20yo ASD son child abuse images

[devoedtobitsandback]

I don't even know where to start here.

My son is 20 . I was away with work and got a call Thursday to say that my house was filled with police executing a search warrant. Luckily my youngest daughter 11 was at my sisters for the week. But my nt 15 and 20 (ASD) yr old sons were both arrested and taken in. I got a flight as soon as possible.

All devices were seized. They say that somebody uploaded child abuse images from my address during a 10 day period over summer. It now seems after some digging on my part thst my 15 year old and my 11 year old were away with me in Wales for at least half of that ten day period. So it must have been my ASD son. I have gently questioned him and it seems he had some anime porn (?) and it's not proper photographs. But he is a people pleaser and says whatever people want to hear too..... so I don't even know if it's true.

My life has been blown apart. My daughter has to stay at my sisters, my 15 yo is staying at home and my ASD son has to he stay at his dads. I need to find legal counsel and start figuring out how to figure this out. I'm torn between being angry, hyperventilating , vomiting crying and wanting to throttle him. He is normally a total rule follower but at the same time he often does not see the fall out and repercussions of his first choice. For him things are black or white and as these are drawings they are not real people, it's a cartoon and cartoons can't be illegal. South Park is racist and awful but is not banned. Nothing else will happen now until there devices have been examined but that could be 6-12 months and I am not being away from my daughter for that long so I want him to go in with legal counsel and confess so my other son 15 is cleared and I can have both my children back at home.

I don't even know why I'm posting. This is partly my fault too. I should have policed him more closely, set restrictions into his pc or been much more clear. He has struggled with his identity and has had blip after blip since high school ended and his friends went their own ways. He has become isolated and very insular and barely left his bedroom.

I'm scared and angry and heart broken.

[AllideasAndNoAction]

Has this happened with him before? I am getting a strong sense of de ja vu from this thread. The ASD and the anime porn is ringing massive bells.

[devoedtobitsandback]

No this has never happened before. Not to him or me. But I believe from googling that it's far from a one off. I am struggling to breathe tbh.

[BlankTimes]

What an awful situation to be in OP, here are some points you may not have considered.
Who else was in your house during that time? Did any of either son's friends or acquaintances visit?
Could anyone else have had your wifi password and downloaded the porn images at yours so their own equipment wasn't used during the time you were away?
Did anyone else ask your sons for your wifi password? There are lots of threads on MN about new neighbours asking for access and the advice is always to say no in case something like this happens.

Have the Police confirmed that the images they've seized are cartoons or drawings as opposed to photographs? It would be a start to know exactly what your son is being accused of downloading.

Secondly, where (which websites) was it downloaded from? My understanding of hardcore porn images that people are prosecuted for having (based on reading about peoples' convictions in the paper) is that the most serious images are not that easily available or accessible for download and specialist sites need to be used to access it. Is that the case here?

How did the Police know those images had been downloaded at your address? Has someone at your address paid for access to the images and there's a connection to bank accounts owned by people at your address? Has someone shared them online and someone else has seen them and reported the images to the Police?

Very, very importantly, does your son have capacity, i.e. does he manage his own bank-account and financial affairs? Does he work without any reasonable adjustments for his ASD, does he/can he independently travel without any input from you? Or is his life organised in a way that you are his appointee for his finances, making his appointments etc. ?

I understand your world has been torn apart, but please try and remove all of your emotions from your actions and look at this situation as objectively as you can and get him the help he needs to get through this process. I don't doubt he's also vulnerable and likely emotionally a lot younger than his chronological age.
Have any of your son's assessment reports or other documentation e.g. PIP assessment referenced him as being vulnerable, needing support or not having capacity to deal with his own affairs?

[devoedtobitsandback]

Ok. Realistically it must have been my son. He has already suggested ( and I'm treading v carefully) that he had a few anime type pictures that he had found on the internet and then shared via an app called discord. To my knowledge it is just cartoon style stuff. The police said it was uploaded or shared from my ip over a ten day period .

My son has certain capacities. I cobtrol his pip payments and am his appointee. He gets his student loan then transfers half to me for safe keeping as I'm trying to teach him to budget. He can't use public transport as doesn't have the executive function skills to plan a journey and allow for mistakes/cancellations. But he is an excellent driver providing he has a satnav. I can leave him overnight alone witha very strict set of rules but he can't tell if he is hungry, needs to shower etc sofamily will check on him through the day.

He is emotionally immature. He has been going through an identity issue for 3-5 years and has been under the psych dept on suicide watch a few years ago but the seemed to improve after a college transfer. Then just the day before his arrest he was in uni in a counselling session as he feels he can't go on and doesn't belong there. He has tried anti depressants but the nhs is so underfu fed he is still waiting for counselling.

