14 year old boy criminalised over naked selfie

I talked to our resident fourteen-year-old about this case. Her response was: "Oh that! That's happened about sixty times already". I mentioned its illegality. She said that they all know it's illegal; they don't care. And she shrugged.

Perhaps the 'authorities' are trying to make these younguns care. Good luck with that.

Young people often respond with "everyone does it" when in fact, everyone isn't doing whatever it is, smoking dope, having sex or sending naked photographs.

I suspect mini bags is right though, when she says they all know it's illegal. Pornography is so much more easily available and to some extent is being normalised. I'm an old fashioned feminist who sees porn as risky stuff, especially for girls and women. I wish we had better sex and relationship education in schools. Yes, this should happen in every home as well, but sadly it doesn't

Sorry to add on but I should have added my agreement to the concerns expressed about this boy being questioned at school by the school police officer and a teacher, without his parents either being informed or being present. If this isn't illegal, it's certainly very bad practice. If he'd been my son, I'd have been very cross with him on so many different levels but I'd have made sure he didn't end up with some kind of crime logged against him. The girl also distributed the photograph which means her name is logged.
It is even worse than the commonly used practice of persuading young people to take a caution and so avoid court.

www.nfer.ac.uk/nfer/publications/PCOX01/PCOX01.pdf is QI to read alongside this discussion.

My God! If "everyone's doing it", young people must be living in a pit of creepy horrible-ness!

Worrying.

I agree the parents should have been brought in at the outset.

(No apologies for an add-on post. )

As an ex-teacher I did wonder about this and asked myself what I would have done. I couldn't see myself talking to the police with a child without their parents present because I would always be aware that it would not be something I would have wanted to happen to my own children.The only exception I could imagine was one school I worked in where there were a number of parents who were aggressive and difficult. Even so I would have wanted them to be able to support their child. I wonder how the school intends to continue educating someone who must now view teachers as people not to be trusted. Not to mention the parents who must find it difficult to work with the staff now.

Schools are in a tougher place at the moment re sexual exploitation.

New and stringent expectations about safeguarding are in place and schools, individual staff and governors can be held liable if they do not report incidents that may indicate a child is 'at risk'.

Sending what may have been a sexually explicit image to people can be a sign of exploitation /abuse etc. Schools by law cannot ignore this. You may think the law is an ass but it is what it is!

Sometimes the police based in schools are part of the staff team ..lines are more blurred now! So talking a situation through with a student in school may be less awful that going to a police station and calling in the parents. As we do not know the exact detail of how this actually took place it is hard to know if there has been a heavy handed approach or a more thoughtful one!

That's helpful, Penstemmon, thank you. I realise that when a case of child abuse is possible the parents are the first suspects so have to be left out of the loop until at least a preliminary investigation has been carried out. It would explain why the school dealt with it without informing the parents. It still doesn't explain how juveniles can be 'logged' without due process of law!

Even if the boy was handled 'gently' he was still interviewed by the police without his parents knowing let alone being present.

I would certainly be challenging this aspect if it was my son. Like Iam I wonder if it was legal for the boy to be interviewed without his parents' knowledge. Even where abuse is alleged, social workers have to seek the consent of parents before speaking to children. Only if this is withheld would further measures be considered. The law stresses the importance of working in partnership with parents, and the Police and Criminal Evidence Act says that children cannot be interviewed without an 'Appropriate Adult' being present. This would usually be a parent unless there are good reasons to exclude them. I think the school, and the police have ridden roughshod over the spirit (if not the letter) of the law pertaining to children in this case, and have given a child (possibly three) a criminal marker in the process. This could have been dealt with much more sensibly.

Absolutely night owl. Plus, my experience of the police officer based in school issue that they were generally so good at working with "difficult" children and their often "very difficult" parents. To interview a boy who admits to an offence, without the benefit of his parents as appropriate adult or legal advice seems very very wrong to me. I don't in any way normalise or support his behaviour, which needs to be challenged but if I was his parent, I'd be taking legal advice on this.

Whatever the legal aspects of it this it must certainly have disrupted the trust that exists between teachers and parents, and teachers and pupils. Part of safeguarding is being able to deal with children in a sympathetic and understanding manner whilst fulfilling the legal requirements. The attitude taken to this could result in children who really need to discuss something being afraid to talk to a teacher about it for fear that they will find themselves dealing with the police. We were always told that the child should be told that although you could not keep the information they shared a secret it would only be passed on to other professionals who could help (social services). If there is abuse, particularly if a family member is involved, children often fear police involvement and need help to see things through.