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ASSAULT CLAIM: David Allen says that his concerns have been ignored

A MAN who claims he was sexually assaulted while receiving care at a Birmingham hospital 16 years ago says he feels he is a victim all over again after a recent complaint he made about the way the police dealt with his case was thrown out.

David Allen, 45, from Birmingham, says he was sexually assaulted by a radiographer at City Hospital in Birmingham on 25 March 1997.

He claimed he was admitted to the hospital’s accident and emergency department after being attacked in the street and was advised to have an X-ray, which is when he says the assault took place.

According to Allen, police questioned the radiographer after he reported the sexual assault. Allen claimed that the radiographer admitted to the assault at the time, claiming it was “a mistake.”

Allen, a former British Rail employee, who met with Bob Jones, the West Midlands Police and Crime Commissioner in August this year to discuss his case, says he feels he is being made the suspect, while he is actually the victim.

In the intervening years since the alleged assault, Allen became involved in alcohol abuse and drugs, which led him to spend 12 years in prison.
But he said he has come up against a brick wall since he tried to take up the case again this year.

Allen claimed he only found out this year that West Midlands Police decided to close the investigation into the alleged assault on 27 March 1997 and not take any further action.

He says if he had been made aware of this decision, he would have made a complaint at the time.

He said that between 1997 and 2013 he attempted to contact the police about the case, but was told the documentation was unavailable.

In July this year Allen’s complaint was not upheld on appeal by West Midlands Police’s Professional Standards Department which felt there were not good enough reasons why he did not make a complaint within 12 months of the alleged offence taking place.

A spokesperson for City Hospital told The Voice: “We have no evidence that Mr Allen was at the hospital on that date in March 1997, but we have contacted him and invited him to the hospital in an effort to resolve this issue.”

Allen said: “I am concerned that this sexual assault has been minimised and trivialised. Due to the stress and trauma of this assault I ended up committing a crime and going to prison.

"To this very day the impact of this sexual assault still exists and is apparent. I feel I am the victim all over again.”