'I'm a criminologist who specialises in child sex offenders - they can never be rehabilitated'

A criminologist who has spent decades carrying out extensive research into child sex abusers and why they behave the way they do has said they can't be rehabilitated.

The heinous crimes carried out by sex offenders and paedophiles is truly beyond comprehension for most people - yet they still happen, and according to Dr Graham Hill, these people - many of whom are fully integrated in society - can never be truly changed.

Dr Hill is an internationally recognised criminologist and former detective who specialises in the behaviour of adults who sexually abuse children and men who abduct and murder children.

With decades of experience, which includes working on the Madeleine McCann case in Portugal in 2007, Dr Hill has been able to analyse the behaviour of offenders and get somewhat of an understanding of why they do what they do.

And he recently spoke to LADbible's Minutes With series to delve into why they behave this way and why they are 'very good at blending in'.

Dr Graham Hill is a criminologist who specialises in child sex offenders, and he has spent decades researching their behaviour and why they commit their crimes (LADbible Stories)

'These offenders are trying to fulfil other human intrinsic needs'

"There's very different motivations for why people behave the way they do," Dr Hill explains. "There are different kinds of child abuser. Some of those... are what's known as exclusive, which means they only are interested sexually in children.

"Some are non-exclusive, which means they have adult relationships, they're married, they've got their own children, and they still sexually abuse children. So that's one category. The one below that is psychopaths."

After saying very few of the men he's interviewed throughout his career are psychopaths, Dr Hill explains that 'understanding that child sexual abuse against children is not just about sex'.

"It's far more complex than that, something sexual happens with the child and between the child and the offender," he explains. "These offenders are trying to fulfil other human intrinsic needs.

"And understanding what those needs are is the secret to building a rapport with the suspect."

Watch Dr Hill's full Minutes With episode below:

Are offenders born this way, or is it a learned behaviour?

Dr Hill believes that these offenders aren't born with a sexual interest in children, and that extensive research has concluded that it's a 'learned behaviour' that results in them 'learning to see children as sexual beings'.

"They learn to adapt and skew their moral code to behave in a way that non-offenders find hard to understand," he says. "So that's what's really important to understand that there's a complex cocktail of drivers for the behaviour."

So, can these people be rehabilitated?

The answer, according to Dr Hill, is no.

Dr Hill doesn't believe child sex offenders can be rehabilitated (LADbible Stories)

'They never, ever stop seeing children that way'

Many child sex offenders who are convicted for their crimes get the opportunity to undergo treatment programmes - but apparently, these aren't as effective as one would hope.

Dr Hill explains: "The thing about treatment programmes, the first thing to say is they shouldn't be called treatment programmes because the word treatment implies that there's a cure. And what we know is if someone develops a sexual interest in children, it is a lifelong way of seeing children as sexual beings.

"They never, ever stop seeing children that way."

He adds: "When offenders get caught in the UK, and they go to prison or they don't go to prison, we put some kind of management around them. We put them on the sex offenders register; they have a registration officer with their local police force.

"We try and manage them, manage their life and stop them going back to prison, stop them re-offending. In America, where I work a lot, they have a very different approach. They don't do a lot of route managing sex offenders at all.

"So what we do know is that if sex offenders come out of prison and don't have any support, they are more likely to offend. If they come out of prison and there's a support network around them, then some will re-offend."

Offenders living among us and 'hiding in plain sight'

But Dr Hill does say that 'some or the majority will work very hard not to re-offend again'.

He reminds us that paradoxically, sex offenders live among us, 'hiding in plain sight, but thriving on secrecy'.

"They are very good at blending in," he says. "Most sex offenders you'll ever meet hold down good jobs. They're integrated into their society.

"Often they will have their own children, their own relationships, and you wouldn't look twice at them in terms of sexual abuse of children. The only ones that you sometimes would look at and say, well, I'm not too sure about that, is these, what we know as exclusive people that are exclusively interested in children and nothing else."

If you’ve been affected by any of these issues and want to speak to someone in confidence regarding the welfare of a child, contact the NSPCC on 0808 800 5000, 10am-8pm Monday to Friday. If you are a child seeking advice and support, call Childline for free on 0800 1111, 24/7.