to get an autistic man stopped by police

[dimaggio]

I feel a little guilty after an occurrence yesterday in the station waiting for a train home. Story cut short I saw a youngish man (20s probably) appearing to show too much interest in children hanging around (this being about 4pm when kids are going home from school), frequently looking or staring at children, or standing very close to people, that?s how it looked to me anyway. I asked one of the British Transport police to keep an eye on him, and they duly followed him before pulling him over after stopping at a leaflet rack for a look where there happened to be other children. He looked totally flustered but looked to be attempting to answer questions politely. When police came back to me they said they eventually found an autism alert card which went some way to explaining his unusual social behaviour, and confusion/uncommunicativeness. Apparently they took his details but only advised him to be careful looking at or standing close to people in a public place. (no arrest, search or charge)

I feel quite bad now as from the little I know about Autism/Aspergers people are very likely to be misunderstood (eg certain colours people are wearing, spacial awareness, how actions are perceived even if they have no bad intent). I put this gentleman in a frightening position being approached by two authority figures who were not exactly easy on him when he was probably just going for his train home. Then again, is this better than letting a genuine offender escape notice and do something? Catch 22 to me.

actually i think i should be one of only a few allowed opinions.

we could quickly ban crocs and insist on pun based humour across the board. And ban soaps. And katie price. And we could shoot Frankie Boyle

all good

I think you did the right thing OP. We have to all use our judgement and if you thought he was acting very oddly then you should have told the police.

As it turned out the young man had ASD, obviously dealt with the police well and was able to explain away their concerns. But he could have been lost, depressed or vulnerable in some other way if he was hanging round a train station. He could have been getting very close to people to pickpocket them. He could have been deciding whether to jump in front of a train. He could have been a terrorist about to blow the station up. He could just have been meeting a younger sibling off a train. You just don't know.

I would rather be questioned by the police if my behaviour appears to be odd rather than have a child be subjected to what I was subjected to.

In my case the perpetrator had been seen hanging about standing very near to other girls before the incident but no-one saw it as their business to do anything about it. It is quite likely I was not the only girl assaulted by him that day.

I am sorry if having questions asked of them results in upset to someone who turns out to have an ASD. The police should make sure they act as sensitively as possible if they ned to approach someone to ask questions. But odd behaviour should not just be ignored because the consequences of missing the rare person who is up to no good can be so serious.

SWC - it's bloody hard isn't it :( x

Vajazz - grow up. As for reporting Seekers comment - wtf? ^Hanging around staring at children' FFS it was a TRAIN STATION - he was WAITING and watching people - the same as the rest of us do while waiting for a train.

As has already been said - someone acting 'oddly' is really not the person you should be reporting to the police! Some of you need educating in the fact that people who abuse children are not the ones hanging around in raincoats eyeing up children!

actually I disagree

i think that challenging every action that is 'different' from every person who seems odd whether their behaviour constitutes a threat or not is not a reasonable reaction to a relatively small risk.
It is like saying that children should never be allowed out alone in case they get abducted.

Our reaction to risk is disproprtionate.

Of course i understand that the effects of an assault are terrible for the victim. But we cannot shape society to prevent relatively small risk unless we are prepared to endlessly marginalise people who are outside mainstream

Pag - you are getting well above your station now!!! Ban crocs indeed!?!

swc - for some reason it's okay to be a bit of a bigot when it comes to SN apparently

Just because someone behaves slightly different from norm, I dont think they should be challenged by police. It does not sound like his bahaviour was threatening in any way.

If you think he was behaving suscipiously then you were right to mention it to the police, you are not to know whether the person has sn or not. Always better to be safe than sorry IMO.

He was a person with autism. People are normally good and nice however they can be 'bad' ie perverts, gropers, pickpockets etc etc. The fact someone has autism doesn't negate them from being a 'bad' person of some description it's just economies of scale. If say 99% of people are 'good' and 99% of people don't have autism then (if my maths is correct) you would have to get 10,000 people to get 100 with autism in that sample, 1 of which would be 'bad' or ill intentioned. There would also be 100 NT 'bad' people who may or may not be wearing trench coats and dark glasses or a stripy top and bag with 'swag' on it...