[BlankTimes]

Sounds as though you have proof that he doesn't have full capacity, that's a start.

The Police should be able to provide someone with knowledge of autism to interview him, the Police even have an autistic police officer's association, so there's scaffolding in place for him to be treated according to his capabilities, you may have to make a noise to get that for him.

Also for legal representation, again you need someone who knows his deficits and can explain them to the police, CPS or whoever so they know without a doubt he shouldn't be "judged" in the same way they'd judge a similar aged NT man.

I'm clueless about apps and gaming and contact with other people, but googling Discord, this came up. It's a site for teens.
Discord has a feature that "bad" content can't be shared.
blog.discordapp.com/parents-guide-to-discord-c77d91793e9c

"3. Block inappropriate content
Discord has the ability to set an Explicit Content Filter that will automatically detect and delete images and uploads containing explicit and inappropriate content.
Follow these steps to turn this feature on:
User Settings -> Privacy & Safety → Check the “Keep Me Safe” box. Check out this help article for more details."

I guess anything inappropriate should in theory not be able to be sent over the app and if it was, recipients could or if young SHOULD have had that filter activated so it wouldn't have got through.
IF it was activated on his computer, he shouldn't have been able to send anything explicit or inappropriate.

I understand people are trying to help him but counselling i.e. talk therapy, for someone who has disabling deficits in social communication surely could be improved on.
You may find the definition of autism on the NAS website is helpful for his defence. The 'limit and impair everyday functioning' bit could be useful to reiterate.
in order for a diagnosis to be made, a person will usually be assessed as having had persistent difficulties with social communication and social interaction and restricted and repetitive patterns of behaviours, activities or interests (this includes sensory behaviour), since early childhood, to the extent that these 'limit and impair everyday functioning'.
www.autism.org.uk/about/diagnosis/adults.aspx

These and my previous comments are only my personal thoughts as a parent of adult dc with ASD, wondering what I'd do in your situation.

You really need help from someone who knows how to represent and help your son in this situation, if the police interview him in the same way they interview his NT age peers, I think he needs someone there who can advocate for him.

[devoedtobitsandback]

They were both interviewed the day they were arrested, I was hundreds of miles away and couldn't do anything. They were repeatedly informed about his autism and he had an advocate with him as a vulnerable adult. The solicitor recommended they both state " no comment " to every question so the case is currently waiting for their electronic devices to be looked at... that's a 6-12 month wait. So I have time to find specialists counsel etc.

I've proven that my younger son was away while half these events happened so it can't have been him. I'm really hoping that is enough for the social workers to allow my daughter back home in Monday as she is really struggling over all this. I know my 25 yo didn't do this, the police have also said the same. But with all this happening later on Thursday and me being working away it was a massive rush to get things put into place.

My eldest so is now at his dads and realistically may never be coming home. He hasbeen banned from the internet short term by me while I find somebody that is an experienced enough to lock down everybody's security to toddler levels. Not that they have tech. Well my 11yo does.

The police have also left a load of info about courses and support networks for us all. He is going to be doing massive amounts to help try get this sorted out. Maybe now he can get to the bottom of his deep seated issues.

I'm just cycling between the same emotions listed above. Barely slept again. Can hardly take a deep breath. I'll be going the G p on Monday. We both will.

[BlankTimes]

Just a quick not to say that although there's no advice I can give, you're in my thoughts over the festive season. I hope some of the courses and support networks are useful for you. I know things will be very tough indeed, but I hope you do manage to have some happy moments whilst you're dealing with everything else.

Don't forget, that when you're the one who has to look after everyone else's wellbeing, you need to look after your own first, so that you are then able to help them.

[devoedtobitsandback]

Thanks for the post, it meant a lot that you even thought about me.

Things are ok. He went and made a statement on Tuesday admitting the anime pictures. His solicitor seems confident that if they recover them from his pc and it matches what he says then it will likely be a caution. If they don’t recover anything then I charges will be brought. So my two youngest children were allowed to come home the same day as they are not classed as a risk to each other. My eldest is at his dads full time which is hard . But we are all pulling together and spending Christmas together. I am feeling better about it all and have realised that it could have been worse and he is getting counselling etc as a result of this and I will do my best to make sure it never progresses. I’m actually glad I found out now as opposed to years down the line when it could have escalated.

@BlankTimes. All the best to you and yours at Christmas and thank you both for hand holding in what has been the worst two weeks of my life.