Post-trial
The Wells and Chapman families received £11,000 in compensation for the death of their daughters. This was a statutory payment administered by a non-departmental public body, the Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority. The compensation tariffs are set by the UK Parliament and administered by the Civil Service. The compensation was widely criticised in the media; the director of the Victims of Crime Trust, Clive Elliott, described it as a "pittance".
Following the announcement of Huntley's conviction, it emerged that various authorities were aware of allegations, from a number of sources, that he had committed one act of indecent assault, four acts of underage sex and three rapes.
The only one of these allegations that resulted in a charge was a rape, for which he had been remanded in custody but released when the Crown Prosecution Service decided that there was not enough evidence for a conviction. Huntley had also been charged with burgling a neighbour in Grimsby but he was not convicted, although the charge remained on file.
On the day of Huntley's conviction, the Home Secretary David Blunkett announced an inquiry into the vetting system which allowed Huntley to get a caretaker's job at a school despite four separate complaints about him reaching social services. One of the pertinent issues surfaced almost immediately when Humberside Police (where all the alleged offences had taken place) stated that they believed that it was unlawful under the Data Protection Act to hold data regarding allegations which did not lead to a conviction; this was contradicted by other police forces who thought this too strict an interpretation of the Act.
There was also considerable concern about the police investigation into the girls' murders. It took nearly two weeks before the police became aware of previous sexual allegations against Huntley and, although he was the last person to see either of the two children, his story was not effectively checked out early during the investigation.
Huntley had not been convicted of any of the criminal allegations, but his burglary charge had remained on file. Howard Gilbert, then headteacher of Soham Village College, later said that he would not have employed Huntley as a caretaker if he had been aware of the burglary charge, as one of Huntley's key responsibilities in his role was to ensure security in the school grounds. The Soham murders led to tightening of procedures in the Criminal Records Bureau system which checks the criminal background of people who work with children, following criticism that the system had weaknesses and loopholes.
Read more about this topic: Jessica Aimee Chapman