Teresa Cooper’s, No2abuse covers news, articles and includes the Church of England Kendall House, Review and Addendum Report – Interim Support Scheme and Terms of Reference.
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‘Trust no one’ a hard-hitting book – authored by Teresa, made number one on Amazon, and was later translated into Swedish and Danish and audio.
Teresa Cooper was one of the first eleven cases chosen for the new Church of England’s Interim Support Scheme. This has been a very toxic process and led to a rapid decline in Teresa’s health. More details here
TERESA’S STORY
This is the war record of one woman’s battle for justice – for herself and hundreds of other youngsters forced to endure a dangerous regime of unnecessary medication, severe physical restraint and sexual abuse in what we euphemistically call our ‘care’ system.
Teresa Cooper, a 54 year old mother of three, bears the bodily and mental scars of three years’ incarceration in a lock-up girls’ home run by the Church of England’s Council for Social Responsibility, and forty years of trying to uncover the truth to prove that she isn’t mad, bad or making it up.
Like so many others, her only crime was to be born to inadequate parents living in poverty and deprivation. But instead of sinking into self-pity, her inner strength drove a fighting spirit that has finally won the day – forcing the Church to apologise and admit that she was forcibly drugged with massive cocktails of potentially lethal psychotropic drugs and sexually abused when she was unconscious.
After three decades of denials, refusals and obfuscation by the Church, Wandsworth social services, Kent police and government ministers, as well as a string of inaccurate and incompetent legal advice, Teresa’s unprecedented victory has opened up an important new battleground.
Teresa set out to prove that the drugs she and other girls were forced to take have resulted in long-term side effects that made them give birth to babies with defects and caused the illnesses the women now suffer including Teresa.
In a remarkable admission, the Bishop of Durham and Church of England admitted there was a statistical link between the drugs at Kendall House and the birth defects 2014.
The Kendall House Review was commissioned by the Church of England. The panel. Dr Sue Proctor, Ray Galloway [Jimmy Saville reports] and Samantha Cohen led the review and their findings, shocking.
2016. The Kendall House report revealed
Years of historic abuse and sedating children and placing them in straight jackets. It was a place where control, containment and sometimes cruelty were normalised. Over 300 young girls aged 9 – 16 were placed at Kendall House.
Every resident was at risk from physical or sexual abuse by staff or visitors
The effects of the drugs also increased their vulnerability to emotional, physical and a smaller number of cases, sexual abuse. Drugs were also crushed and given with sugar, or dissolved in honey and hot water
Girls as young as 9, were routinely and often without any initial medical assessment, given antidepressants, sedatives, and anti-psychotic medication. Often these drugs were given in dosages which exceeded usual prescribed adult levels. This served to control their behaviour, placing them in a constant stupor, restricting their ability to communicate or to learn, or have any personal autonomy.
These drugs put them at risk of numerous side effects, many of which were distressing. The effects of the drugs also increased their vulnerability to emotional, physical and, in a smaller number of cases, sexual abuse.
Those that resisted, challenged, or overcame the effects of these routinely administered drugs faced sanctions. These included being locked in a room for long periods and receiving emotionally abusive threats and actions. In many cases, even the slightest misdemeanour’s, the typical features of teenagers’ behaviour, were ‘dealt’ with by physical restraint, sometimes violent, and intra-muscular injections of powerfully sedating medication.
Residents were troubled teenaged girls, some sent there as a place of safety, others because of anti-social behaviour, some had psychological or behavioural problems. They were supervised by unqualified staff led until 1985 by Law, who had an “autocratic leadership style.
There remained damaging life-long effects and a small number of residents went on to attempt suicide during and after living there and sadly some succeeded.
Founder Rev Nicolas David Stacey, London and Quadrant – ex director of Kent Social Services.
L&Q is Teresa’s landlord and was forced to endure excessive harassment by employees and malicious eviction attempts throughout the review and after.
The Kendall House review was revisited in the month of September 2016 – to offer Teresa and others who did not participate in the initial review – a chance to participate and talk to the panel.
Teresa said, “I did not participate in the original review I fought over thirty years for because the terms of reference contained incorrect information designed to exclude me and my experiences in seeking justice.”
I participated in the addendum review and received an official acknowledgement from the panel.
The opening of the Kendall House Addendum report reads
In addition to the acknowledgments set out in the main report which was published in July 2016 (and is available on the Diocese of Rochester website), we would like to add our thanks to the former residents and former staff member who spoke with us as part of this extended review. We also would like to make an acknowledgement to one particular former resident of Kendall House.
In the main report, we described the response of the Diocese of Rochester to complaints made about Kendall House since its closure in 1986
Largely, these complaints were made by one-woman, former resident, Teresa Cooper. Teresa has worked relentlessly to try to make the church understand, accept, and act in response to her concerns about the abusive practices at Kendall House. Through lobbying, researching, and detailed analysis, she has supported many other former residents to seek affirmation of their experiences, as well as working on her own process of recovery.
We would like to take this opportunity to thank Teresa Cooper for all her efforts, and her struggles in seeking the truth about Kendall House. In respect of this review, we are most grateful for her contribution, in her interview and her emails, and to all who participated, for showing such courage in speaking with us.
The report excludes a lot of information from the report due to the panels contract with the Church of England and the Terms of Reference.
The drug experiments that were taking place at Kendall House were excluded from the review. No information was given as to who supplied the drugs, who authorised them, where the test blood and urine samples were supplied to or what the results were because of the Terms of Reference.
There was no mention of the forced adoptions or the birth defects.
A powerful and compelling story of one woman’s instrumental fight for justice. An engaging insight into the betrayal lies and corruption. An exposé of the length the Church of England and higher authorities went to cover-up the abuse of many young girls at the notorious Kendall House.
Teresa’s courageous journey successfully proved Kendall House abuse and held the Church of England and others accountable – for one of the most horrific abuses of children in English history. Abuse that later affected the unborn children and grandchildren born with birth defects.
After many gruelling tests and biopsies, Teresa has now medically proven that not only does she have a new rare life-threatening disease, but Doctors also hold the misuse of drugs at Kendall House fully responsible.
Late 2020, Teresa was approached by the Church of England’s Interim Support Scheme and whilst it provided some positive support it has also been a very toxic and damaging process exacerbating Teresa’s health and mental wellbeing. It does not paint a satisfactory picture and displays a lack of care, understanding and a fragrant disregard for her health or safety.
Bully tactics and misuse of the scheme by church employees is a continued problem and it has caused significant harm.
There is no understanding of the extreme child abuse Teresa suffered.
The severity of consequences to her physical and mental health and the catastrophic impact it has had on her life and family – the scheme employees and church persons have treated her with utter contempt.
There appears to be a personal vendetta against Teresa, by those employees.
The church interim support scheme reveals a very disturbing safeguarding issue where nothing has been learned. They fail to understand one of the main points…..
The scheme represents those who abused every survivor of Church of England childhood abuse. They expect survivors to simply drop their trust issues and fears. If only it were that simple. It is not. It is a long painful process rebuilding trust and the way to fuel that mistrust and negativity further is to blatantly ignore it.
The Church of England took away all trust and it is their job to rebuild every bridge they willingly burnt to the ground for decades. It is not an easy road when dealing with hurt and angry survivors of abuse but it is the church’s responsibility to absorb and learn from it.
Communication is not their strong point.
No2abuse was set up by Teresa to give survivors of abuse a voice and a place to source information.
No2abuse aims to cover those stories in your new online news and resource website
