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If you can’t remember the principles of an ABE interview, perhaps you shouldn’t be doing them?

Posted on January 16, 2020 by suesspiciousminds

 

Yet another High Court case about a flawed  set of Achieving Best Evidence interviews. It is more than a little dispiriting that 30 years on from the principles of ABE having been carefully crafted to do exactly what it says on the tin, Achieve the Best Evidence, I can’t recall a reported case where the Judge praises the quality of the ABE interview, but dozens where they have been awful.

 

In this case

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWFC/HCJ/2019/75.html

EF, GH, IJ (care proceedings) [2019] EWFC 75 (06 December 2019)     

 

Three boys had made allegations of sexual abuse and physical abuse against their father and their paternal grandparents. Some of those allegations involved the abuse happening within secret rooms at the grandparents home.

That’s not the trickiest thing in the world to investigate to see if it checks out. Is there or is there not a secret room at the grandparents home?  Rather than checking that out, the officer instead conducted 23 ABE interviews (six each with two of the boys, and eleven with the third)

In giving evidence, the officer told the Court that if she had not retired and handed the case over to another officer (whom the Court exonerated from any blame) she would have continued to interview the children if they still wanted to talk.

 

  1. Katrine Andrews retired as a police officer in September 2018 although her last working day was 14th July 2018. She was the officer in charge of this case from October 2017 to the date of her retirement. Accordingly, for ease of reference in this judgment I shall refer to her as DC Andrews.
  3. A recurring theme of her evidence was that:
  5. i) she had a very heavy caseload and usually carried 17 to 21 live investigations in addition to this case;

ii) all of the other officers in the protection unit were, at that time, similarly overburdened with heavy caseloads;

iii) she did not approach any of her senior officers to seek additional help and/or support; and

iv) she considered she had undertaken her investigation into this case to the best of her skill in light of the heavy burden of work she had had to manage.

  1. In her evidence DC Andrews could not recall the Achieving Best Evidence principles. She could not recall the 4 phases of planning and preparation for conducting an ABE interview with a child, namely rapport, free narrative account, open ended questions and closure.

  3. She thought the interview conducted by PC Morris with EF on 21st September 2017 had been video recorded, even though she must have known there was no such facilities at the police station where she was based.
  5. She confirmed she had asked all three of the boys to complete a timeline outside the confines of an ABE interview. She considered it would take too long to undertake this exercise during an ABE interview. She seemingly had given not a moment’s thought or consideration of the risk of the boys’ accounts being contaminated if they prepared a timeline outside of a formal ABE interview. She told me there were ‘no problems’ with asking a child to prepare a timeline (outside of the confines of an ABE interview) before interviewing the child because it gives an interview structure.
  7. She told me that EF, GH and IJ appeared to be happy to talk, so she just let them talk. She said she was victim-led and she would not stop a child talking if the child wanted to talk.

  9. She was asked whether she considered 6 ABE interviews with EF, 11 with GH and 6 with IJ were manifestly excessive? I would not stop interviewing them, she said, until the children wanted to stop talking. I then asked her if she had not retired in June 2018 whether would she have undertaken further ABE interviews with them and, in terms, she said yes. She did not accept that her approach risked encouraging the boys to make allegations but, in a very troubling rider, she added ‘They knew what I was looking for’.

  11. DC Andrews did not seek the advice nor the approval of her senior officers to undertake this number of interviews with these three boys. Further, I could not discern from the investigation log:
  13. i) any evidence that a more senior officer had held supervision sessions with DC Andrews; or

ii) any senior officer had undertaken any review of the conduct of and the progress of the investigation.

  1. She was pressed time and again for why she had not taken any substantive step to investigate the case other than by conducting interviews with the children (e.g. a visit/search of the paternal grandparents’ home to discover if there were ‘secret rooms’ in the property). Every time she responded that she had planned to do so only when she had finished interviewing the boys.
  3. There is no reference to planning or preparation by the officer in the investigation log. She boldly told me that she never wrote down her planning or preparation whether in the log or elsewhere. Save for asking the boys to each write a timeline and for booking the video suite for their ABE interviews, I could not discern that this officer undertook any planning or preparation. DC Andrews told me she had asked the boys, when writing their timeline to recall the first and last incidents of abuse and then they were to choose the ‘worst’ ones in between. There is no reference to this conversation in the investigation log which the officer claimed resulted from having a heavy workload.
  5. She did accept she should have told the boys about writing the timeline rather than to have delegated the task to the mother.
  7. One matter the officer did find time to record in the investigation log was her observation that the boys appeared to find the experience of multiple and extremely lengthy ABE interviews ‘cathartic’.
  9. The officer asserted that the mother had told her in November 2017 that the boys were making allegations of physical and sexual abuse. This is curious because the evidence of the mother and of EF is that the first of the boys to make an allegation of sexual abuse was EF to SC on 27th December 2017. The conversation is not recorded on the investigation log because of work overload.
  11. When it was put to her that her investigation had serially breached the ABE Guidance, she denied it. When it was put to her that she had undertaken an incompetent and negligent investigation, she denied it and added ‘I got a lot of information out of them’.
  13. At the conclusion of DC Andrews’ evidence, I gave her fair warning that I would likely to be highly critical of her conduct of this investigation. I told her that if she wished to instruct solicitors or counsel to make submissions as to whether:
  15. i) I should not be critical of her conduct; and/or

