New Netflix documentary explores children's claims their father ran a satanic cult
Accused: The Hampstead Paedophile Hoax was released by Channel 4 in 2024, and has now been released on the streaming giant.
The hour-long documentary tells the tale of how Ricky Dearman was accused of running the ring by his two children and their mother, Ella Draper. A documentary about the true story of how a pair of children falsely accused their father of being part of a Satan-worshipping paedophile ring has hit Netflix. Pic: Channel 4
Police interviews saw the children make shocking claims about their father along with some 175 teachers, parents, police and religious leaders — and their half-brother.
The kids claimed that the cult raped children, killed babies and then wore their skulls while dancing around drinking their blood.
Following a police search of the local school and church, it was found that the rooms in which the children said the babies had been killed did not exist.
Shockingly, it was later revealed that the children were forced to make the claims by their mother, Ella, and her then partner Abraham Christie.
Draper and Christie could not be prosecuted for the unfounded claims due to the psychological abuse of the children taking place in Morocco while they holidayed, the Guardian reports.
If you want a jolly briefing of what bad the internet can do, and how there are absolute nutters lurking out there hiding behind their keyboards, just watch Accused The Hampstead Paedophile Hoax (now available on Netflix). It's frightening. — Goo (@goo_stewart) June 1, 2025
Despite the claims being debunked, the widespread sharing of them online gave increased attention to conspiracy theories that there is a satanic cult in Hampstead.
A number of theorists have been jailed as a result of the harassment of those wrongly accused.
This documentary is making my blood boil, I want to punch these 4 main protagonists in the face so badly.Sabine, Rupert, Ella and Abraham you are absolute scum. Pieces of shit.
I should start a go fund me to go find THEM!#Netflix | #AccusedTheHampsteadPaedophileHoax — The Unknown Soldier (@savemefriend16) June 1, 2025
The Channel 4 documentary, which was recently dropped on Netflix, speaks to a number of those who had their lives destroyed by the shock claims.
Viewers have taken to X to have their say on the disturbing true story, with one writing: 'If you want a jolly briefing of what bad the internet can do, and how there are absolute nutters lurking out there hiding behind their keyboards, just watch Accused The Hampstead Paedophile Hoax (now available on Netflix). It's frightening.'
Watching Accused: The Hampstead Paedophile Hoax. I feel so bad for those falsely accused parents. This shit is wild. Imagine getting your kids to say stuff like that 😳 #Accused #Netflix — SSarah (@SLarhorn) June 3, 2025
Another added: 'This documentary is making my blood boil, I want to punch these 4 main protagonists in the face so badly.
'Sabine, Rupert, Ella and Abraham you are absolute scum. Pieces of sh**. I should start a go fund me to go find THEM.'
A third shared: 'Watching Accused: The Hampstead Paedophile Hoax. I feel so bad for those falsely accused parents. This sh** is wild. Imagine getting your kids to say stuff like that #Accused #Netflix.'
