SOURCE: Fort Worth school district
Paliamentary Question
Posted by News Editor
Tuesday, January 24, 2006
Claire Curtis-Thomas (Crosby, Lab) asked the the Secretary of State for the Home Department pursuant to the answer of 29th November 2005, Official Report, column 452W, on the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, what the basis is for his confidence in social workers' awareness of the risks of prejudicing future police investigations; and if he will make a statement.
Hazel Blears (Minister of State (Policing, Security and Community Safety), Home Office) replied:
It is the responsibility of the Senior Investigating Officer to set the parameters of the police investigation and to ensure that third parties involved in the case are aware of the risks of prejudicing the investigation.
'Working together to safeguard children: a guide to inter-agency working to safeguard and promote the welfare of children' was jointly published by the Home Office, Department for Health and Department for Skills and Education in 1999.
Chapter five includes guidance on investigative interviews with children where social workers have a role and states at paragraph 5.36 that "leading or suggestive communications should always be avoided". In addition, paragraphs 6.24 to 6.26 sets out guidance in relation to investigating organised and multiple abuse and states the need for the police and other agencies involved to agree clear written protocols in relation to all key operational and policy matters.
Hansard reference. Acknowledgement
According to a report in the SUNDAY TIMES (22nd Jan 2006) dozens of parents imprisoned for killing their children will be denied a chance to challenge their convictions, in a ruling set to reignite the debate over the validity of shaken baby syndrome.
A review of 88 such cases ordered by Lord Goldsmith, the attorney-general, is expected to say only four of the convictions merit reinvestigation. The result, to be published next month, has angered lawyers, doctors and parents protesting their innocence. They say they were denied the far-reaching review which in 2003 enabled Sally Clark, a solicitor, to overturn her wrongful conviction for murdering her two babies.
According to one clinician, no pathologist was asked to help with interpreting complex medical reports in the review. Chris Milroy, professor of forensic pathology at Sheffield University, said he believed it was limited to examining only the clinical evidence presented in court.
The attorney-general’s department declined to comment on the alleged shortcomings of the review (more)
Professor Sir Roy Meadow will begin a High Court challenge tomorrow against a decision by the General Medical Council to strike him off.
The 72-year-old paediatrician was found guilty last July of serious professional misconduct over evidence he gave in the trial of Sally Clark, who was convicted but later cleared of murdering two of her babies. Sir Roy is appealing against the decision of the GMC and its punishment of removal from the medical register.
His lawyers are expected to argue at a three-day hearing in London before Mr Justice Collins that a GMC fitness to practise panel was wrong to conclude that what he did amounted to serious professional misconduct. They are also expected to contend that, in any event, removal from the register was too extreme a punishment.
The panel concluded he had "abused his position as a doctor" by giving misleading evidence in the Clark trial. It said the consequences of his errors "cannot be underestimated" and had "seriously undermined" the position of doctors giving evidence in trials.
The GMC said Sir Roy failed in his duty as an expert witness and was wrong to compare the possibility of Mrs Clark's two children dying of natural causes to the odds of horses winning the Grand National.
Mrs Clark was found guilty in 1999 of murdering her sons Christopher and Harry but had her conviction quashed on appeal in 2003. Sir Roy also gave evidence in two other high-profile child trials in which mothers were wrongfully convicted. Angela Cannings and Donna Anthony were jailed for murdering their children but later cleared by the Court of Appeal.
A press release issued by the NUSUWT condemns Gov't over reaction to the current controversy regarding the vetting of teachers.
"NASUWT will be objecting in the strongest possible terms to local authorities which go down this road and has raised the matter with the DfES."
Commenting on emerging reports that, in the wake of the furore about sex offenders in schools, some local councils are issuing instructions to schools to conduct CRB checks on all existing members of staff, Chris Keates, General Secretary of NASUWT, the largest union representing teachers and headteachers throughout the UK, said:
"This is an unnecessary, gross overreaction which could undermine the steps taken to restore parents' confidence in schools.
"It has the potential to overload the system, preventing full and proper checks being conducted speedily on new education staff.
"I cannot begin to quantify the distress such panic measures could cause to committed and dedicated staff and the burdens this will place on schools.
"There are potentially significant costs to the education budget.
"It is also likely to cause substantial logistical problems for the Criminal Records Bureau.
"NASUWT will be objecting in the strongest possible terms to local authorities which go down this road and has raised the matter with the DfES." (full report here)
According to an article in the Belfast News Letter teachers in Northern Ireland have no protection against false allegations.
