DS shown drug video - county lines and how to handle?

[HeathersFeathers]

DS said ‘I need to tell you something but you must promise not to tell the school’ .
Today during class, two boys ‘Z’ and ‘X’ were jesting around, posturing/showing off trying to establish a pecking order. My DS is not friends with, but sits next to child Z.
Child X said I’ve got year 11 friends who can sort you out’ to child Z. Then Z said ‘well I know people in these circles so you can’t touch me’ and proceeded to show X and my DS a video of himself with lots of bags of weed lined up on a table wrapped in cling film and was saying to the camera, this one is x grams, this one x grams etc. like a sales video . (To be clear - Z was in the video talking to the camera) Z told my DS , he was going to save up to buy a ‘scaler’ something along those lines, DS not sure what drug paraphernalia looks like or names for it. DS said how much is one of those and what’s it for . Z said ‘it’s a machine to roll joints with’. They are 12.
DS has begged me not to tell the school as apparently only himself, child X and another person have been shown this video. DS is scared it could be traced back to him telling someone.
What should I do with this information? I mean, I know what I should do, but I don’t know that I can trust the school to handle
this properly and protect my DS .
DS has had trouble in the past from tough kids at this school, I raised concerns and DS said it caused him some problems, ended up with a smack in the mouth. ( inner city school that has its fair share of issues).
can’t help but think it’s county lines. Obv told DS to stay away from this kid.

Why are you even asking what you should do? A 12 year old has a video of himself caught up with drugs and county lines

Tell the school. The damage this kid could end up with just doesn't bear thinking about

This is very simple, talk to the safeguarding lead in the school and outline potential county lines issue plus worry your DS has about being identified then targeted.

the chances are this boy has shown a few people this video. Rumours likely to be circulating around peer groups. The boy is the victim here, although he may not fully understand this.

in regards to your son, tell him he’s done a really good thing telling you. This boy is a potential victim and things could be extremely dangerous for him. Tell your son that safeguarding is everyone’s business and you have to report this to protect a vulnerable child, despite not normally breaking his confidence.

I really feel for you - that's difficult.

Is there any way you could have an anonymous chat with someone in the safeguarding team, to find out what the process would be if you reported something like this? eg. whether your son would be spoken to or not,

An alternative might be to report directly to the police, but I'm not sure what would happen then either.

I'd also consider waiting a while before doing anything, in the hope the boy concerned would be less likely to link it back to my child.

Your DS has begged you not to tell the school.
It could all be bravado, perhaps an older brother or even a parent's bunch of weed.

I wouldn't do anything at the moment I would be more concerned that my child would stop talking to me.

Can you, without naming names or mention of any incident, talk to another parent you trust first, as in, "hey have you heard any rumours about you know county lines type of bragging behaviour recently?"

If they are waving videos around it's only a matter of time before an adult in authority finds out regardless.

PLEASE report this incident.You MUST inform the school safeguarding lead about this, the county lines side of things might only be part of the picture. School will not refer to this incident alone when talking to the kids, as they have a duty to safeguard your DS.

Incidentally, going by the answers on this thread, it seems that EVERY adult in the country and not just those who work with children needs to undertake safeguarding training.

You know what to do OP.

Report to school. Share your son's concerns.

Your safeguarding lead will turn it straight into to the children's services referral system they use.

Children's services will call a professionals meeting and decide how best to proceed.

It's rare a 12 year old is involved in county lines without having a history of back and forth with children's services. I have no doubt the family are already known to children's services and this is unlikely to come as a surprise. Hence your son's part in the matter likely to be able to be buried.

Keep us updated.

What if the school is utterly useless? Some are.
Your kid's name gets out as a grass?

Innocent kids can get knifed you know. Sometimes this isn't as simple as telling a safeguarding team.

These kids are 12, but saying they have protection from year 11s, 15/16;year olds. Which may or may not be true.

You've been put in a very difficult position OP.

Some schools are useless and all that could happen is your child becomes the target of both gangs. Which is what the DS is afraid of.

If it's inner city it's most likely gangs not county lines. To be fair the police and school probably are already aware.

I'd be surprised really if the kid only showed the video to your son and this other boy. He's probably been showing others too. So it would be a lot harder to trace back to your son.

Contact the safeguarding lead at school. Outline what your DS told you. Include that there is video evidence. Tell them your DS is worried about repercussions and that he has been targeted before. Stress to them that he needs to be protected from harm during any investigations they carry out.

