Scott Mills Sacked Thread 2

[KidsDoBetter]

to continue previous discussion

They ar3 a massive employer, and a lot of the staff are celebs, so they're more newsworthy

The BBC employs (don’t quote me!) around 20,000 people. Assuming that 10,000 of them are men, it would be surprising if there weren’t a few unsavory individuals in there.

I'm bringing up 2 trans kids, get a life. People like you should just go away.

Because they employ a lot of men who are ambitious, extroverted and risk-takers. You don't get on national TV/radio by taking no for an answer. I guess they are more likely to "take what they want" or at least as likely. My default assumption now is that anyone highly successful is likely to have dark secrets.

Err, what?

You say “makes you wonder about the BBC” - you are asked to say more and you lash out?

That’s quite the false equivalence! And, for the avoidance of doubt, PRIDE might be a “safe space” but the age of consent still applies.

Oh kate get away I said that from the start.

I'm trolled by kate.

Sure you are.

No it isn't. They haven't even remotely suggested that he's guilty of a crime and got away with it.

BBC News have reported that while the BBC knew about the police investigation a decade ago, the current leadership were only made aware that the alleged victim was under 16 last week, and that's what led their decision to sack Mills.

The complaint's age is massively relevant. It's one thing to say you've been accused of sexual offences by some guy you had a drunken one-night stand with and ghosted. It's quite feasible how that could happen to a young DJ. Explaining how you've gotten into a situation where you're accused of serious sexual offences against a child is a different matter.

CPS said there was no case to answer

They did not say this. They didn't feel that the evidence available was more likely than not to secure a successful prosecution. The police who investigated and submitted that case, and multiple levels of senior officers who cleared it, quite clearly believed there was a case to answer.

Mills would never have been given the career opportunities he's enjoyed at the BBC if they'd known there was the potential for that story to break.

He didn't disclose the extremely important fact that the person he was accused of committing serious sexual offences against was thirteen. Whether he lied about it or simply neglected to mention it, that's a massive breach of trust. Something with the potential to cause the organization reputational harm, as it has done. Something that will lead to questions about what they knew, and whether they hid it from the public while paying him millions of pounds of our money over the years.

They were completely justified in sacking him.

People at the level are almost always employed via personal service companies. Essentially Mills was a BBC employee, but legally the BBC had a services contract with the PSC, which Mills is an employee of, rather than an employment contract with Mills himself.

While it does allow them to terminate someone extremely rapidly and without having to worry about statutory employment rights, they do have to follow the terms of the contract and a fair process. If they don't, it's no different to unfairly dismissing an employee...you're just getting sued for breach of contract instead.

Where has it been confirmed that the complainant was 13 years old?

I suppose there’s a kind of depressing perverse reassurance in the fact there are women prepared to leap to the defence of men-regardless of their sexuality….

Bit of napkin math - the crimes were alleged to have taken place from 97-2000, against "a teenage boy under the age of 16". If he was 16 or under in 2000 he'd have been 13 in 1997.

13, 14 or 15...the point is that he was a child at the time of the offenses.

It’s speculation from the report that the police were investigating events that happened between 1997 and 2000 with an under 16 year old. So if he was 16 or under in 2000 then he would have been 13 in 2007.

Well said.

Was it that a continuous period was alleged or that the complainant couldn't remember the exact date so a window of time was used? The latter is not uncommon with reporting of historic allegations.

I think we should be careful about extrapolating anything with certainty based on such vague and limited information.

https://www.thesun.co.uk/tv/38727660/scott-mills-sex-abuse-victim-friends-sacked-dj/

It hasnt been confirmed. I was just surmising and guessitmating the age based on the idea he might have been under 16 for the period 1997 to 2000, which would have meant, if so, that he was 13 at the earliest period (1997).

Its just a musing.

It’s a musing from some but a PP used that age as it was fact, which is probably unwise

He didn't disclose the extremely important fact that the person he was accused of committing serious sexual offences against was thirteen

We know he was underage. Why does it matter how much underage?

One person is now speculating that seeing as SM and victim were in touch that it was a relationship/friendship gone sour… or maybe the victim has woken up and realised he was underage, groomed, taken advantage of.

It shouldn’t matter but a 13 year old sounds worse to most people than eg a 15/16 year old.

I'm very sad that this has come out, I know many people weren't a fan of his but I listened to him a lot growing up on radio 1 etc and I'd never have imagined this happening. I do think the details may not ever be known, and a lot of it is pure speculation, but who knows, this day and age things seem to find a way of coming out online. I don't think it's helpful to be making statements about things that aren't facts like the age of the boy or the actual offences alleged etc, but obviously speculation is natural and will always happen