The report by Gemma Murray says
Mud sticks for teachers after allegations are made about them by a pupil - even though 97 per cent of cases are later proven to be false.The largest teachers' union in Northern Ireland, the NASUWT with 12,500 members, receives at least one query a week from members facing claims by their pupils. From the moment the allegations are made about a teacher, procedures kick into force very quickly. And the rumour-mill that accompanies the teacher's suspension is devastating.
Seamus Searson, NASUWT organiser in Northern Ireland, said while all allegations must be investigated fully, the teacher is offered no protection. He or she is effectively presumed guilty until proven innocent. He said: "The teacher is suspended and not the child. When a child calls foul the allegation is taken seriously which is right and proper. But a large number of these allegations are not true. There is lots of protection for the child - but none for the teacher.
In a small community where the teacher is suspended from school, the rumour-mill kicks into top speed," he said.
"When these things have gone through the whole process, the teacher is found not guilty, they may still find it very difficult to return to the school.
"The teacher has no opportunity to address the allegations until it gets to the legal stage."
Mr Searson said he had seen untrue allegations against teachers tear careers and home-life apart.
"I have seen cases in England where child protection has even involved the teacher's own family being considered at risk," he said. "The children were then taken away from the teacher because of the allegation.
"It really destroys the lives of teachers and their families. If the teacher leaves the school the allegation travels with them. It would not be easy for them to find another job. "It also goes on their criminal record that there was an investigation - even if there is no substance to it. In most cases it leads to a mental breakdown and the teacher is rarely the same person afterwards."
Source
Outrage over innocent 13 jailed in sex abuse scandal
LEGAL experts and politicians called yesterday for the abolition of France’s Napoleonic system of criminal justice after the televised testimony of 13 men and women who had been wrongly jailed on paedophile charges.
The call for urgent reform to the 200-year-old institution of investigating judges was prompted by outrage over the way in which a young magistrate at Outreau, near Boulogne, had detained the thirteen defendants for three years and sent them to trial on flimsy evidence. Another defendant committed suicide in jail.
Judge Fabrice Burgaud, 34, added to the anger yesterday when he insisted that he had nothing to apologise for, and said that he was the victim of “deep injustice”.
President Chirac apologised to the Outreau thirteen last month, when five were acquitted on appeal of raping and abusing children as part of an alleged child-abuse network. Four people remain convicted after the original trial last summer. “I am anxious to offer my regret and apologies for what will always be seen as an unprecedented judicial disaster,” M Chirac wrote in a letter.
On Wednesday, France heard nine hours of emotional testimony by the 13 to a parliamentary inquiry into one of the worst fiascos in a system that has too often punished the innocent, and allowed cases to collapse from delay. France has been repeatedly criticised by the European Court of Human Rights and campaign groups for pre-trial detention that can last up to five years.
The Outreau 13, who include a priest, a court bailiff, a taxi driver and a bakery owner, described how Judge Burgaud tormented and humiliated them to extract confessions. He had ruined their lives, breaking up marriages and families, they said.
The judge rounded them up in 2002 after they were falsely accused by Myriam Badaoui, the woman at the centre of the trial, who, together with her husband and another couple, were the only ones to be convicted. The only other evidence came from confused accounts from Badaoui’s children, who were victims of her abuse (more)
A MAN jailed for five years for raping a 15-year-old girl has spoken of his prison hell after a judge quashed his conviction.
Jason Gabbana walked free from the court of appeal in London after revelations that police failed to disclose the teenager had earlier made a false allegation about a sex attack.
Mr Gabbana, 23, originally from Tuebrook, says his time in jail has left him emotionally scarred, and he is considering legal action against the police.....
...... I've cleared my name and I want people to have no doubts I was wrongly convicted."
A Merseyside police spokesman said: "We note the decision of the appeal court and comments by the judge with regards to the need to remind officers of their duty of disclosure.
"We also acknowledge the belief that this was a simple oversight and not done maliciously.
"An internal investigation has been launched to ensure that any lessons can be learnt from this incident.
"It would therefore be inappropriate for us to comment further at this time." (full report)
Town House TV is looking to speak to male nursery workers who feel they have been victimised because of their gender. We’re currently researching and developing a network UK documentary that looks at issues arriving from men seeking work in what is typically seen as a female profession. We are keen to speak to men who have been wrongly accused of misdemeanours against the children in their care or any other reasons that has put their job in jeopardy.
Please contact Jezz Wright at Town House TV on 01603 281 007. Any conversation will be treated in the strictest confidence and there is no commitment needed at this stage to take part in the documentary.
A mother and her young son cannot claim damages from a local authority which wrongly accused her of harming the child who was then taken from her.
The child was in care for four months before it was found his rib injuries were caused by brittle bone disease.
The mother, from Bury, Greater Manchester, claimed that both she and her son suffered psychological damage.