ii) I should not name her in the judgment,

I would be prepared to receive and take account of the same. She chose not to do so.

 

Having waived that right to instruct solicitors, some negative findings unsurprisingly came the way of DC Andrews

 

  1. The role played by DC Andrews in the lives of this family is hugely significant. It was plain from her oral evidence and police investigation log that she had given no consideration to the ABE Guidance at any time during her involvement with EF, GH and IJ. Rather, she breached most aspects of the Guidance and of accepted good practice when interviewing children and young people.
  3. I refer to the following principal breaches:
  5. i) DC Andrews undertook no planning or preparation prior to any interview with the boys;

ii) the ABE interviews were excessively lengthy and instructed;

iii) there was little or no use of open questions;

iv) the boys were asked via their mother, and not by DC Andrews herself, to compile a timeline. She told them to think of the earliest allegation and then of the last and then to choose the ‘worst’ ones in between;

v) she had decided not construct a timeline with each of the boys during an ABE interview because it would have been too time-consuming;

vi) because she was victim-led and had to believe the boys’ allegations, she saw nothing wrong or inappropriate in undertaking 6 interviews with EF, then aged 15, 11 with GH, then aged 12, and 6 with IJ, then aged 10;

vii) there is no evidence of her undertaking the interviews of the boys or of the father with an open mind;

viii) she inappropriately praised the children during the course of the interviews;

ix) the ABE interviews of the boys proceeded on the basis of going through the boys’ timelines – in effect a tick box exercise;

x) there was no consideration of the context in which these allegations came to be made nor for the escalation in the same both in the seriousness of the allegations and expansion in the number of people against whom allegations were made;

xi) save for the most rudimentary enquiries, no enquiries were made by DC Andrews to indicate or prove whether the boys’ allegations were true or false, in whole or in part;

xii) DC Andrews gave no consideration to the impact of the therapeutic counselling two of the boys were receiving; and

xiii) she failed to seek the advice of superior officers and/or their permission to undertake what I consider to be a manifestly excessive number of unjustifiably lengthy ABE interviews.

  1. An element of common sense and good practice was only brought to this case when DC Hopkins took over as the officer in charge of the case in July 2018. He put a stop to any further interviews with the boys. For this decision he came under wholly inappropriate pressure from the mother and UV to undertake further interviews with the boys. It is to his credit that he resisted.
  3. Perhaps the most concerning aspect of DC Andrews’ role and the most egregious aspect of her conduct of this investigation was her comment in her oral evidence that the boys ‘knew what I was looking for’.
  5. It was submitted on behalf of the father that the police investigation was conducted negligently. I do not agree. It was conducted in an utterly incompetent manner which I find was harmful to the three children. DC Andrews’ conduct of the ABE interviews played a very significant role in the boys’ allegations increasing in number and severity and to include other paternal family members. One of the reasons EF gave for making false allegations was the role played by DC Andrews.
  7. I was advised by the legal department of the West Midlands Police that in 2017 and now, it was not the policy of the force nor the training given to the officers that children must be believed when they make allegations: the advice is to keep an open mind.
  9. The West Midlands Police do not, however, escape criticism. There is no evidence of DC Andrews receiving any or any effective supervision during the 11 months in which she was the officer in charge of the case. How she was permitted to conduct this investigation in such an incompetent and harmful manner for such a protracted time is beyond me and, in my view, inexcusable.

 

I would not for a second suggest that conducting an ABE is an easy task. I certainly couldn’t do it. It requires a huge amount of skill and expertise and training. It requires both planning and the ability to think on one’s feet and adjust your strategy to what is emerging or not emerging. You need to be mindful that the circumstances in genuine child abuse can often make for bewildering and confused accounts AND that there are circumstances that lead to children giving untruthful accounts, and be able to keep both possibilities in mind.  It is hard.  But we can and must do better.  Children deserve better. Their parents deserve better. Too often we see the attitude that the ABE principles are more honoured in the breach than the observance, and too little understanding of the fundamental reasons why they arose at all.  If someone is setting down to interview a child to see whether they have been abused, the Achieving Best Evidence framework is there to protect the child and to give the best possible chance of what emerges from that interview being the truth, whichever way it points.  We discard those principles or play around the edges of them at our peril.

