Maxie Allen and Rosalind Levine arrested - The vindictiveness of the school and police overreach

I bet they wouldn't - 2 to deal with the suspected burglar, 2 maximum to do 'family stuff'. That is of course assuming the police bothered to investigate the burglary in the first place, which in my experience they wouldn't despite multiple ring doorbell evidence they would rather ignore.

The problem is there is no common sense anymore, let alone any reading going on
I have spent years fighting companies and local authorities. Just to get a correct bill or a fine for something that wasn’t sign posted removed.

Won each time but honestly wish people would read and check what I am saying is the truth then put themselves in the motorists or the customer’s shoes and make a decision based on that.

The fact that the school went to the police says more about there being missing information about the actions of the parents rather than anything else.

They certainly would send round 6 people to arrest a suspected burglar if they had intelligence that there were children at the location.

When my dad's car was stolen from outside our house and there was CCTV and ringdoorbell footage of the theft, guess how many officers turned up? ...Errr... exactly ZERO. They told us over the phone (once an officer was actually assigned to the case several days later) that the car is probably already abroad, so unlikely to ever be found.

Yet 6 officers turned up to arrest these parents who criticised the school on a WhatsApp group?! The UK is mad.

Can I point out that the recruitment process for appointing a new Head does not have to be an external one.
If the current Deputy is considered to be completely competent and would make a good Head, then why not appoint them?
It can cost a school £2k+ to recruit someone, takes at least 2 terms and you still don’t know what you’re going to get!

As far as I know being gobby is not a criminal offence in the UK.

Six police officers were sent to their house FFS in what was a massive overreach by the police who in my experience really drag their heels for proper crime eg if you're burgled, they certainly don't send 6 police officers round!!

Where does malicious communication turn into stalking? - and which one is a real crime? or are neither a real crime and both should be made legal? Would or should malicious communication be made legal in UK?

inflammatory and defamatory” comments on social media

Writing defamatory comments comes with consequences

Can I call the police for slander?

If statements are made which are threatening, grossly offensive or obscene, then this could constitute malicious communication, which is a criminal offence. This could be reported to the police. Generally, this requires the communication to be by way of letter, electronic communication or article.

warnings on a private WhatsApp group

a group isn't private

added to which its evidence

Surely the school would have sent in proof of the malicious communications or given examples of what they were.

To make an arrest the police must have had enough information that there is cause to think a crime has/is/will be committed

Even then given the nature of the “crime” as people are presumed innocent not guilty, inviting the couple into the station for a chat or a home visit by a couple of officers without sending in 6 police officers then finding out the school had over exaggerated everything

What is dreadful, having found out which school this is and knowing the school and the area well is I know someone who lives around there and could have used 6 police officers after she dialled 999 because of a home invasion by a gang whilst she was at home What she got was 45minutes later a couple of officers coming round to give her a crime number

Just speaking in general terms, as I don’t know the specifics of this case, if the reported “threat” was serious or imminent you may arrest first in order to protect the safety of any victims/property etc.

The problem with a voluntary interview is that the officers would have had no power to seize any electronic devices, which would have been used to send the emails/texts. We could ask for them to be surrendered voluntarily, but obviously a “guilty” person is unlikely to do so. Giving them prior notice of the investigation would give the suspects time to delete evidence/destroy phones, laptops etc. Obviously I’m speaking more in general terms as I don’t know anything about this case beyond what’s been reported in the papers.

I do also suspect the school could have handled this a lot better.

I get that but there is still a threshold for arrest. Friend of mine is a custody Sargent and says his job is about deciding if that threshold has been met and if not then he de arrests them. There are certainly cases where people sue for wrongful arrest because the threshold isn’t met.

The police shouldn’t just arrest someone because the school says xyz. There should be some examination of messages, etc before the arrest

so due to the lack of action by the couple against the police for wrongful arrest I suspect that threshold had been met. Which is why I wouldn’t be surprised if there is more to the story about what they’ve said /done than they’ve told the media. Yes parents can complain, they can moan, they can send emails demanding answers but at some point they will cross a legal threshold for harassment. And I suspect they crossed that line.

I’m a teacher and I have had my fair share of unreasonable and sometimes frankly offensive communications from parents (being accused of promoting witchcraft was a particular special case!). I’ve also known parents make vexatious subject access requests, requiring weeks of man hours to process, attempts to get the police involved for minor incidents, threats to sue - all manner of nasty batshittery (from middle class parents, before anyone pipes up about class). Maxie and Ros may have been annoying but they haven’t done anything wrong. If being a pain in the bum was an offence, the prisons would be bursting at the seams even more than they currently are. Some parents are annoying. Schools with decent staff and robust systems handle this effectively in-house.

Was anything personally defamatory said? No. Were the communications offensive? No. Was there harassment? No. This is an example of a weak and defensive management style from the school.

Thanks for that, IfIHadAHeart

To my mind, if the Police had all the emails, then surely they had their evidence and should have read and assessed it? They have concluded that there is no case to answer, 5 weeks in.

Could that not have been done first? Or a voluntary interview, rather than an arrest?

I am a police officer (nothing to do with this case, and work at the opposite end of the country). I can’t speak as to the ins and outs of the case itself, but can explain sending six officers.

The couple were arrested for harassment and malicious communications. The way we would prove/disprove such an allegation is by seizing and examining electronic devices. This would involve a house search (requiring at least one officer, preferably more) which needs to take place at the time of arrest or immediately after as per the legislation. We have no power to seize property belonging to people who are not under arrest. Two people were arrested, who need to be transported to custody separately, requiring at least one officer per suspect but best practice is two - one driving, one observing the suspect. In addition, they knew or suspected there may be children at the address which would require officers to look after while making arrangements for their care - relative/social services. So what may look heavy-handed quickly becomes logistically the minimum number of officers required to carry out the job.

The investigations were closed with no action being taken against the parents, so presumably no evidence was found on any seized devices. It may well have been a malicious/exaggerated report from the school. Having dealt with similar cases, it’s not the norm to make arrests unless what’s being reported are serious threats to school staff. I don’t know about the specifics of this case but reading between the lines I would speculate that the school made it sound a lot more serious than it turned out to be.

I think this is a bit much, tbh.
Schools are run by their Senior Management Teams and boards of governors (who are volunteers and include parent representatives). None of them fulfil their roles for the school with the intention of messing things up/being discriminatory/not doing their best.

From the Guardian article, it sounds as though the communication from the parents was aggressive and persistent, so I can imagine it feeling very personal for those on the other end of it.
Reporting it to the police seems very extreme, so I’d love to hear their side of the story before making such harsh judgments.

Is that right? I haven’t seen that.
The end of the linked Guardian article says the police had self-investigated and decided their response had been proportionate.

The you can be arrested and cautioned for the purposes of gathering evidence and investigating it doesn't have to be a case to be built against you for the arrest to be legal.
If you think about the logic of what you infer it just couldn't work