Accused: The Hampstead Paedeophile Hoax is streaming on Netflix now.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Irish Independent
3 hours ago
- Irish Independent
What to watch on TV and streaming today: Leanne, Griff's Great American South and Show Boat
Ottoman Empire by Train with Alice Roberts RTÉ2, 7pm The journey continues with a trip to see the tombs of two historic leaders born 600 years apart — Osman and Kemal Atatürk. Roberts also learns about a lucrative breed of goats. Annika BBC One, 9.10pm The crime drama set in Scotland and starring Nicola Walker begins its second series with an investigation into a drowning. Griff's Great American South Channel 4, 9.10pm Griff Rhys Jones' new six-part exploration of America's southern states starts in Tennessee. Ceiliúradh Peil na mBan 2025 TG4, 9.45pm If fans aren't already in the mood for the All-Ireland ladies football finals, they will be after watching this programme in which Máire Ní Bhraonáin and her guests offer a preview and listen to music from the six participating counties. Show Boat RTÉ One, 3.45pm Oscar-winning musical romance following the lives, loves and varying fortunes of those working on a Mississippi river paddle steamer over the course of 40 years. Kathryn Grayson, Howard Keel, Ava Gardner and Joe E Brown star. RTÉ One, 9.25pm The fifth entry in the action series follows Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) and his colleagues as they defy their orders to track down a secret society of hired killers. Jeremy Renner and Rebecca Ferguson (above, with Cruise) co-star. Trainwreck: Storm Area 51 Netflix, streaming now Frankly, I don't mind that they're starting to get repetitive; it's still appointment viewing every week in Chez McGinley. In 2019, a joke Facebook event to 'storm Area 51' went viral, drawing millions and triggering warnings from US authorities. Indeed, it does sound exceedingly similar to last month's Real Project X instalment, but I'm still here for it. Conversations with a Killer: The Son of Sam Tapes Netflix, streaming now 'Tis the turn of David Berkowitz's police tapes to get an airing. This chilling docuseries unpacks the Son of Sam killings, exposing Berkowitz's disturbing mindset he unleashed on 1970s NYC. Brady and the Blues Prime Video, streaming now Prime appears to be chasing some of that Welcome to Wrexham magic with a new sports docuseries featuring NFL icon Tom Brady. Mind you, this could be entirely different given Brady, at 3.3pc, is very much a minority stakeholder in Birmingham City FC. Perfect Match Netflix, streaming now Netflix's biggest reality stars – from Love Is Blind to Too Hot To Handle – head to paradise to search for love (or more followers) in a strategic dating showdown. So, like Battle Camp but with more bikinis. For more 'unscripted' drama, WWE: Unreal takes fans inside the writer's room for a look at the chaos behind the curtain. Leanne Netflix, streaming now Leanne Morgan's world flips when her husband leaves after 33 years. Menopausal and newly single, she leans on her family – especially her fierce sister Carol (Kristen Johnston) – to tackle this next chapter with Southern grit and lashings of 'jello salad'. Chuck Lorre is involved, so it can't be too bad.
Irish Daily Mirror
4 hours ago
- Irish Daily Mirror
'The people of Galway take Race Week off - to spend more time in worse traffic'
If you've been trying to contact Galway this week, sorry about that. Galway's off. Maybe you're in the midlands and you've spotted someone wearing an oversized jumper, with bongo drums, and four thin dogs on bailing twine. You may have thought "that person looks lost - I'll give Galway a call, they're probably looking for that person in Eyre Square"... So you phone Galway and no response. Not even a message minder saying "thanks for calling Shop Street, we'll call back if we get some arts grants". And then you realise. Ah... It's the Galway Races. The lost hippy with the bongo drum will have to find their own way back to their spiritual home. For a city that spends most of the time in traffic, the people of Galway all take Race Week off - mostly to spend even more time in worse traffic. Those who have jobs take Race Week off. Those who don't have jobs take Race Week off too. Credit to the good men and women of the Emergency Services who are always working. Them, and people who sell coffee or chips from trailers. So you might see work happening if someone scalds themselves with an americano after bumping into someone with a snackbox. Other than that, forget about it. There's a small minority who wear their special clothes and watch wonderful tiny people do amazing things on horses. Everyone else is having pints or - in these challenging times - slightly less expensive cans. Neachtains pub will be so crowded there might even be people in there who don't qualify for an arts grant. Many people celebrate their time off by avoiding the city and instead visiting the towns and villages they actually live in. Oranmore, for example, will be packed as there will be a huge influx of people from Oranmore. There might be tourists. You'll know them because they'll be dressed for the weather - not for a Netflix drama based in industrial England. You can tell it's Race Week because there's fewer helicopters in the sky. Locals might quip: "It must be the races because it's not like Apocalypse Now". So if you need to contact Galway, wait two weeks. Or maybe give Clare, Sligo or Mayo a shout instead.
