Ex-doctor pleads guilty over circumcision service

Mohammad Siddiqui caused "painful cruelty to children", the Crown Prosecution Service said

A former doctor has admitted causing "painful cruelty to children" by running a mobile circumcision service.

Mohammad Siddiqui, 58, from Birmingham, was a practising doctor at the University Hospital Southampton NHS Foundation Trust when he started visiting homes to carry out circumcisions.

He was suspended and later struck off the General Medical Council (GMC) register by a medical practitioners tribunal, but continued the circumcisions anyway, which "ignored" basic hygiene rules.

On Tuesday, Siddiqui pleaded guilty to 25 charges against him, including assault occasioning actual bodily harm and cruelty to a person under 16.

He will be sentenced at Southwark Crown Court on 14 January 2025.

Between June 2012 and November 2013, Siddiqui ran a private mobile circumcision service and sourced anaesthetic while working in paediatric surgery at the trust.

He travelled around the UK performing non-therapeutic male circumcisions - where there is no clinical reason for the procedure - on patients up to the age of 14.

In 2015, he was struck off the GMC register after a panel of the Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service found him guilty of failures in performing the procedure in the homes of four babies.

He continued his service because non-therapeutic male circumcision is unregulated and not required to be carried out by a medical practitioner.

'Unsafe and unsanitary'

On Tuesday he pleaded guilty at Southwark Crown Court to 25 charges including 12 counts of assault occasioning actual bodily harm, five of cruelty to a person under 16, and eight of administering a prescription-only medicine, the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said.

"Siddiqui practised these circumcising acts in an unsafe and unsanitary environment and so meted out painful cruelty to children leaving them with emotional and physical scars," said Anja Hohmeyer of the CPS.

"He showed a complete disregard for the impact of his actions on his victims, families, and communities."

Det Ch Supt Fiona Bitters, from Hampshire & Isle of Wight Constabulary, said: "I hope his pleas today help to bring some comfort to his victims who have had to wait many years to see justice served for his actions."