Operation Sacred Ground: Investigating Harmful Ritual Practices, Witchcraft Accusations and Safeguarding Gaps
Date: 01 April 2026
Time: 9:00 am-10:00 am BST; 7:00 pm-8:00 pm AEST
Venue: Online - click here
About Our Event
Operation Sacred Ground is a practitioner-led research project examining how witchcraft accusations and harmful ritual practices intersect with safeguarding failures, policing challenges, and cultural misunderstanding.
Drawing on case-based analysis, operational experience, and academic research, this talk explores how belief systems can become sites of harm—particularly for children, vulnerable adults, and marginalised communities—when accusations escalate into abuse, neglect, or violence.
The session introduces a structured investigative lens for recognising early indicators of ritual-related harm, navigating belief-sensitive contexts, and improving multi-agency responses without criminalising culture or faith. The session is designed for safeguarding practitioners, police, social care professionals, and partner agencies seeking practical tools, ethical clarity, and operational confidence when responding to belief‑related harm.
About Our Speaker
Dr Keith Silika is a ex police officer and currently a lecturer in Policing specialising in researching harmful ritual practices, witchcraft accusations, and safeguarding within belief-based contexts. His work sits at the intersection of policing, cultural criminology, artificial intelligence, child and adult protection, with a focus on translating complex belief-related harm into operationally usable frameworks for frontline professionals.
