In 2012, the rock world was shocked when Ian Watkins, frontman of Welsh rock band Lostprophets, was charged with a number of sickening child sex offences. Despite his guilty plea and subsequent imprisonment, news has now broken that the former rocker has been reportedly grooming a young fan from prison.
As The Sun reports, a two-year-old has been placed into state care after it emerged that Ian Watkins had been in contact with the child’s mother. Despite Watkins being sentenced to a high-security prison for 35 years, he had reportedly been writing to the 21-year-old mother since last year.
The unnamed mother, who had previously met Ian Watkins as a fan when she was 16, had also visited him in prisons after she received letters from him claiming that he loved her. Watkins had also reportedly made comments to the mother that included a suggestion she wear an engagement ring, and a joke about her daughter watching her have sex.
NME notes that following this exchange, the mother began to feel “scared”, and reportedly vowed never to let Watkins have any contact with her daughter. Prison officials seized her mobile phone and laptop in December of 2016, but reportedly found “nothing untoward” within their communications. The mother had then returned to the prison to visit Watkins in January, telling him what had occurred, before visiting him again in March of 2017.
The mother’s child was taken in care after social services were alerted to the fact that she had been in contact with the disgraced singer. “This is an absolute shambles,” a spokesperson for the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children said. “We’re sickened. It’s utterly bewildering that he could carry on grooming.”
“It shows contempt for children he abused, and raises serious questions about supervision.”
Ian Watkins’ former band, Lostprophets, dissolved in 2013 following Watkins’ imprisonment. Members of the group can these days be found performing in the group No Devotion, which they formed with Thursday vocalist Geoff Rickly.
Check out No Devotion’s ‘Stay’, below.