The sad fact is people with autism/ASD live in a non autistic world were the majority 'normal' isn't their 'normal'. While we as a society are getting better at thinking 'Maybe that person has autism/learning difficulties/a mental health problem etc the baseline most people would go from in a train station is to stand equally far away from every other person staring at the floor or the departures board which this man wasn't doing. This meant the OP noticed him and something about him made her anxious. She alerted the nearby police officers who obviously agreed with her as they spoke to him (I doubt they'd have gone over if a woman went up to them asking them to keep an eye on a black person/fat person/ginger person etc).

I don't know much about autism but as this man was out alone he must be reasonably high functioning? Hopefully he'll have learnt from this and be able to moderate his behaviour to stop it happening again, for his sake.

I'm still struggling to see what the man did that was worthy of having the police called over. He stood close to people in a public place and looked at children. I'm trying hard to be open-minded but I still don't understand.

It's not even as though he was in a place that was designed mainly for the use of children, like a play area. He was an adult standing at a train station, presumably waiting for a train.

I find it ironic though that when my ds1 was younger and hated other people getting too close to him, he was viewed as the 'odd' one - yet here it seems to be the other way around.

I suppose the OP acted on her best judgement

but what constitutes unusual interest in children?
I often look at children/teens they can be amusing/ irritating
sometimes I look rather absent mindedly and can appear to be staring

I find this 'looking for dangers' a bit unsettling
I am not sure real offenders a re particularly obvious, in fact many are
the respectable unimpeachable type who make people feel comfortable with them

I am not making a judgment on the op because I wasn't there. However, I think we should distinguish 'socially un acceptable' behaviour from'unconventional' behaviour. Unacceptable is, for example, groping someone, tipping their shopping on the ground or shouting abuse (I.e. Causing genuine distress) Standing close to someone, staring at them or trying to play with children are unconventional behaviors, but not socially 'unacceptable' in my opinion at least. I think it would be very sad if people with autism or learning disabilities were not allowed out alone because of their difficulty abiding by social norms.

OP did the police then ask you why you were showing 'to much interest' in a young vunerable males?

I would much rather my son got told to "Go home" by the police than lynched by an ignorant peedo huntin' mob!

I agree with colditz. I won't hide my son at home because others think that anything different is scary and bad.
But OP, you did nothing wrong. I'd rather my son wasn't attacked by some illogical member of the public defending his family by 'sorting out' my child. Much better to have a police officer working out what's happening.
That's why the autism alert cards are so useful.

I haven't read all the thread yet, but I do think you did the right thing. It wasn't the man shown below was it?

linky

You know one of the sad things about being the parent of a teenager on the spectrum foxinthewoods?
The fact that I don't recognise your name, so when I clicked on the link I was 50% expecting it to be an image that would form part of a 'witty joke' response. Because that's often what the public response is to odd behaviour, along with mimicking and taunts.
So I'm pleased that it was a sensible link.

I am a regular here, but do name change often, only because I'm a bit funny about being outed

Oh dear, that could easily have been my ASD DS!! He loves children in a very sweet and innocent way as he is a young child in his own head. He particularly loves babies. I have tried to tell him to be careful not to stare at children for exactly this reason, but he doesn't really understand.

I can understand why you did this, but it makes me so sad that someone might react to him like this and it would frighten him so much. He is already going through an obsession that the police will arrest him at any moment for "bad thoughts".

This makes me want to cry :(

My son has ASD and he gets people staring at him all the time. He probably thinks that is normal behaviour!

WHOA that sparked a lot of replies, quite a mix of YABU and YANBU. I can't possibly answer everyone but as to not searching him, maybe it is different in Scotland as quite a few legalities are. I take all the points about reporting suspicious adults but also sympathise with other mums with ASD DSs (this card sounds worth considering for any of you). Who knows what will happen to this man from here. To be fair to police they were pretty abrupt but didn't charge him (AFAIK) though I don't know if this will rear its head if he ever needs a Disclosure/CRB as it only requires police to say they 'have a record of dealing with someone for suspicious behaviour".

I'm afraid I would do the same again, and as people suggest I only happened to see police nearby, I didn't phone in a panic. It is up to THEM how to handle it after there and how sensitive they are to vulnerable people.