Reports of children as young as 11 abused in West Midlands mini-marts, BBC reveals

The reports were raised multiple times with police and safeguarding partners over the past 10 years, according to internal Dudley Council documents seen by the BBC.

Extracts from intelligence briefings from 2019 to 2024 also claim that children may have been at risk of being sexually abused after being offered drugs, alcohol and cigarettes in mini-marts.

A West Midlands Police spokesman initially said: "There is currently no evidence to substantiate these claims of child sexual exploitation (CSE) connected to shops in Dudley."

But after further evidence was presented to it today by the BBC, West Midlands Police asked us to use an updated statement which did not contain the claims of "no evidence". It said instead: "We have a robust partnership approach to CSE and safeguarding in the borough and across the wider West Midlands.

"CSE is a serious crime, so we will always act on any information we receive."

David Greenwood, a specialist child abuse lawyer who investigated CSE in Rotherham, says: "It's hard to see how West Midlands Police can categorically deny the existence of evidence.

"We need to remember these are truly serious offences against vulnerable children which must be robustly investigated."

Worries over child abuse on high streets in the West Midlands were repeatedly shared in briefings with members of a child sexual exploitation safeguarding group between 2016 and 2025, according to the council worker.

The briefings compile intelligence from complaints made to Trading Standards by community members and different authorities, as well as intelligence from "regional databases such as Citizens Advice Bureau… Companies House data… and open source research".

The council worker also showed us a log of the times when concerns over CSE in shops in the West Midlands were raised by Trading Standards or police in the safeguarding group.

We understand the members of the group included West Midlands Police, council safeguarding officers and charities.

The council worker outlined that in one briefing from June 2024 a report was shared of an attempt to "lure a child to a flat" after being given free cigarettes.

Concerns were also raised by the worker that a "particular shop that was operated by an organised crime group was targeting young women" between 2016 and 2017.

West Midlands Police itself said it was possible that high street shops in the town of Lye were engaged in CSE in 2019, and requested help from Trading Standards, according to the log seen by the BBC.

Throughout 2019 and 2020 the CSE group discussed high street shops in the town, which was described as a "hot spot" for abuse where "a few children were mentioned being exploited".

Between 2019 and 2024, regular intelligence reports were sent by Trading Standards to the safeguarding group. They highlighted CSE concerns related to "pop-up shops", according to the council worker.

However, in December 2024, police stated that they had "a lack of intelligence and information around CSE and they may not know what is going on", according to the worker.

In the same month, an intelligence report says: "Trading Standards mentioned that 11-year-olds were taken in one pop-up shop to an unknown location via vehicle to collect cigarettes and vapes." The shop was then closed by Trading Standards.

The log also states that in September 2025, Trading Standards asked West Midlands Police to "carry out foreign conviction checks, to see whether the suspects they were investigating had any... sexual offences against children".

In January this year, 41 names were provided to the police, including a man who "was being investigated for rape". The document states that "we understand these checks have not been requested yet by West Midlands Police".

Separately, the BBC has seen sections of Dudley Trading Standards intelligence briefings, dating between 2019 and 2024, which repeatedly raise concerns about child sexual abuse linked to high street shops.

They identify 11 shops and shop workers across the borough where there were concerns of CSE.

A report from Trading Standards in 2024 said workers in a Stourbridge mini-mart were "now selling drugs and giving away these illegal goods to children in return for sexual favours".

Intelligence from 2019 about another mini-mart worker in the West Midlands alleged he had offered "free cigarettes to school girls for a kiss and sexually assaulted a female PCSO in Wales".

One report from September 2023 reads: "These crime groups in Dudley have links to CSE, drug offences, modern day slavery, and have illegal immigrants working on the premises."

On one of the briefing pages it states there were 118 logs of criminal activity, including CSE, found by Trading Standards at one shop in Brierley Hill.

Another law enforcement source, who has worked across the West Midlands, told the BBC that they received intelligence in 2025 that children between 13 and 15 years old were being given vapes from shop workers in return for sex.

They received reports from parents and other shopkeepers, they said, adding that during raids some of the shops "had pull out-beds and bags with women's make-up in it".

Parents and teachers reported concerns that child sexual exploitation was happening along Dudley high street, according to Dudley Trading Standards officer, Kuldeep Maan.

"The information we were getting is that children were coming to this area and were given free cigarettes, free alcohol, in return for sexual favours," he says.

While carrying out raids on shops in the area, he and his team say they have come across concerning signs.

"We were going up to the flats and seeing used condoms everywhere."

Maan says some shops in the area sell nitrous oxide (also known as laughing gas).

To investigate the claim, we sent a female undercover researcher to the borough of Dudley, where a shopworker offered her a canister of laughing gas for £30.

The man wanted the researcher to go back to his home to receive the canisters, but she refused.

A male undercover researcher also visited a mini-mart elsewhere in the West Midlands, where we were told vapes were being sold to children.

Inside, he was offered illegal cigarettes by a man who has been charged with the rape of a woman.

A woman who previously worked in a mini-mart in the West Midlands has told the BBC about being sexually assaulted by a shop worker just after the Covid-19 pandemic.

She describes going into a different mini-mart to buy cigarettes and being touched by a worker, who then tried to drag her into the toilets.

"I screamed and ran out of the shop," says the woman, who was 21 at the time and has now moved out of the area.

She says she was touched and propositioned for sex by mini-mart shop workers multiple times in different shops.

"They were harassing me, touching me… saying, 'I'll pay you money to go to the hotel'" she says.

"Because they got away with it with other girls, they thought they could get away with me as well."

A similar incident happened to a 13-year-old girl, according to the woman, who says she heard about it from the girl's mother.

"She went to buy something… they tried to drag her upstairs," she says.

"[The man was] touching her up, kissing her, trying to rip her clothes off and everything… she managed to run away."

She has also heard of young girls being given free alcohol, drugs and food and being made to have sex with men - either in hotels or in flats above shops.

Wayne Little, cabinet member for children's services at Dudley Council, has told the BBC: "We take all reports of child sexual exploitation seriously and work closely with internal colleagues and partner agencies as part of the Dudley Safeguarding People Partnership."

Additional reporting by Phill Edwards