A woman has claimed she was groomed into a two-year sexual relationship with a man 10 years older than her, despite police knowing about it.

She said the abuse started when she was just 14, still at school and living with her parents in Rotherham.

Jessica - not her real name - said she thought she was in love with the 24-year-old man, despite what she described as his violent rages, which she said eventually led to him trying to kill her.

It was only two years ago, when she saw reports of revelations of similar cases in the media, Jessica said, that she realised she had been groomed by a paedophile.

She is one of 15 women taking action against Rotherham council to claim compensation for failings by police and social services.

Jessica claimed she met the man when he picked her up in his car in 1999 after he spotted her with friends outside shops in the town.

Speaking to the Press Association, Jessica said: "He got out, started talking to me and a friend and asked who I was. He asked me to get in the car with him and that was it. After that I saw him every day for two years."

Her parents were furious and contacted the police within days, but Jessica said they did little to intervene.

She started skipping school to be with him, lying to her parents and getting friends to cover for her. The situation escalated to her going missing for days on end, on one occasion for six weeks.

They started having sex about three or four weeks into the relationship. Jessica said: "I remember him asking me to have sex with him. I kept making excuses, not because I thought there was anything wrong with it but because I was scared.

"I felt, 'I like him, I want to be with him', but my parents were saying it was wrong, he was too old. But I didn't care. I was absolutely fascinated with him."

Jessica said they went to bed and breakfasts, hotels, his house and even other people's homes to be together, and had sex almost every day for two years.

The situation drove her family apart and at 15 she was put into care, but she said she still saw him every day, despite the police and social services being involved.

The relationship became violent, starting with shouting before progressing to slaps and shoving, and him pulling her hair.

Jessica said: "I remember one time we were fighting on a hill and he headbutted me. I wasn't scared at all in the moment, because I was so used to the fighting and the arguments. It just became so normal."

The relationship ended when she was 16, but months later she said he saw her in the town and attacked her, trying to push her over a balcony.

Jessica said she and her family had complained to the police but little had been done.

She said: "When I was 16 I was trying for a year to make statements to the police. For the whole two years of the relationship my parents were trying to bring charges but the police were saying that because I didn't make a statement (earlier) nothing could be done."

Now 29, Jessica believes the police and Rotherham Council have covered up her own abuse and that of others.

She said: "I am still in shock that not only has it happened to me, but yesterday I found out it was 1,400. I think it is absolutely disgusting.

"There are 1,400 victims. When somebody is abused their parents, brothers, sisters, aunts and uncles suffer. Thousands and thousands of people's lives have been ruined because Rotherham Council and the police couldn't be bothered to deal with it because they didn't want to clash over a race row.

"I think it is do do with the fact it is because they were Asian and they didn't want communities to be in uproar about it.

"I think people need to stop pussy-footing around and get a grip and realise what damage is being done. They (the council and police) are not sorry I got abused, they are sorry for being caught out.

"I think it is an absolutely huge cover-up. You can't tell me 1,400 children have been abused and they didn't know about it."

Speaking of her own abuse, Jessica said she is now over the emotional trauma but is now angry and wants answers.

She said: "At the time I didn't, but now I feel I definitely was groomed. He was a man, I was a child. I wasn't old enough to consent ... When a man does that to a child he is a paedophile. There is no question about it, it was abuse.

"There were so many occasions when it could have been stopped. We were together for two years, over 700 times. Somebody could have stopped it and they didn't. But the police knew about it, from day two or three."