The Court of Appeal ruled Bury Council did not owe the mother a duty of care and she cannot sue for negligence.
Although there was a duty of care owed to the boy, the was no evidence, other than from the mother, that the separation had caused any lasting damage, the appeal judges ruled.
Lords Justices Mummery, Wall and Laws waited to hear the case until after a House of Lords ruling on similar claims over children had wrongly been taken into care ... more
There has been quite a lot of comment in the Press about the decision taken by Ruth Kelly, Secretary of State for the Department of Education and Skills regarding her decision to allow a teacher who admitted sexually abusing a child, and who name had been placed on the Sex Offenders Register, to teach in a school. It has subsequently emerged that other ministers have in the past taken similar decision in exceptional cases. Not unexpectedly a great deal of the Press comment has been hysterical in nature and somewhat ill informed.
The BBC have produced a helpful summary of what the case is about here and here and provides a potted history of the action Ministers have taken in recent years.
Some of the more responsible comments can be found in excellents article in The Times by Matthew Paris's (here), David Aaronovitch (here), and in Peter Preston's article in the Guardian (here). The Guardian also have added to the debate by summarising some of the finer political issues involved in Ministers a persons suitability to teach (here) and by looking at the issues from both sides of the argument in Mary Riddells thought provoking article (here). A similar approach is taken by the Observer (here)
By Mary Shaw
You're walking down the street, peacefully minding your own business. Suddenly, a stranger points to you and says, "He did it." Police officers frisk you, knock you around a bit, handcuff you, and throw you in jail. They tell you that an eyewitness has identified you as the perpetrator of a rape. Or maybe a murder.
You're innocent, so you look forward to the opportunity to clear your name in a court of law. But you cannot afford a top-notch defense attorney, so the court assigns an overworked novice public defender to your case. He drops the ball. You are found guilty, and you spend the next several years in one of the most horrible settings on this planet.
If you're lucky, maybe DNA or other evidence will eventually surface to prove your innocence.
And, if you're lucky, maybe the court will agree to admit that evidence and give you a new trial.
And, if you're lucky, maybe your conviction will be overturned and you will be exonerated.
But there's a good chance that this is where your luck will end. The nightmare of your wrongful conviction is far from over.
As compensation for the years you spent behind bars for a crime you did not commit, the state might give you $10 and a bus ticket.
And that $10 might well be all that you own now. Studies have shown that over 90 percent of exonerees in the U.S. lost all their assets, including their savings, vehicles, and homes, while imprisoned.
Newly free, you try to find work and rebuild your life. But prospective employers often do a background check, and they learn of that conviction on your record. Most states do not automatically expunge the records of exonerees, and expungement is an expensive undertaking that isn't always successful. So you get work where you can - most likely in a low-paying job like taxi driving or janitorial work.
Sound far-fetched? Think it could never happen to you? Guess again. I recently met two men who learned these things the hard way right here in Pennsylvania. And they are just the tip of the iceberg.
In this country to date, nearly 400 wrongfully convicted individuals have been exonerated after conclusively proving their innocence. Some were on death row, and were lucky to have had the chance to prove their innocence prior to their execution dates.
The system must change. The state must not continue to punish the innocent after their names have been cleared.
For starters, all states should implement the following three measures:
- Expungement: A criminal conviction must not mar the permanent record of an innocent person. An exoneree's record should be automatically cleared when a conviction is overturned. Any records of these cases should be sealed, and should not be available to potential employers, credit agencies, or other parties who might do a background check.
- Compensation: Currently, only 17 jurisdictions provide exonerees with financial compensation. When they do, it is often woefully inadequate. While no amount of money could ever make up for the lost years and suffering of the wrongfully convicted, states should provide exonerees with adequate funds to build a new life.
- Social services: Most states do not have social programs in place for exonerees as they do for parolees. So, if you're innocent, there's less help for you on the outside than there would be if you were actually guilty! Returning to life on the outside is difficult. Exonerees often require assistance with housing, finding employment, and obtaining medical, dental, and psychological care. These services should be provided by the state, since the state's own misjudgments were responsible for creating the need.
It's the least we can do.
Mary Shaw is a Philadelphia-based writer and activist. She currently serves as Philadelphia Area Coordinator for Amnesty International, and her views on politics, human rights, and social justice issues have appeared in numerous online forums and in newspapers and magazines worldwide. Note that the ideas expressed in this article are the author's own, and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Amnesty or any other organization with which she may be associated.