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Child questioned on FORTY FOUR occasions about alleged abuse by father

Posted on June 10, 2016 by suesspiciousminds

Such abuse turning out to have never happened and having been fabricated by the mother.

 

This is an extraordinary case heard by MacDonald J

AS v TH (False Allegations of Abuse) [2016] EWHC 532 (Fam) (11 March 2016)    

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Fam/2016/532.html

It was a private law case, though one threaded through by involvement with social workers, police officers and therapists.  It began when the mother of two children N and S, left TH (the father of S) and moved from Scotland to England.

She then made a series of allegations of abuse by TH, both against her and against the children.

To turn to the paragraph that gave this post its headline

 

78. Namely, that between 11 August 2014 and 29 July 2015, and when account is taken of the intervention by CAMHS that I will detail later in this judgment, the children were questioned with respect to, or seen as a consequence of the allegations made in this case, often in the presence of each other and their mother, by no less than nineteen professionals on no less than twenty occasions for S and no less than forty-four occasions for N. Five different police officers were involved with interviewing the boys.

 

The Judge notes at the end of the judgment, the comments of the Guardian.

235. The Children’s Guardian attended each day of this fact finding hearing. Having listened to the evidence in this case the Children’s Guardian told the court that she considered this case to be “quite extraordinary“. Surveying the conduct of professionals in this case she concluded that “it is as if a sort of hysteria took over and prevented people from asking certain questions“. I cannot help but agree.

 

To be honest, the case is peppered with judicial despair/horror about what had happened, and I could pluck critical paragraphs from almost anywhere.

But the opening gives you a flavour of where things are going:-

 

  1. This is very troubling case. In Re E (A Minor)(Child Abuse: Evidence) [1991] 1 FLR 420 at 447H Scott- Baker J observed:
      1. “It is disappointing that, despite the passage of time since the Cleveland report, several witnesses had either not read the report at all or, if they had, they ignored its conclusions in many respects. Permeating the whole case is the underlying theme of ‘the child must be believed’. Of course what any child says must be listened to and taken seriously, but the professionals must be very careful not to prejudge the issue”.
  3. Seventeen years later Holman J felt compelled to make similar observations in the case of Leeds City Council v YX & ZX (Assessment of Sexual Abuse) [2008] 2 FLR 869 at [143] as follows:
      1. “I wish only to stress…the very great importance of including in any assessment every aspect of a case. Very important indeed is the account of the child, considered, of course, in an age appropriate way. An express denial is no less an account than is a positive account of abuse. It is also, in my opinion, very important to take fully into account the account and demeanour of the parents, and an assessment of the family circumstances and general quality of the parenting…Even 20 years after the Cleveland Inquiry, I wonder whether its lessons have fully been learned.”
  5. Eight years after the decision in Leeds City Council v YX & ZX and nearly 30 years after the Cleveland Inquiry I have found myself during the course of this hearing asking myself the self-same question as that posed by Holman J.

 

 

And the closing

 

