A 76-year-old man has pleaded guilty to drugging and sexually assaulting two boys, aged nine and 10, at a summer camp in Leicestershire.
Jon Ruben was arrested in July 2025 after eight children and one adult fell ill at Stathern Lodge.
He pleaded guilty to 17 charges at Leicester crown court on Friday. They include sexual assault of a child under 13, assault of a child under 13 by penetration, eight counts of child cruelty, three counts of making indecent images of children, and four drugs charges.
Ruben, from Ruddington in Nottinghamshire, denied one of the sexual offences he was charged with against a nine-year-old boy. Prosecutors have been given two weeks to consider if they will proceed with this charge.
The prosecutor Mary Prior KC told the court that Ruben had run a holiday camp for at least 27 years and “there is a long history of children feeling sick at the camp over many years”.
She added: “For many years he has played what he calls a sweet game with the children in which he goes into the bedrooms. The game is that each has to eat really sticky sweets as quickly as they can but they must chew them.
“Children have always felt ill the next day but he explained it as they were overwrought.”
Concerns were raised to police by Ruben’s stepson this year after he discovered baby oil, syringes with white powder and other items in the defendant’s belongings, the court heard.
Ruben then went on to play the “sweet game” with six boys on 26 July this year, who were all ill the morning after – with some unable to walk, Prior told the court.
She added that he then played the “sweet game” in a room of five children before he was arrested at a nearby pub. Eight children were later taken to hospital and liquid Xanax was found to have been used on some victims.
Prior said the drugs had been crushed and injected into sweets which could have damaged the heart or “if we were to look at the worst case scenario, death”.
Devices belonging to Ruben were later analysed and he was charged with having 50 category A indecent videos of children – the most serious kind.
Prior told the court that Stathern Lodge, the rented premises, was not connected to the camp and Ruben was in charge of the young people there.
In a statement after the hearing, Leicestershire police said the owners and operators of the lodge were “not connected to the incident”.
Temporary DC I Neil Holden said: “This has been a horrific, complex and emotional investigation involving multiple young, innocent, vulnerable victims and a man who committed the vilest crimes.
“Our focus today must of course remain on the young victims and with the support of partners and dedicated family liaison officers, we have and continue to support their welfare and to ensure their safeguarding going forward.”
• The NSPCC offers support to children on 0800 1111, and adults concerned about a child on 0808 800 5000. The National Association for People Abused in Childhood (Napac) offers support for adult survivors on 0808 801 0331.
