Harriet Richards has waived her right to anonymity to describe how her older sister, Jassey Snooks, sexually abused her as a child, plying her with drugs and alcohol before forcing her to perform sex acts on webcam for strangers when she was just 13.
Snooks, now 44, a former teaching assistant for pupils with special educational needs at Hardenhuish School in Chippenham, was convicted last month at Winchester Crown Court of inciting a child, her sister Harriet, to engage in sexual activity. She was given a 16-month prison sentence, suspended for 18 months, placed on the sex offenders' register for ten years, and ordered to complete 30 rehabilitation activity days and 175 hours of unpaid work.
Harriet, now 30 and a mother herself to ten-month-old Alfie, said no one suspected what was happening to her. "She wasn't a neighbour or a family friend. She was my adult big sister, my Mum's daughter. She'd cradled me in her arms when I was a baby. She was the person I looked up to and trusted more than anyone in the world. Actually I adored her," she said.
Snooks was 26 and the mother of two young boys when she began manipulating her younger sister, according to Harriet. "Jassey told me: 'This is just what sisters do, but don't ever tell Mum because she won't believe you and she'll disown us,'" Harriet said.
How the grooming began
Harriet grew up in the coastal village of Porlock, Somerset, where her mother, Amanda, worked as a chef and housekeeper for a wealthy local family while her father, Jeremy, worked away during the week as a sales director for a clothing company. A bright pupil who loved drama and singing, Harriet became deputy head girl at her middle school in Minehead, Somerset, and hoped to win a scholarship to a performing arts school.
In 2007, when Harriet was 12, Jassey took her to a nightclub in Minehead, telling their mother, "We'll look after her." Made up to look older, Harriet got in, and her sister gave her cannabis to smoke and several alcopops to drink. "The word 'no' wasn't in my vocabulary. I was flattered by her attention. I was being groomed, but I didn't realise it," Harriet said.
By her 13th birthday, Jassey had bought her a strapless boob-tube dress instead of a gift suited to a child. Family life grew increasingly unstable: her parents' marriage was breaking down, and after the family moved to Chippenham, Wiltshire, her father emigrated to Canada, leaving Amanda more reliant on Jassey for childcare while she worked long hours as a hairdresser. At her new school, Harriet said she was badly bullied, and Jassey began ringing the school pretending to be their mother to keep her off lessons.
Webcam abuse
The abuse escalated after Jassey's own marriage broke down and she briefly moved back in with Amanda and Harriet. One evening, Harriet said, Jassey told her to come downstairs once their mother was asleep, where a webcam was set up and a man was watching. "Jassey said to me: 'We're going to do this,' and she took her top off. I did too. I was just a child, barely developed," Harriet said.
At 13, already sexualised by her sister, Harriet sent a naked photograph of herself to a boy at school who had shown interest in her. He shared it with their entire year group and the bullying worsened; Harriet said she was thrown into a brook and beaten up. She confided in Jassey, who encouraged her to stay at her flat more often.
Over the next two years, between 2008 and 2010, until Harriet was 15, Jassey staged sex shows on webcam for men roughly three times a week while her sons slept, Harriet said. Jassey gave her drugs to keep her compliant: "She gave me amphetamines, ecstasy, cocaine, poppers, weed. Drugs are a great tool for a predator. She took them too. She gave me drugs, more drugs and vodka." Harriet's school attendance collapsed and she failed her exams. She lost her virginity at 13 in what she described as a consensual one-night stand, after which she said Jassey pressured her into further degrading acts. One of the men who had watched the webcam shows, aware of how young Harriet was, was called by the Crown Prosecution Service last year to testify against Snooks, helping to secure her conviction.
Escape and recovery
The abuse stopped when Harriet, then 15, began a relationship with a boyfriend who, like others around her, believed she was 18. He ended the relationship when he discovered her true age. Harriet twice attempted suicide in the years that followed, and said she stayed loyal to Jassey out of fear, describing her sister as having "an explosive temper."
She met her now-husband, Dale, 29, in 2019, and they married in February last year. They now run a property management company together, and Harriet has recently qualified as a personal trainer. She has been drug-free for three years.
It was two years ago, in March 2024, that Harriet's childhood friend Lucy, who had witnessed the abuse as a teenager, asked if she remembered what Jassey had done. "She said: 'It was really disturbing. Why did your sister want to do that to a 13-year-old? It was incest and paedophilia,'" Harriet said, adding that hearing those words made her realise she had to tell her mother.
Reporting to police
Dale, who had not previously known what happened, contacted Amanda, who came to see Harriet immediately and believed her account without hesitation. Harriet then reported the abuse to police, supported by an adult independent sexual violence adviser from the organisation First Light, and by Horizon Victim and Witness Protection Care. Her father, Jeremy, 55, has also supported her, though other relatives, including an aunt, cousins and step-grandparents, have sided with Snooks.
Facing her sister in court
Giving her victim impact statement, Harriet told Snooks: "What I believed was normal was not normal. What I believed was love was abuse. Coming to understand that truth has shaped and tortured my life in ways I cannot fully explain. I will never be the same person I was before this happened. I have lost family, friends, relationships, and at times I have lost myself. I have struggled to eat, to sleep, to work and to function."
She also told Snooks: "You allowed the world to believe I was lying. You allowed people to believe I was unstable. You encouraged others to turn against me to protect yourself. How dare you. You were the sister I once would have done anything for, and you chose to sacrifice me," adding that the "shame and guilt are no longer mine to carry" but her sister's burden.
Harriet said she would have preferred a custodial sentence. "How can she not be locked up? She is a danger to society," she said. Still, she said the conviction had freed her: "I feel triumphant. I've been through this hellish battle and now it's time to get my life back."
