A woman has revealed how her childhood was plagued by horrific abuse inflicted upon her and her sister by their wicked stepfather who was only a few years older than them.
Helen Neaven, 43, and her younger sister, Angela McBride, 41, both from Peterborough, faced unimaginable horrors in their family home while growing up.
Their mother’s husband Glen Johnson, who was just seven years older than Helen and nine years older than Angela, sexually abused and tortured the sisters one-by-one.
Sadly, the abuse was swept under the rug, and the sisters spent decades without justice as their childhood hell remained a dark secret.
They went on to have families of their own and battled with debilitating PTSD in their day-to-day lives.
Despite having families of their own in later life, Helen and Angela suffered from debilitating PTSD.
Approaching their 40s, they courageously came forward to the police and now they have achieved justice.
The siblings have bravely waived their anonymity in a bid to encourage other historic abuse survivors to speak out and seek justice.
Two sisters who suffered horrific torture and sexual abuse at the hands of their wicked stepfather have spoken out after seeing him jailed nearly 30 years on. Pictured: Helen Neaven (right) and Angela McBride (left)
The sisters were just children when their stepfather Glen Johnson, who wasn’t even 10 years older than them, moved into the family home
Helen was just 10 years old and shared a bedroom with her eight-year-old sister Angela in 1990 when they realised their mother had a new flame.
The girls, who never knew their biological father, saw their mother hugging a young man downstairs.
‘The next thing, he was moving in,’ Helen recalled. ‘Mum was 29 and Glen was 18. She was 10 years older.
‘Although I found it odd, I hoped our new stepdad would be kind. But as soon as he settled in, Mum told us that Glen was in charge and we had to listen to our new father.’
Right away, Johnson, who worked in logistics, was very strict in the family household.
Often he yelled at the girls for making a mess, and told them to tidy up.
Helen, who now works as a business support officer, said: ‘Glen didn’t bond with us. He would just scream at us to pick up our toys and belongings.
Johnson, now, 50, has been jailed for historic sex offences after the sisters decided to report him when Helen was 40 and Angela was 38
‘He would follow us around, bullying us and giving us bedroom inspections. If the bedroom wasn’t spotless, he’d flip our beds upside down and trash the room.
‘Angela and I were always terrified and we’d cower away in a corner.
‘After school, we’d come home exhausted. But Glen made me do the washing and make dinner whilst Angela hoovered and cleaned. He gave constant demands where I had to make cups of tea. I didn’t know if it was normal or not, I felt miserable.’
Before long, Johnson took authority over the whole house, leaving Helen and Angela terrified to cross him. Then one day, when Johnson flew into a rage, the torture began.
‘One afternoon, he confronted us about a doughnut that had been bitten into,’ Helen recalled.
‘He screamed at us, demanding to know who’d taken the bite. We both shook our heads, telling him it wasn’t us.
‘He lined us up and forced us both to take a bite of an uneaten doughnut. Then he matched the teeth marks with the other doughnut.
‘Turned out it was my sister’s. He then forced us to stand against the wall, and bend our knees to get into a squat position.
‘He forced our arms out and he made us freeze in that position. My thighs were burning, and shaking violently.
The sisters dealt with horrific abuse in their younger years at the hands of their stepfather
Johnson (pictured) operated a reign of terror in the family household and subjected the sisters to torture if they did anything he considered disobedient
The sisters, who never knew their biological father, first saw Johnson when they saw their mother hugging him in the hallway of the house
‘So was Angela’s. As an hour passed, we were both in a flood of tears, trying to stay up.
‘Glen watched us in excruciation, yelling at us if we fell over, and made us go back into the position.
‘Then, he got a Yellow Pages book and a BT phone book and put it onto our arms. It was agony, and I was on the verge of passing out. We were hysterical.
‘After that day, Angela and I named it the ‘horrible position.’
From then on, every day, Johnson would threaten to torture the girls with the agonising position if they didn’t listen to him.
Helen and Angela were ‘living in fear’ under Johnson’s reign of terror in the home – but things were still to get worse for the sisters.
Later that year, he called Helen into the room he shared with her mother and eerily told her he needed to examine her body.
She recalled: ‘He told me he needed to check I was growing up. Suddenly, he put his hand down my top, and cupped my breast.
