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Runaway and 'abductor' hid at refugee night shelter
Peter Allen in Paris22 Jan 2009
RUNAWAY schoolgirl Laura Stainforth stayed in a French refugee centre full of UK-bound migrants with an alleged abductor she met on the internet.
The 15-year-old from Cleethorpes, Lincolnshire, spent a week with Robert Williams, 49. She phoned home to say she was safe but refused to reveal her whereabouts. Williams, who is on bail for allegedly raping a 16-year-old, is due to appear in court today at the start of extradition proceedings.
Laura disappeared eight days ago. She and Williams sailed from Dover the next day, then took a train to Lille where they stayed at a night shelter run by a charity. Few questions are asked in such places, said French police.
After they were seen begging at a railway station, police closed in and the pair surrendered yesterday at the British Consulate General.
Laura appeared "calm" and was in "good health". British police are in France to repatriate her.
French police said Williams was "likely to be extradited within a couple of weeks".
Reader views (7)
I don't know what is worse: the man she ran off with or the dump they went to . . . or begging when they got there! Not the classiest of mini-breaks, I'd say.
- Roz, Chamonix, France, 23/01/2009 09:33
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Common sense seems to evade the young generation of today.
- Shallotman, Basildon, 22/01/2009 15:03
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Neil, the girl is 15 years old, legally a child. Any adult knowingly involved in taking her away from her legal guardians is liable to charges of abduction - she is not deemed legally competent to make the choice to go with him.
She is guilty of a schoolgirl's naivete, agreed. A 49 year old man is legally responsible for his actions.
- Rogan, Irving, 22/01/2009 14:38
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When I read about this story before I was expecting her to be a little girl! This looks like a young woman, the eyes are very knowing for her age, but still she is a very silly girl. If she thinks this man is OK why would she not bring him to meet parents, whatever age? (and very wrong on his part) I think it could be very childish attention seeking.
- Margaret Salafrio, St John's Wood, 22/01/2009 14:31
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I can't see how she was "abducted" when she went of her own free will. Naive she may be, but naivite is not a crime and people should be allowed to make their own mistakes.
- Neil, london uk,, 22/01/2009 13:39
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Hopefully her parents will receive the bill for police time spent on finding her, plus the fares to France and back for the police to collect her. What a very niave and stupid girl she must be.
- Sue, Orpington, Kent, 22/01/2009 13:02
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This is a result typical of today's mollycoddling, cotton-wool-wrapping parents. I know that neither of my sisters nor I would EVER have gone to meet a man we didn't know, because we were told from a young age not to get into strangers' cars, accept sweets off them, etc. Parents need to start injecting a bit of commonsense into their off-spring again.
- Sarah Bradshaw, Enfield, Middx, 22/01/2009 12:52
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