You really must tell the school. You have clear evidence of a vulnerable child in trouble.

She’s asking what she should do because she’s worried that reporting this to the school will bring harm to her child. It is a reasonable consideration. If the kids are mixed up with gangs then they may be kids that don’t take lightly to being grassed upon and she doesn’t want to put her son at risk. I am a child safeguarding professional and even I understand the dilemma as a parent.

OP, ultimately I would speak to the school, like a pp said, I doubt this will come as a surprise to them. However, I would make it absolutely clear that your sons name is to be kept out of it and ideally the video is not mentioned in any discussions with the child.

It’s really depressing to read the suggestion not to do anything in case the school is useless.
your son has done the sensible, mature and brave thing in telling you. You need to do similarly and pass it on to the school safeguarding lead. As a PP said, your son won’t be the only person who’s been shown this stuf.

Strange scenario for this boy to have this video of himself - what is the purpose of it ? - and I am not quite sure what he is doing showing it around the place to random other kids.

Regardless I have to say my firm advice to you would be not to put your child at risk by telling school. You will be potentially risking harm to him if you do so that the school çannot realistically protect him from, as they will not know everyone involved.

Yes it would be good if the boy with the video got some help. And OP could make the choice to risk herself in order to report and get him that help. But I don't think she has the right to risk her son's safety by doing this.

And it wouldn't be "the school being shit" if they can't protect him. They are not resourced to pay bodyguards to follow him around 24/7 (nor would you want him to live like that).

If my daughter found this out I would strongly advise her NOT to report, I have to say (tho obviously would be proud in some ways if she chose too - but also scared on her behalf). I would not dream of breaking her confidence by reporting without her consent and thus risking her safety.

If you are worried that the school won’t handle it well then you can call MASH who are the multi agency safeguarding hub - Google mash and your county and there will be a number to ring. You can report anonymously.

That effectively reports it to social services who will then contact school if needed rather than the other way round. So it will be less clear that the report has come from in school.

Although as far as you know only your son and one other child were shown the video, other people outside school must know of it’s existence (whoever sold him / gave him the weed. Whoever shot the video etc).

If he and your son aren’t close friends I’d say there’s a high likelihood that he’s shown it to quiet a lot of people. Sometimes kids In these sort of situations know that they’re in danger but not how to extract themselves so it’s likely not as clear cut as him bragging about his “mates” - it’s also possible he’s Subconsciously hoping that someone will step in to help. You could also check his social media to see if he’s shared it anywhere public (yes 12 year olds in this sort of position are that stupid)

I wouldn’t risk reporting to the police- school or social services are your best bets.

I appreciate that you’re worried for your son but I would strongly urge you to report this. The other child is in a lot of danger.

Are you for real? 🤦‍♀️

If this were my ds I'd do nothing as I'd want to protect him. I'm trained, I KNOW what I SHOULD do. If this boy only made the video the night before and had actually only shown those 2 classmates, then your ds would be at risk. This is the real world and consequences could be very real. Just monitor. You just don't know what you're getting into. Tell ds he must continue to communicate with you.

Report straight to the police and you don't necessarily have to go to school.

If you report it to 101, you do need the boys full name and address maybe date of birth you will be doing him a massive favour.

He's selling weed for county lines and it only leads to trouble and further criminality

I would wait several months before saying anything so it isn’t connected to DS. Also wait and see how things pan out.

You absolutly need to report it.
If you comfortable with the way school will treat it, go to the police or crimestoppers (which is anonymous).
You don't have to go through school, but you do need to report ASAP.

You're in a difficult position and although clearly reporting is the right thing to do, I can understand your reservations.

https://crimestoppers-uk.org/fearless

Fearless (part of crimestoppers) in the link above is a place where you can report online anonymously. I think I'd do that as a first step.

You must inform the school. They need to know. And the police as well.

I understand your desire to report this to the school, but your first priority is to uour son and I think you are playing with fire.

Going against the grain here but I think you need to protect your son. Breaching his trust is bad enough, but he would be my top priority and I wouldn't risk putting him in danger.

I would warn your son to keep a mile back from these boys, keep his mouth shut and let Z’s parents worry about him.

Not telling anyone is clearly also a risk to your son. He's in class with someone involved in selling weed? That's not likely to be a positive thing.

You need to report it. If you inform police or social services, they would bounce it back to school anyway. It doesn't really matter which you tell.