Shaun Dallison: Pedo dad abused girl, 14, while HIV positive and turned her against her mom
A perverted father sexually abused his 14-year-old daughter for years while being HIV positive.
Shaun Dallison got back in touch with Lauren Eden-Penn by using his diagnosis after he left her biological mother while she was still pregnant with her. He eventually began grooming and sexually abusing the teenager by plying her with alcohol and drugs and even turning her against her own mother. Now 22, Lauren has waived her anonymity to openly speak out against her abusive father after he was released from jail halfway through an eight-year sentence.
RELATED ARTICLES
"When he reads my story if it does give him a sinking feeling in the stomach I hope he realizes that it hasn’t gone away," the mother-of-two from Bournemouth told the Sunday Mirror. "As much as my life has got better, I do struggle with my mental health and it is always going to be there. It is a life sentence for me. It will always be there no matter how much I move on. But if anybody else is in a similar situation I would tell them not to blame themselves like I used to blame myself. I realize now you can’t blame yourself for terrible decisions that someone else has made. It doesn’t define you. Even if terrible things have happened to you, you can still go on to achieve things that you want to do.”
The ordeal began when Lauren was just 11 after Dallisson contacted her following a "near-death experience." At first, he would take her and her half-brother to the cinema and a number of family trips. But Lauren noted how their "normal family" life" took an ugly turn when she turned 14, and her drug-fiend father began abusing her. “I fell asleep and I woke up to dad touching me," she recounted. "I was just kind of frozen at that point. I didn’t really move or anything. I just kind of cried a little bit and I don’t think he realized I was awake, but when he did realize he stopped. He was saying ‘I am a monster, what have I done? What have I done?’ But it kept on happening.”
Dallisson then began abusing Lauren on a regular basis, and his daughter kept mum as she was terrified of losing him again. She said he flew her, her brother, and nan on a trip to Egypt, where he abused her once again. Upon returning, the abuse continued for a few more months until Dallisson suddenly stopped hurting his daughter. However, he allegedly made her feel guilty by stopping his medication and calling himself a monster. Meanwhile, the teenager's mother grew concerned over how withdrawn she had become. Upon going through her daughter's phone, she found messages from the father apologizing for his depraved actions. The mother, who has not been named, subsequently confronted the abuser and he confessed before the authorities arrested him.
Lauren remembered how she had to undergo HIV testing and was fortunately in the clear, but she couldn't shake the psychological effects of the abuse. "At the time I struggled a lot," she said. "I did try to end my life at one point. I definitely slipped into drug use. Although social workers were giving me counselors I just wanted to be left alone, I didn’t want to talk about it."
In 2014, Dallison was sentenced to eight years in prison after pleading guilty to five counts of engaging in sexual activity with a minor and one count of supplying cannabis. However, he was released four years later and has spent the past four years on license -- albeit that's now coming to an end. Meanwhile, a brave Lauren managed to rebuild her life and completed her GCSEs and A levels before going to university. She has since launched a successful business and has two children of her own.
"Over time I gradually started to realize that none of it was my fault. But then when I had my first daughter I found that very emotional. I just looked at her and thought how could you do that?" Lauren said. “I’ve never really felt angry. I now kind of think why? It isn’t even anger, it is more pity. How could he do that to me?" She added, "My partner has been a huge support. Telling my story is almost freeing in a sense. Nobody can hold it over me - it is out there. I hope by me speaking out it will spark conversations that are important. Even if one person reads my story and thinks it is not just me then it will be worthwhile.”