For those who missed there is an excellent article in the Times (12th January 2006)
Innocent but presumed guilty
Camilla Cavendish
How many homes are broken by the closed and secretive family courts? Frighteningly, we don't know THE 1990 ROCHDALE abuse scandal, brilliantly documented last night in Real Story on BBC One, is one of the most extreme in the lexicon of social service disasters. One minute a little boy is telling ghost stories, the next he finds himself in care amid rumours of satanic abuse. Even when a judge throws out the case, he is kept in care for ten more years, because the social workers change their story and claim that his parents are unfit. We all hope that things have changed since then. But the almost complete censorship of what goes on in the world of “child protection” makes it impossible to know even how many cases go through the family courts. And 15 years on, the BBC’s court battle to identify the Rochdale social workers shows that the professionals still close ranks just as they always did.... (more)
According to Life Style Extra UK News (13th Jan 2006) one in five teachers have been falsely accused of misconduct by a pupil
Three-in-five secondary teachers say they know of students who have brought weapons into their school, according to a shock new survey.
Knives are the most common, but teachers have also seen BB guns, batons and, in one incident, a meat cleaver in the classroom.
The poll, by SecEd magazine which illustrates the shocking tide of violence in schools, also found that the vast majority of teachers (84 per cent) agreed there should be harsher punishments for students caught with weapons in school.
The survey, which was sent out to 3,000 headteachers and senior teachers, also reveals that one-in-five teachers have been physically attacked by a student – not necessarily with a weapon.
More than half knew of a teacher in their school who has been attacked while one-in-20 said they had been physically attacked by a parent.
When asked if schools should introduce metal detectors, 21 per cent of teachers agreed.
The poll also found that that one-in-five teachers (20 per cent) have been falsely accused of assault or inappropriate conduct by a student.
more ...
Its Not All Bad News
Posted by News Editor
Tuesday, January 17, 2006
There is no doubt that the Government's recent handling of List 99;has dented our campaign in drawing attention to the plight of carers and teacher falsely accused of child abuse.FACT's position is absolutely clear. Those carers and teachers who abuse children should not be allowed to work with children. Ruth Kelly (and previous ministers) have undoubtedly been put in a difficult position and on occasions may not have always acted wisely.What is clear is that the system of 'listing' people considered unsuitable to work with children is in need of complete overhaul. The system not only needs to ensurethat those who are a danger to childrencannot work with them but also that only those who a factually innocent of child abuse are not placed on the list. There needs to be an evidential approach to list, more accountability for the decisions taken and a proper system for challenging 'wrong' decisions. Being falsely accused is not as Tony Blair has recently made clear, acceptable. Indeed at the launch of his Respect speech he made it clear
"an innocent person should be protected from wrongful accusation".
Tony Blair
It's time I think to remind him and the Government that action speaks louder than words and that there should be no difference between policy and practice.
A false allegation of indecent assault against a teacher at a Lisburn school could cost the South Eastern Education and Library Board an estimated £50,000 after an out-of-court settlement.
David Bell, the technology and design teacher at Laurelhill Community College, who is at the centre of the dispute, was awarded £7,500 in damages at the Bar Library in Belfast this week.
Last night he told the Belfast Telegraph he was "very unhappy" with the outcome after confirming the figure came about as a result of a verbal agreement between the parties on Thursday.
"I never wanted money. It was never the issue. All I asked for was an apology," Mr Bell said.
"At an estimate from our lawyer, the SEELB will face final costs of up to £50,000. That's the value to which the board is now going to have to sack teachers and classroom assistants to make up the hole in its budget....." (more)
There are two very interesting articles in the todays Times regarding the Rochdale Satanic Abuse investigation. The first is a leading article ....
The effects of the Rochdale social services scandal are still with us.
Even at the time, the satanic abuse fever that gripped some social services departments in the late 1980s and early 1990s appeared other-worldly. The lurid claims of well-organised human sacrifices and ritualised abuse seemed at best improbable. A succession of inquiries confirmed that the heady atmosphere in which determined social services professionals pursued these allegations resembled 17th-century Salem more than late-20th-century Britain. Not a single conviction for satanic practices followed. But until now one chapter of the story had yet to be written. For the first time we can hear the harrowing evidence of the children of Rochdale who were taken from their families in unforgivably clumsy dawn raids and kept apart on flimsy reasons for up to a decade. Some of the details in the stories that we carry today are heart-rendingly senseless. Why was it considered necessary to deprive young children of their familiar clothes when they were taken into care? Why were their parents forbidden to visit on their birthdays? Why were the parents of one boy only allowed to see him for one month a year, even though a judge had dismissed the case against them? How, unchallenged, were social workers allowed to spin a single child’s dream into a reality that has devastated the lives of 16 children and their families? No one should ever pretend that being a social worker is easy. Spending your working day dealing with some