Irish Examiner
8 hours ago
- Irish Examiner
Colin Sheridan: Obama's silence on Gaza makes Freedom of Dublin award deeply problematic
There's a long and noble Irish tradition of giving medals to people who don't need them. Mimicking our one-time oppressors, we're good at the pomp and pageantry, terrible at timing. And in this grand tradition of ceremonial sycophancy, we've now decided to give the Freedom of Dublin to Barack Obama — the same Barack Obama whose presidential legacy includes a kill list, expanded drone warfare, and now, more recently, a silence on Gaza so deafening it practically registers on the Richter scale. Now, before someone starts waving a Hope poster in my face and singing 'Is Feider Linn', let's be clear: this isn't a character assassination. Barack Obama is, by many accounts, charming, intelligent, a skilled orator, and less overtly monstrous than some who followed him. But if the bar for receiving Dublin's highest civic honour is simply 'better than Trump,' then let's all take turns. This isn't about left or right. It's about right and wrong. And giving Obama the keys to a city that prides itself on solidarity, social justice and neutrality — a city only a century since it's own liberation from colonisers, a city that once shut down its port in protest of apartheid — is a moral absurdity that would be funny if it weren't so grotesque. Let's talk about Gaza. Right now, we're witnessing an unquestionable genocide, one that even conservative estimates rank among the worst atrocities in recent memory. Tens of thousands dead. Children buried under rubble. Journalists and doctors targeted with impunity. And what's Obama's response? A few muted bromides about 'the complexity of the situation' and the usual plea for restraint — the kind of lukewarm platitude you'd expect from someone looking to protect a Netflix deal, not someone once hailed as the conscience of the free world. Remember, this is the same man who, while president, gave Israel the largest military aid package in US history — $38bn over ten years. The same man who watched as Gaza was pummelled in 2014, and then blocked efforts at the UN for accountability. In Obama's world, apparently, some lives matter more than others — and it's not the ones buried under the debris in Khan Younis So let's ask: What, exactly, are we honouring? Is it the weekly 'Terror Tuesday' meetings where he personally signed off on drone strikes — many of which killed civilians, including children, with such frequency that his administration had to redefine the word 'combatant' to keep the numbers palatable? Is it the Nobel Peace Prize he received before bombing seven countries? Or is it the charming eloquence with which he explained away extrajudicial assassinations and mass surveillance? Maybe it's the warm pint he had in Moneygall. Maybe that's enough. Maybe our foreign policy is so thin it can be blown over by a puff of Guinness foam. Obama's defenders, and there are many, will say: "He tried." They'll point to the Iran deal. They'll mention the thaw with Cuba. And fair enough — no presidency is black and white (though drone strikes absolutely are). But a Freedom of the City is not a footnote in a CV. It's a declaration of values. And at a time when Dublin has become a symbol — however small — of international moral conscience on Gaza, this award feels not just tone-deaf, but actively insulting It's worth asking how we'd feel if another country handed such an honour to, say, Tony Blair, citing his contribution to the peace process while politely ignoring Iraq. We'd scoff. We'd march. We'd write strongly-worded op-eds, the kind I'm doing now. And yet, because Obama quotes Seamus Heaney and has a smile that makes white liberals feel good about themselves, we're expected to ignore the trail of bodies left in his geopolitical wake. It's also galling because the Freedom of Dublin isn't just symbolic fluff — at least, it wasn't meant to be. It should be given to people like Nelson Mandela and John Hume — people whose lives were defined by their resistance to violence, not their management of it. To toss Obama into that company is like inviting Monsanto to an organic farming festival. Let's not pretend this is just a harmless bit of civic theatre. In a world as interconnected and morally muddled as ours, gestures matter. They signal what we stand for And giving Obama this award now — as children in Gaza die in silence, too exhausted to even scream — sends a very clear message: that brand is more important than behaviour, that the image of progress is more valuable than the practice of it. And to those in Dublin City Council who greenlit this award: shame on you. Not because Obama is uniquely evil — he's not — but because you should know better. You should know that real solidarity isn't measured in photo ops, but in principles. You should know that timing matters. Context matters. And right now, there's blood on the sand in Gaza, and silence in the White House archives. We don't need empty ceremonies. We need moral courage. And giving the Freedom of Dublin to Barack Obama is not an act of courage. It's an act of cowardice wrapped in a velvet sash.