  1. 230. I am satisfied that that N and S have been the subject of emotional abuse by their mother by reason of her conduct towards them as set out above. I am satisfied that as a result of the conduct of the mother detailed in this judgment both children have suffered significant emotional harm.
  3. As I stated at the outset of this judgment, this is a very concerning case. In August 2014 the mother manufactured alarm using a falsified version of past events in an attempt to avoid returning the children to Scotland. Using a combination of emotional pressure, inappropriate exposure to adult discussions and, on occasion, coaching, the mother proceeded to recruit the children to her cause. With the aid of repeated and persistent poor practice by a range of professionals the mother further succeeded in enclosing the narrative she had created within a hermetically sealed bubble, thereby succeeding in preventing professionals carrying out the checks that would have revealed that the allegations that were being made first by the mother, and then by the children required, at the very least, a critical and questioning appraisal. Indeed, by reason of their almost entirely unquestioning approach towards the mother, a number of professionals simply acquiesced to their confinement in that bubble. Had professionals adhered to well established guidance and procedure they would have discovered that the allegations lacked credibility.
  5. It is important to recognise that the professional failures I have set out have had consequences. By reason of the failure of the relevant agencies to follow the clear and well established guidance and procedure the children were not only left in a situation where a parent was permitted to persist in conduct that was harmful to their emotional welfare but, by their omissions, those agencies actively contributed to that harm.
  7. Child abuse, including child sexual abuse, exists as a terrible reality in society. Professionals charged with safeguarding the welfare of children must be constantly vigilant. As Ms Lot rightly pointed out to me, professionals are trained to adopt an approach by which they recognise that such abuse can happen anywhere. However, in circumstances where false allegations of abuse are also a reality in society, it is essential that this professional vigilance is allied firmly to the rigorous application of practice and procedure designed to ensure the proper investigation of allegations of abuse if injustices are to be avoided.
  9. Within this context, this case suggests that it is once again necessary to re-iterate the importance of the principles set out at Paragraphs 22 to 52 above. When investigating allegations of child abuse, including allegations of child sexual abuse, it is imperative that all professionals involved adhere to the law and guidance set out in those paragraphs so as to ensure the rigorous and fair investigation of allegations that is the foundation of ensuring the children concerned are safeguarded.
    In terms of detail, the Judge described one of the ABE interviews. Apologies that some of the questions are graphic, but I’m afraid that’s the nature of the allegations. Bear in mind that the ABE guidance is really clear and strong about the need for the account to emerge from the child and the need to avoid leading questions.
      1. 188….DC Hackworthy’s had concluded that S was not suitable for interview. S’s interview on 5 March 2015 took place in the context of him having little notice that it was going to take place, having been removed early from school for the interview, not having eaten and being given snacks prior to the interview, which he consumed during the interview. It is clear from watching the interview that this creates a distraction for S. The items he was given to snack on during the interview were given to him by his mother immediately before the interview commenced and were considered by S to be treats. As with N, at the outset of S’s interview at the outset of the interview DC Glendenning told S that “If you say something really, really interesting she is going to write it down“. DC Glendenning thus, once again, created a cue for S whereby he would know what the “interesting” answers were by watching the officer’s pen.
      3. During the course of his interview S stated that his father had hit him on the arm and had choked him. He said this happened when the mother went to “Nanny S’s” with N but his father said he could not go. S also alleged that his father gave him wine (a new allegation). Later S also alleged that TH punched him in the neck (also a new allegation). Thereafter S repeatedly made clear to DC Glendenning that that is the sum of what had happened he has nothing more to say. From watching the interview it is clear that S is very firm in this regard. Notwithstanding this, DC Glendenning continued to push S to reveal further matters. At this point the interview departed even further from the precepts of the guidance.
      5. After S has stated eight times that nothing else happened DC Glendenning embarked on the following exchange with S:
          1. Q: Right, what about when you are alone with your dad?

A: When I’m alone with my dad he’s been a, he’s been nice but when Grandma was, is here, he’s been nice when, when she isn’t here, she’ he hasn’t been nice.

Q: OK, has your dad ever done anything dirty to you? Dirty, that you didn’t like:

A: Mmm, nothing else.

Q: Nothing else, erm, also its very important today that we find out everything, erm and also we’ve been speaking to your brother and he said some things that your dad did that wasn’t very nice to him, and that were dirty. Had your brother told you about these?

A: No.

Q: As he ever told you anything that your dad did to him?

A: Mmm mmmm, hasn’t seen and I’ve forgot…nothing.

Q: Nothing, are you sure there’s nothing else that’s worrying ye and?

A: There’s nothing else.

Q: Nothing?

A: Mmmmm.

      1. Prior to this point S has not used the word “dirty” at any stage. In seeking to explain why she had introduced this DC Glendenning said in evidence that it was because it was “difficult to get him to open up” and she was trying to put “it” in S’s terms of something possibly sexual. DC Glendenning appeared initially to be unaware of the forensic difficulties created by the interviewer introducing the concept of “dirty” events in the context of S being alone with TH before S had raised the issue in any way. However, ultimately DC Glendenning accepted in cross examination it was wrong to introduce the word. DC Glendenning accepted that S may well have perceived this as her wanting him to say that his father had done something dirty to him.
      3. Notwithstanding that S had again made clear in response to the foregoing questions that nothing else had happened, DC Glendenning still persisted. She next informed S that she was aware that S had said things to Ms Khanom. DC Glendenning conceded in cross examination that she had no note of what it was that S was said to have said to Ms Khanom and, as set out above, that Ms Khanom had no clear recollection. Within this context the following exchange took place:
          1. Q: Can you remember what you told her?

A: I told her the same as I just told you.

Q: Nothing else?

A: I told her a little bit of it but not that much.

Q: I think she says you like to say it in its parts and its part 1 and part 2 when your talking about things.

A: Mmmm.

Q: And that you said that part 1 was dirty, can you, it’s really, really important if you could tell me what part 1 is today and then you don’t need to tell me again, can you tell me what part 1 is? What your dad did?

A: Mmmm, really don’t want to tell that bit.

Q: It’s just.

A: I really I really don’t like telling that bit.

