great, I can’t take him fishing and do all those things with him, but here’s a man who can'” Later it transpired that Rod couldn’t fish and, claims Sam, went off and bought hundreds of pounds worth of equipment to maintain the subterfuge. “Rod said people were giving him drugs in the village and that he’d look after him. It wasn’t true – it was Rod who gave him pot and booze,” says Ann. “I thought he was keeping Sam out of trouble. But later I found out that he was keeping him off school two or three days a week, sending in notes and that sort of thing. He even booked him in for an eye test one day so it would look legitimate. And all that time he was taking him to arcades, getting him drunk.” By the time the sexual contact started, Smith was a trusted family friend. Sam says; “I thought he was nice to me. Then he started touching me and getting me to touch him, and getting me to watch porn films. When he wanted to do something to me he’d say stuff like ‘I thought we were mates’, that sort of thing. It made me feel guilty because he had been friendly. And yet he was doing these things to me.” As his arrogance increased, Smith took Sam on trips away. “He’d phone, saying we’re late, not going to get back, so Sam could stay over. We even went on holiday together – and I put him and Sam in the same room,” says Ann, covering her face. The abuse was stepped up. Smith tried to get Sam to lure a schoolfriend into participating in a sexual act with him. He tried to force Sam to use a block of gents toilets in Boscombe, well-known as a ‘cottage’ for homosexual men. “When I wouldn’t go in there he became really angry,” remembers Sam. Still Ann did not suspect. “Rod was into everything. He was involved with the Under-15 side at RingwoodFootball Club for a few years. One woman there mentioned at a meeting about him but it was all poo-pooed. They couldn’t believe it, I suppose.” “He would pick up boys for football and drop them off. He posed as a football scout for Bristol Rovers. He had these cards printed up and everything, and went to football clubs in the Bournemouth area with these. But after I contacted the club at Bristol they just said he wasn’t a scout for them. I don’t know if they even warned anyone there was this fake scout going round,” she says. Ann defends herself against charges of naivety by saying: “I thought that because he helped with the football and cleaned at schools and I knew he had been a foster carer, he must be OK, or checked out, or something.” The abuse came to light by chance, when a former victim of Smith’s found the courage to go to the Surrey police, because he learned of his relationship with Sam and suspected he might be abused also. “Sam had gone to Surrey with his sister to take up some Christmas presents for people they’d met though Rod. Sam stayed with this boy Rod had fostered in the past. I think seeing Rod with Sam jolted this boy and made him consider what had happened to him. He contacted the police, basically to save Sam, and told them what had happened to him.” Ever cunning, Smith called up Ann and told her: ‘I thought you ought to know that he (the boy) has gone to the police and told them all sorts of lies about me and what I’m supposed to have done to him 20 years ago.’ “Me and my friend felt so sorry for Rod that we met him for a cup of coffee! I can’t believe we did it but he was so plausible that we didn’t doubt him,” confesses Ann. “I first realised it was true when the Child Protection Unit called up and said they were coming round to pick up Sam.” It was just before Christmas 1999 and as the family prepared for the big day, the story came out bit by painful bit. “We were dragging it out of Sam,” recalls Ann. “I said the police could only help him if he told them everything. “He only gave evidence to stop it happening to someone else and we were ready to go to court until the day before, when they rang us to say Rod was pleading guilty. It meant Sam didn’t have to give evidence. But because it was such short notice we couldn’t get up to Surrey to see him sent down and I do believe that would have been good for Sam, to see him get punished and to know that what happened wasn’t his fault.” The $64,000 question is, of course, why did Sam let it go on? Undoubtedly, as a fatherless boy, Sam enjoyed Smith’s attention and the chance to do new things, such as the fishing. And Sam was pleased, as any child would be, to receive Smith’s gifts, which included an expensive pair of skates. But Ann defends her son. “People will say why didn’t Sam do anything, but at that age they are only children, even if they are growing into a man’s body. Rod played on that and the guilt Sam felt. “He was very clever. He literally crept up on us.” She starts crying. “I feel so guilty, I can’t tell you how guilty I feel. I feel that I should have noticed this man and what he was up to. With hindsight it’s so obvious. But then it all seemed so plausible. I’ve always felt I was close to my kids and that I’d know if anything was wrong, but he was so clever. He calculated everything – he even had a young boy racer’s car, a Ford XR3i to impress kids. He gave Sam things I couldn’t give him, like trips and treats. “I always said I would kill anyone who hurt my kids – I always thought I was aware about perverts. But he sneaked in underneath all that.” Smith was sentenced to six years for each offence of indecent assault, to run concurrently. Earlier this month Ann received a letter from the parole board, saying Smith will be considered for parole next March. “He could be out in just over a year,” she says. “That would mean he had served less than 15 months for each of those offences.” She finds this hard to bear. Ann hopes that by going public, she’ll prompt more of Rodney Smith’s victims to speak out and, perhaps, provoke further investigations into his sordid past. “I know there are others,” she insists. “I want to say to anyone else who’s been molested by Rod Smith or anyone else – come forward. It’s so important because you’ll help stamp it out, then.” The episode has, she says, changed her whole outlook on life. “I thought I knew what was going on but I didn’t. Parents like me are told they are paranoid about paedophiles. Now, I say they should be.” * These names have been changed.