Military team starts work at Jersey children's home

Hi-tech military radar equipment is being used today in the search for more bodies at a former care home where human remains were found buried in a stairwell.

A specialist military team has started work inside Haut de la Garenne where a skull fragment was discovered last week and pieces of what are believed to be human bones were found yesterday.

The Jersey home is the focus of a major child abuse investigation involving 160 victims with allegations stemming back four decades.

The inquiry has led officers to a network of secret underground chambers - referred to as “punishment rooms” by victims – and so far one has been excavated.

Forensic teams found a bath and a second item, reportedly shackles, in the cellar as well as a trap door and a chilling message written on the wall saying “I’ve been bad for years and years”.

Police believe there are three more chambers and work breaking in to the second is expected to start next week.

Victims claim they were kept in solitary confinement in the cellars and were drugged, raped and flogged by both staff and other children at the home.

The skull was found in a stairwell in the north west corner of the building on Saturday February 23.

Yesterday police announced they had found a few items at the same site that could be fragments of bone and said a sniffer dog trained to find human remains gave a “strong reaction” to them.

The possible bone fragments have been sent to the UK mainland for tests.

The operation at Haut de la Garenne continues to grow as officers receive calls every day about alleged abuse.

Since they announced finding the skull they have received more than 150 calls and an extra 70 victims have come forward.

There are more than 40 suspects in the inquiry and a specialist police team is based at the port in case any attempt to escape.

The majority of the alleged abuse is understood to have taken place in the 1970s and 1980s.

Since the horrific claims from former residents at Haut de la Garenne were made Jersey’s former health minister Stuart Syvret has repeatedly claimed there is a culture of concealment and cover up on the island.

As an example he used the case of social worker Simon Bellwood who in 2007 was brought in to run the Greenfields secure unit near the capital St Helier.

Mr Bellwood claimed they used a “Dickensian” system where children as young as 11 were routinely locked up for 24 hours or more in solitary confinement.

The 33-year-old said he tried to change the regime but when parts of it were brought back he complained and was sacked.

His employers said he was fired for incompetence and Mr Bellwood, who is being backed by the British Association of Social Workers, will challenge them at an employment tribunal on Monday.

The hearing will start at 9.30am at Trinity House in Bath Street, St Hellier.