Q: I know you really don’t like telling it but see, N’s been very very brave today and he’s told us part 1 and part 2, what happened to him. And obviously, we want to make sure that your safe and that you’re here safe with your mum so we need to know what [TH] did, so that we can make sure that your nice and safe and make sure if he’s a bad person that nothing else will happen to anybody else, do you understand that? And I know it’s, it’s scary telling strangers about things that happened but it’s very very important that we know, so that we can do the right thing and we can make sure that the bad man is dealt with, do you understand that? And Mihema (sic) told me that you told her, so just, if you just told me just that once, then I can sort, I can make it all sorted.

A: Well mummy told the nurse but I don’t want told her, the nurse parts1.

Q: I know.

A: Mum told that the bad, bad dirty man done it to me.

Q: I know, but it’s good that your mum told us, but we really need you to tell us, so that.

A: Mmmm

Q: So that we know exactly what happened, you only need to tell it once because that’s why the cameras are here cause one you tell it that’s it. And then you can go back and nobody will be annoying you again. Understand it is very very important. Could you just tell me it really, really quickly?

A: Mmm, Mmm, I couldn’t say it that quickly.

Q: Can’t say it that quickly, how about then, we go back, was it, was it in your dad’s house? In the flat?

That pain in your forehead is because you just banged your head on your desk or keyboard, or any solid object close at hand at how terribly leading that interview is. Oh. My. God.

    1. It is difficult to know where to start with respect to summarising what is wrong with the approach by DC Glendenning set out above. Indeed, the passage largely speaks for itself as an example of extremely poor interviewing practice. DC Glendenning’s questions start from the premise that something “dirty” has happened to S, that TH is the perpetrator (pre-cast by the questioning into the role of the “bad person” and the “bad man”), place emotional pressure on S by telling him that N and his mother are “brave” and “good” for telling what happened and that a statement by him is needed to keep others safe and make promises to S that are unjustified (i.e. if he tells it once he will not have to tell it again). In addition, certain of DC Glendenning’s questions were misleading in other respects. In particular, N had not in his interview made his allegations in terms of “part 1” and “part 2”. Finally, it is clear that S has plainly overheard his mother making allegations to a “nurse” that “the bad, bad dirty man done it to me“.
    3. Within this context, DC Glendenning’s was forced to concede during cross examination that she had during this phase of the interview placed grave pressure on a five year old child to make an allegation against his father. DC Glendenning further conceded that following this passage of questioning that S may well have felt he had little choice but to give DC Glendenning what she wanted.

 

And yet, we’re STILL not done with how bad this ABE could get.

    2. Following the exchange set out above DC Glendenning then proceeded to question S in detail starting, as can be seen, from the premise that something has happened. S told DC Glendenning that what occurred had occurred in Scotland, that he was wearing the pirate costume that he was wearing in the interview (which seems unlikely) and that N was not present. S said that his father did “a naughty thing“. When asked what this was S again limited his allegation to “He. He choked me and he hit me and, and he punched me, and and he, he made me drink that wine“.
    4. DC Glendenning tried yet again. Finally, after telling DC Glendenning that he only wanted to talk to one person, after it was proposed that the other officer leaves the room, and after DC Glendenning said “And you can quickly tell me what happened and then that’s it, would that be OK” S stated that TH “asked me to put his willy in my bum“. S went on to state that “he, he only asked though” and “He didn’t try he just asked“. When DC Glendenning asked “did he ever try and put his willy in your bum” S was adamant that he had not.
    6. Still DC Glendenning refused to accept that as the final position and re-introduces Ms Khanom, asking (again without having access to any recording of what S actually said to Ms Khanom) “Right, erm, when you speaking to Mihema (sic) earlier on, she says that your told her that your dad [TH] put his willy in your bum“. DC Glendenning did not seek to explore with S different versions he had given to Dr Haji and Ms Ille. When, at the end of this exchange, DC Glendenning askes S “Have you ever touched his willy?” S replies “Mmmm of course not“. Later in the interview S states that TH “didn’t do anything to mum“.
    8. Following the interview of S DC Glendenning completed an additional comments form. On that form DC Glendenning recorded her impression of S during the interview as being one of child who “appeared nervous, frightened and confused over what was right or wrong“. Within this context, during cross examination regarding the interviews of S and N on 5 March 2015 DC Glendenning conceded that she was concerned during the interviews that both the children had been coached and that that concern never fully left her during the course of those interviews.

 

 

The social work interview with the children took place WHILST the mother was present and in front of EACH OTHER. I apologise if you now have another blinding pain in the head. Sorry.  Pause for a moment, and pop a pillow in front of you. You will still feel the head-desk urge, but you will now have a softer landing.

 

On 8 December 2014 both children were seen by a social worker from Westminster, a Ms Ille. The records demonstrate that the children were repeatedly questioned by the social worker together and in the presence of the mother and in a highly leading manner that paid no heed at all to proper practice.