‘He placed my hand on his crotch area, teaching me what a hard on was. He fondled me all over. His clammy cold hand gave me a prickly sensation.
‘I was scared, and confused. It felt wrong. After he told me not to tell, or I’d get him into trouble. I didn’t tell Angela or anyone what had happened.
‘Over the years, Glen became more cruel to us. I grew old enough to realise I was being abused.’
The sisters are telling their story in the hope of encouraging other historic victims of abuse to come forward
As the girls grew up, the family moved into a bigger three-storey home – but despite having more space, the girls were forced to stay in their rooms each night.
He also began to pit them against each other, leading them to become very distant.
Eventually, in 1995 when Helen was 15, she moved in with her boyfriend to get away from the house of horrors she’d been raised in.
By this time, Angela had just turned 14 and was still living with their mother and Johnson. But when Helen went back to the house one afternoon to see her sister while their parents were out, Angela blurted out that she, too, had been sexually abused by their stepfather.
‘My heart sank as I realised it had happened to my baby sister too,’ Helen said. ‘I told her I knew she was telling the truth because he did the same to me.’
The girls’ agony was made worse then Johnson came home and heard the commotion between them, which sent him ‘off the rails’.
‘Angela and I were forced to sit on his knee and apologise. It was sickening,’ she said.
‘The abuse was soon swept under the rug and Angela and I never spoke of it again.’
Both traumatised, the sisters vowed to forget everything. Over the years as they grew older, their relationship was still torn and they kept a distance.
It wasn’t until they both were adults that they found themselves reconnecting.
Both married and had their own children; Helen became a mother-of-two and Angela a mother-of-five.
As long as her mother remained with Johnson, Helen refused to let her children anywhere near him – but the trauma of her childhood began to take its toll.
After drifting apart in their teenage years, the sisters became closer again after each having their own children
She said: ‘As a busy mum, juggling kids and work, my mental health deteriorated. I suffered with depression, anxiety and PTSD from what Glen had done.
‘Sometimes whilst shopping I’d even ask permission from my husband to put something in the trolley.
‘The scars that Glen had made on me had stuck, even later in life.’
One day, when the sisters were both in their mid-30s, Angela revealed to Helen that Johnson had also touched her inappropriately when she was just nine years old.
‘It was like a knife to my chest. I said he touched me too. Both in our mid-30s, for the first time in our lives, we spoke a little of the abuse. We hugged tight.
‘All those years I spent feeling so alone, and isolated, were for nothing, because Angela was the only person who knew the exact pain I’d been in.’
After that, Helen and Angela grew close, becoming a comfort to each other. They even moved a few doors down from each other on the same street in Peterborough.
It wasn’t until 2020, when Helen was 40 and Angela was 38, that they both bravely decided to come forward to the police.
Helen said: ‘We’d had enough. When we spoke to the police, they arrested Glen at his home.
‘A lovely officer fought hard to prove how the ‘horrible position’ was child torture, and backed us every step of the way.
‘After my entire life thinking I wouldn’t be believed, the police listened and cared.’
In December 2023, Glen Johnson, now 50, of Waltham Close, Peterborough, pleaded guilty to one count of child cruelty and one count of indecent assault against a child against Helen at Cambridge Crown Court.
He also pleaded guilty to one count of child cruelty and two counts of indecent assault against a child against Angela. He was sentenced to four years and two months.
Helen said: ‘In court, Glen looked like an old, vulnerable man. The authoritative ruler I’d known as a young girl was no longer there.
‘He was very unkempt and frail. He even told a lawyer that he was sorry for ruining our lives.
‘Although he’d shown remorse, nothing would take away the lifetime of pain he’d inflicted upon me and Angela.
‘Now Glen’s in prison, it’s his turn to suffer. While Angela and I can finally begin to heal.
‘One positive to come out of this is how close it has brought us. We are sisters who have bonded through our trauma, and we’ll be best friends for life.
‘To anyone else out there who’s suffering through this silence, please reach out to someone. You are not alone.’
She added: ‘After 30 years, my sister and I finally have closure. I want other mums reading our story to know, it’s never too late to get justice.
‘If we can inspire just one person to come forward, that’s our job done.’
