Coronation Street's Bill Roache was this morning arrested at his home on suspicion of rape. The long-time soap actor who plays Ken Barlow is facing allegations of historic sexual abuse of a 15 year old girl, with Lancashire police releasing the following statement:
'An 81-year-old man from Wilmslow in Cheshire has this morning, Wednesday, 1st May 2013, been arrested by Lancashire Constabulary on suspicion of rape. The man will be interviewed at a police station in Lancashire during the course of the day. The offences are alleged to have been committed in Haslingden between April and July 1967 and to involve a girl aged 15-years.
We take all allegations of sexual abuse extremely seriously and would encourage people with any information about sexual abuse, or anyone who has been a victim of sexual abuse, to come forward and report their concerns confident in the knowledge they will be investigated appropriately and with sensitivity.'
According to Sky News, police arrived at Roache's home early this morning and are continuing to search the premises. They are also stressing that this is not a part of Operation Yewtree, which is investigating claims of historic sexual abuse following the death of Jimmy Savile. This comes on the back of Roache recently making a particularly distressing statement in an interview in New Zealand that sparked outrage.
'There’s a fringe of people who, particularly pop singers, they have these groupies. These girls who come, they’re sexually active, sexually mature. They don’t ask for their birth certificate, they don’t know what age they may be.' he said. 'But they’re certainly not grooming them and exploiting them, but they can be caught in this trap. Whether they’re proven guilty or not, we should not be judgmental about anybody, ever. We should always be totally forgiving about everything'. Roache later released a statement apologising for any offence taken from his comments.