 

Once again, I am entirely unclear why Ms Ille, a qualified social worker, saw fit to question the children in company of each other and in front of their mother and to allow the mother to participate in that questioning and to reveal her worries and concerns in the presence of the children. Efforts to secure the attendance of Ms Ille for cross examination proved unsuccessful.

 

Have you got that pillow or soft object handy? If not, get it now. Because we’re going back to a bit about the ABE interview that I didn’t dare tell you before.  DEPLOY your pillow now.  Actually, get a second pillow. Use that too. You are seriously not going to believe this.

 

  1. Further, DC Glendenning stated that she realised straight away that N had notes with him. She further stated that she was concerned that it was possible someone had helped him write those notes. In evidence the mother claimed that N compiled these the night before the interview by himself upstairs. She denied that she talked to him about what he should say in the interview. DC Glendenning was clear in her view that the mother had seen the notes prior to the interview and said as much. DC Glendenning was also certain that the mother had known N was writing the notes and had read the notes prior to the start of the interview. DC Glendenning said she was concerned that N had been prepared for the interview.
  3. Notwithstanding her concerns that N had been prepared for the interview, DC Glendenning proceeded to interview N with his notes available to him. DC Glendenning justified this course of action by reason of N being “desperate” to have access to the notes. N’s desperation to have the notes is clear from the DVD of the interview which I have seen. In particular, it is significant that when it became apparent to N that his notes may be removed, N became flustered and gave a confused answer which indicated that his recollection was not firm.

 

You say notes, I say script, let’s call the whole thing off. Yes, let’s…..

 

There’s another social work investigation, but the social worker doesn’t speak to anyone other than mum and the children, having been told by mum that it is too dangerous for the family for anyone who knows dad to be approached. The social worker had to accept that she had approached the case as though all of the allegations were true, and commended mum for taking protective action when closing the case.

 

  1. I have made reference above to the social worker, Ms Salamant. The refuge made a referral to Hackney Children’s Services on 8 September 2014. Hackney commenced a s 47 investigation on 9 September 2015, which assessment was concluded on 23 October 2014. Ms Salamant was the allocated social worker. There were patent deficiencies in her assessment.
  3. The assessment was completed solely based on information from the mother or information for which the mother was the only source and, latterly, on information gleaned from the children at a series of meetings and, in respect of N, an ABE interview. During her evidence Ms Salamant conceded that, in complete disregard of the principles of good practice that I have set out above, she at no point contacted either father of the children or any member of the children’s extended maternal or paternal families and at no point contacted the children’s previous schools or the health services previously engaged with the children. Ms Salamant further conceded that she did not speak to the mother’s new partner, ER, nor sought to carry out police checks with respect to him (notwithstanding that the refuge expressed concern regarding this relationship).[2] Indeed, until told in the witness box Ms Salamant did not know his address or that he too had children.
  5. Ms Salamant’s omissions were grounded in an apparent unquestioning acceptance of the mother’s claim that it was too dangerous to contact the fathers, the maternal and paternal extended families, the children’s former schools and doctors or the local authorities from whose area they had moved for fear that TH would locate the family. Ms Salamant accepted without question the allegations made by the mother that that TH and BC had “colluded” to find the mother’s address in England, that TH was linked to drug dealers, that “someone” may be sent to England to find the family, that TH was seeking to kidnap the children and that her own mother might accept money from TH to disclose the family’s whereabouts. Ms Salamant made no efforts to investigate whether these matters that the mother claimed prevented a full assessment were, in fact, credible. As I have already set out above, each of the assertions by the mother were, it transpires, entirely un-evidenced and, I am satisfied, untrue.
  7. Finally, and as a consequence perhaps of her one dimensional assessment, it was plain to me having heard her in the witness box that Ms Salamant had proceeded at all times on the basis that the allegations made by the mother and the children regarding domestic and sexual abuse were, without question, true. At no point did Ms Salamant interrogate this assumption.
  9. In light of the findings I set out in the Schedule at the conclusion of this judgment, it is sobering to note that when she closed the case on 23 October 2014 Ms Salamant stated that the mother:
      1. “…has taken all the necessary steps to ensure that N and S are safe from harm and has demonstrated a capacity to reflect on her experiences and provide the children with a sense of stability and safety during this uncertain time.”

On behalf of the mother, Ms Krish concedes, very properly, that Ms Salamant’s assessment, when viewed, as it must be, through the prism of the guidance set out in the Cleveland Report and Working Together to Safeguard Children 2015, was fundamentally flawed and lacked even the basic information upon which to base judgments regarding the welfare of the children or the credibility of their and their mother’s allegations.

 

There was a pre ABE meeting in October 2014, and unfortunately, the recollections of the social worker and police officer as to what happened at that meeting do not only fail to match but they are diametrically opposed.

