DS accused of assault

You're handling this well imo OP. You don't have the full story yet so it's very wise not to go in heavy at this stage. Speaking from experience thats the worst thing you can do right now.

Hope you get to the bottom of it soon, for all your sakes.

you are clearly minimising this and your son IS a bully. Jumping with other boys on another boy who ends up injured to the point the police are involved is pretty dam serious.

you obviously think your child can do no wrong - 'oh a bit of rough play sweetie' No it really isn't.

Very true. He's asthmatic, and when he couldn't get his breath or get to his inhaler because of all the boys piled on him, he really freaked out. He was so frightened he pissed himself.🙁

Bodily based trauma is pretty difficult to shift. You can talk about it to the cows come home but still have a reflex reaction when the body is triggered. What seems to work best is a kind of eye movement therapy called EMDR.

I have two adopted children, adults now, whose nervous systems are completely messed up because of the fear they experienced as infants. It is incredibly difficult to shift.

I think you need to get your son legal advice.

While I wouldn't condone violence, I do think you need to think about reprocussions if he gets the blame.

The victim doesnt know who attacked him - them legally your son is innocent unless there's evidence to the contrary.

You need to explain how serious this is and get him a lawyer so you know what you're dealing with and I wouldn't speak to the school or the police until id done that

My son was accused of something when he was a bit older than your boy. He’s now in his mid thirties. The victim made a statement to police which was supported by some of her friends who were present. My son denied it, was interviewed by police and didn’t come over well (mostly grunts). I didn’t believe him and was angry and ashamed. The victim then retracted her statement and so did the other young people. I still didn’t believe him. I could barely look at him for weeks.
Many years later my son and I have discussed this and I’m now aware through other information that the incident didn’t happen at all. Me disbelieving him then really made him withdraw from me for a long time. It was a bad time.
It’s a horrible situation to be in as a mum and every situation is different. If I had my time again, I’d try to be more neutral in the situation while obviously clearly condemning any violence.

It's not odd if you have an ounce of imagination. They could have surrounded him, maybe he doesnt know their faces and being scared they all looked similar, maybe he was confused, or they attacked him from the back and he didnt see. Not hard to imagine.

he might not have done it, but if he didn’t stop it then legally it amounts to the same thing.

I'm not a lawyer, but that sounds unlikely. If I saw a group of men fighting or assaulting someone I wouldn't get physically involved or even try verbally to get them to stop as I'd feel the risk of serious injury (to me) was too high. I don't see how that would make me culpable.

Thirded. It doesn’t matter if you’re not guilty, it’s extremely unwise to speak to the police, or sign anything, without representation.

Also, they may be putting more pressure on your son with threats of the police and exclusion because they don’t in fact think he’s a troublemaker, and will thus be more likely to ‘break’.

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Really? Really? How about the small matter of consent?

I used to do kickboxing, obviously I knew I was going to get kicked in a fight. That did not mean if I was minding my own business at work and a colleague kung fu kicked me I’d be ok with it. Or a stranger in the street!

Are police actually involved, or is the threat of police being used as a way to scare your son into giving information?

It doesn’t sound like they have any actual evidence against your son, or even an allegation by the victim specifically naming your son.

That he isn’t saying anything doesn’t mean he was responsible or involved beyond being a bystander. It can be as simple as not wanting to put a target on his own back and becoming a social pariah by being perceived to be a ‘snitch’.

If it was my dc i wouldn't be interested in "supporting him" more punishing him. Regardless if the attacker was him he was involved in presumably goading someone and from updates part of a pile on. He would also be punished for not telling anyone, failing to stop the act and as u said clearly withholding information. As a parent I wouldn't also be questioning were perhaps I have gone wrong. Not blaming u OP but what friendship group does he have, have u noticed any behaviour beforehand and is he aware to not be a bully this needs to be enforced day in day out with kids now a day the whole world is changing too fast now a days

Doesn’t sound like a joke. Sounds like a group of boys physically bullying someone 🤷‍♀️. I’m sure the boys will say it was banter/a joke but the victim obviously disagrees.

There is A LOT of melodrama on this thread. But remember, it's MN where some posters are horrified and call you abusive if you leave a 17 year old at home alone...

I wonder what action the victim (and his parents) want to take against those involved and investigations by the school and police.

This is a hysterical, melodramatic response.

something horrific has happened to another child

OP hasn't said what's happened to the other child apart from the pile on. She's said that the child has been 'fine' with her son since the incident, and that they were friends before. Something has happened, but 'horrific' is a ridiculous stretch.

and not only does your son know exactly what happened but is refusing to tell you and is trying to get away with..

You have no idea what her son 'knows'. He's already named the boy he says did it. He could have seen everything or nothing. He could be telling the truth about the boy who did it, or he could be throwing him under the bus to save his own skin.

Point being, if you assume the worst and treat him like he's guilty, he's hardly going to open up about it.

I would not be telling my son I’d stand by him regardless, he should be in his room.. No phone, no iPad, no anything.

Why would you not stand by your child in this situation? It's a bit of rough and tumble at school that got out of hand, he hasn't killed anyone.

From the information OP has given this is seemingly out of the ordinary for her son. All that overreacting, shutting him away and not standing by him the first time he slips up is going to do is ensure that he never feels comfortable in coming to her in the future.

My parents always made it clear that they would have my back through anything, but in return they demanded absolute honesty. This doesn't mean that they covered for me, or that I wasn't punished.

He needs to understand that he needs to help fix whatever has happened to another child because it’s clearly something horrific before the police turn up at your door.

He's already named the boy he says did it, and apparently reconciled with the boy who got hurt. Assuming he's telling the truth, what else do you want him to 'fix'? OP has already given him 'the talk' and will punish him for being involved in the pile on.

It is not 'clearly something horrific' - if the boy had been hurt badly enough to warrant police involvement, this would have already happened.

“He’s no angel”

“It was a joke”

“I can imagine him carrying on”

“It’s the second time”

He knows what happened, he was fully involved, and I think you both know it.

such an extreme reaction means there are deeper problems than a "pile on"

I’m editing my answer as it was worded incorrectly.

it sounds like he is very much involved as in not just a witness. Even if he didn’t throw a punch etc he is still a perpetrator of the assault as it began with the pile on (if I’m understanding correctly)

Someone I know was so traumatised by being "piled on" in their last year at primary that they are still freaked out by it more than 50 years later.

They've had to leave gigs, crowded pubs, clubs etc, generally anywhere where people are crammed together. They can't use the tube or trains at peak times.

It is a truly horrible thing to do to someone.

To those saying that all kids/boys fight, no they don’t. Some do, and are fine with the roughhousing, but others don’t. So when those that like that kind of physical play engage in it with others who are not used to it, it can go very wrong quickly. Roughousing should only ever be done between kids/boys who give their consent, which can be withdrawn any time and the others stop immediately as they can read body language and know the rules. I see this a lot in the older years of the primary school I work in, where 9/10 times it descends into a fall-out simply because a child complains to the other they were too rough, that one then gets defensive, others join in taking sides and we then have an actual fight start. Some boys haven’t developed impulse control or they lack self confidence to simply walk away or ‘lose face’. It’s very status heavy.

If this lad has been jumped from behind by a group then that isn’t an activity that has consent.
(IANAL)

It’s not messing around to pile on top of another child. Don’t minimise what has happened.