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16 January 2015

​A witness has described how he was drawn into a sexual relationship with a visitor to Haut de la Garenne when he was 12.

Mr D said that Tony Watton, who ran a canoe club and art gallery, had been the only person to have shown him affection and he didn't know what was happening was wrong.

The boy would go to see Watton during the day when he played truant from school.

Mr D also suffered at the hands of Morag Jordan when he went to live at Haut de la Garenne from the age of 9.

He said living with her was "living in constant fear all the time."

Inquiry Counsel Harriet Jerram asked if other staff ever intervened and he said not, "it was the norm."

Mr D also suffered violence from Gordon Wateridge. After one incident he complained to the Superintendent running the home and asked for the police to be called. This didn't happen: "...nothing ever happened, no-one took any notice."

Mr D remembers the visit by Jimmy Savile in 1976, during which Witness 125 told police he was sexually abused. Mr D says he didn't have any contact with the BBC presenter and declined to have his photograph taken with him.

Earlier he described being adopted as a small child and said it had been the "wrong decision." His adoptive parents' attitude towards him had changed after they had their own son. He said his care worker Patricia Thornton didn't appear to like children and never asked how he was.

The hearing is continuing and further statements from other former residents at Haut de la Garenne will be read into the record this afternoon.

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