 

  1. As a result of the mother’s report of what N and S had said on 11 September 2014 the children were seen at the refuge by two Police Officers, DC Card and DC Bishop, and Ms Salamant. The account of DC Bishop and that of Ms Salamant as to what N said on this occasion are diametrically opposed. Neither DC Bishop nor Ms Salamant took contemporaneous, or near contemporaneous notes of their conversation with the children. S refused to speak despite encouragement from his mother in the presence of the two Police Officers and Ms Salamant.
  3. Ms Salamant stated in evidence that upon arrival there was a brief discussion between the adults present in the presence of the children. Ms Salamant stated that this was a “general conversation” at which it was explained to the children that police officers present to ensure they were safe and well. Ms Salamant could not however recall the full conversation. DC Bishop said the mother was with the children for the whole of the introductory conversation during which DC Bishop was talking to the children. In contrast to Ms Salamant, DC Bishop estimated that that conversation lasted 15 to 20 minutes. No record of that conversation was made.
  5. With respect to the allegations said to have been made by N, Ms Salamant could not recall what N had actually said nor the context in which he said it. After returning to the office and nearly three hours after the meeting had begun Ms Salamant made an entry in her records, namely that (a) TH had played with S’s privates, (b) TH tried to drown me and gave me “Chinese” burns and (c) he witnessed TH hit his mother. Ms Salamant also recorded that “N made a disclosure stating that [the mother] is isolated and is not in touch with friend and family“. She conceded that N would not have used the form of language in the record she completed and accepted that her recording was wholly inadequate. She further recalled that the mother had made the same allegations as those she ascribed to N and appeared, ultimately, to be uncertain as to whether that which is recorded in her record came from N or from the mother.
  7. Within this context DC Bishop, having also participated in the conversation with N, recorded in her pocket book only that N “stated that his brother’s dad had hurt him when he dropped food on the floor.” DC Bishop readily conceded that her notes were very poor. DC Bishop was however very clear in her oral evidence that N made only one allegation. DC Bishop said that she did not hear N say anything about the matters recorded by Ms Salamant in the social work records. In my assessment, DC Bishop was a more reliable historian that Ms Salamant

 

 

Interview by GP

 

(vii) Appointment with Dr Haji on 8 October 2014

  1. On 8 October 2014 N and S were taken to see Dr Haji, a general practitioner. It would appear that at the outset of the appointment the mother gave Dr Haji an account of the family’s background and of the allegations of sexual abuse in the presence of both N and S. The social work entry records that, in front of S, Dr Haji asked N to describe what he had seen TH doing to S and that (in another slightly different account) N is recorded stated that TH “touched S down below and entered him.”
  3. Dr Haji records that S was “unfortunately present” when N pointed to his penis and said he tried to put this into S’s back passage. Within this context, the social work record of this appointment states that at this point, and several times thereafter, S interjected forcefully and said “that’s a lie, that didn’t happen“. Dr Haji’s note records that S shouted that “this had not happened“. Within this context Dr Haji is recorded as having contacted children’s services to express his initial concern that S (given the context I suspect the recording is mistaken and Dr Haji in fact said N) may have been asked to disclose the sexual assault allegation.
  5. I am entirely unclear why Dr Haji saw fit to take a history from the mother of the family’s issues in front of the children. Notwithstanding that it produced several forceful, and forensically significant, denials from S, I am equally unclear why Dr Haji considered it to be proper to permit N recite his allegation concerning the sexual abuse of S in S’s presence

 

 

There were allegations at school, and the procedures there too were not followed

 

  1. The most recent safeguarding training at the school, a copy of which I have also seen, makes clear under that the ‘Cause for Concern Form’ must include exact information, the name of the child and the date. The training makes clear that the teacher receiving the allegation must not ask questions and should not tell carers of concerns unless part of an agreed strategy.
  3. Both Ms Lot and Ms Duggan appear to have failed comprehensively to follow their own school’s safeguarding guidance and training and the accepted good practice with regard to the recording of allegations made by children. In the case of Ms Lot, in addition to not making any written record, she proceeded to question N and informed the mother (apparently in N’s presence) of what he had said. These are in my judgment serious omissions on the part of a teacher fulfilling a child protection role. As a result, the court is left with no accurate record of what N said and no clear idea of when he said it.

 

 

The Judge was satisfied that the father had not abused the children and that the mother had fabricated the allegations. There’s a lot of detail in the judgment about this, if you are sceptical, I’d point you towards reading that. (Being fair, just because the investigative process was flawed does not mean that the allegations were untrue, so you would need to read those passages to be sure).

 

  1. Standing back to survey the broad canvas of the evidence, I am satisfied for the reasons I have given that not only were the allegations made by the mother and the children false, but further that the allegations made by the children were generated by the mother placing unwarranted emotional pressure on the children by herself making false allegations regarding TH and making them known to the children, by inappropriately involving the children in adult discussions and by, on occasion, actively coaching the children to make allegations against TH.
  3. In the case of Re W (A Child) [2014] EWCA Civ 772 Ryder LJ (as he then was) observed as follows with respect to the significance of parents who make or cause to be made false allegations of physical and sexual abuse:
      1. “Given the prevalence of false allegations made by parents against each other in private law proceedings, conduct at this level by a parent should be understood to be serious child abuse that will usually necessitate intervention by a court.”
  5. Within this context, and having regard to the extensive matters set out above, I am satisfied that that N and S have been the subject of emotional abuse by their mother by reason of her conduct towards them as set out above. I am satisfied that as a result of the conduct of the mother detailed in this judgment both children have suffered significant emotional harm.

 

The Judge also outlined that the failure of all of the professionals to follow proper procedures had harmed the children and compounded the emotional harm that the mother was causing them.

 

  1. I am further satisfied on the evidence that the actions of certain professionals in this case breached well-established principles of good practice, actively contributed to the difficulties that I have set out above and materially prejudiced the welfare of both children:
    1. i) Almost all the professionals and agencies involved with the children proceeded on the unquestioning basis that the mother was telling the truth and failed to interrogate that assumption by carrying out basic enquiries. The most acute example of this was the assessment of Ms Salamant. Ms Krish properly concedes that the social worker never really challenged the mother’s account and that the most basic independent professional enquiries were not undertaken. Ms Salamant’s failure to challenge the mother’s account and accept it at face value meant that she permitted the mother to dictate completely the frame of reference for the actions of the local authority and other agencies and meant that mother succeeded in portraying herself and the children as victims of serious physical and sexual abuse when in fact they were not. Ms Salamant’s failure to make enquiries of the fathers, the children’s extended families, the children’s schools, doctors and previous local authorities was particularly egregious in circumstances where such enquiries would have revealed a fundamentally different picture to that being painted by the mother.

ii) A number of professionals failed in their duty to keep accurate records of what the mother and the children were saying. This failure was particularly acute (a) on 12 September 2014 where neither DC Bishop nor Ms Salamant kept accurate records of their meeting with the family, resulting in accounts of what the children said that were diametrically opposed, (b) at N’s school in September and October 2014 where Ms Duggan and Ms Lot failed to make any record at all of the allegations made by N in breach of the schools own safeguarding policy, Ms Lot attempting to pass this failure off as a feature of the case being open to social services and (c) on 29 October 2014 when DS Hackworthy took no notes at all of his pre-ABE interview with N and S. Outside the interviews of the children, not one professional recorded a contemporaneous or near contemporaneous account of what the children said to them.

iii) A number of professionals took it upon themselves to question the children with respect to the allegations outside the regulated confines of an ABE interview. There was a particular failure to follow the guidelines by (a) Dr Haji on 8 October 2014 who proceeded to elicit an account from N in front of S, (b) Ms Lot at N’s school between September and October 2015, who took it upon herself to ask multiple questions of N, (b) Ms Ille on 8 December 2014 who repeatedly questioned both children in a highly leading manner (having never met the children) and (d) Ms Khanom who likewise proceeded to question the children in a leading manner.

iv) There was an apparent failure of agencies to co-ordinate their interventions in respect of the children. The most extreme symptom of this was the number of professionals the children were spoken to by in respect of the allegations. As set out above, between 11 August 2014 and 29 July 2015, and when account is taken of the intervention by CAMHS, the children were questioned with respect to, or seen as a consequence of the allegations made in this case, often in the presence of each other, by no less than nineteen professionals on no less than twenty occasions for S and no less than forty-four occasions for N with five different police officers were involved with interviewing the boys.

v) For the reasons I have set out above both DC Bishop and DC Glendenning failed to apply, in the case of DC Bishop, Achieving Best Evidence, and in the case of DC Glendenning, the Guidance on the Joint Investigative Interviewing of Child Witnesses in Scotland. The results of this failure are plain from the passages of the interviews set out above. DC Glendenning conceded that the sole purpose of the interviews on 5 March 2014 was “to get evidence of sexual abuse“. DC Glendenning’s conduct of the interviews on 5 March 2014 with N and S represent in my judgment particularly serious examples of poor interviewing practice.

vi) Finally, ahead of any findings of fact being made or criminal conviction in respect of the allegations, CAMHS intervention in this case extended to therapeutic intervention for N by three psychiatric and psychological specialists in addition to group therapy over 29 sessions and for S over six Play Therapy sessions on the basis that both children had been abused in the manner alleged by the mother.

 

 

 

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