An adult is saying DS is lying, DS is defiant that he isn't

[ThatMotherHen]

More a what would you do really.

He's a teen with special needs. I don't think he's an angel at all, I'm not one of those but he is usually well behaved and usually very accurate.

Ds came home and told me something I wasn't happy with which was said by an adult. I queried it twice and he told me the same story word for word. Even when he knew I was going to speak to the adult he stuck to the same story.

The adult is saying they didn't say it. Well more along the lines of don't recall saying it. (It's something they would recall and was the same day!)
DS is still insistent and sticking to his story and is furious to be called a liar.

What would you do?

I would tell DS that you believe him, but that the adult either doesn't remember saying it or is embarrassed to have said it so there isn't really anything you can do this time, but that if anything similar is said you will be doing 'x' to deal with it. (Don't know what was said so not sure what is appropriate)
This is great advice, though I think it is also worth adding if it could be relevant that sometimes tone and context might change the meaning enough for an adult to not recognise what they actually said even when he's being 100% accurate.

It might also be useful to show him this thread. That just based on just this small snippet from you there are a lot of other adults who believe him and not the other adult. I don't have SN, but I also find it highly triggering to be told I'm lying, possibly because I was deeply upset by not being believed over a couple of events at primary school (not serious in the long run but important at the time) and not believed about older DS bullying. Believe your boy, his reaction suggests he's hurt because he's telling the truth.

Sorry, foreignness, I wasn't blaming you - I meant the teacher who was supposed to relay the message should have done it in writing. Clearly the teacher in that case was out of order anyway - when it comes to an injury you believe the child and chase up later (issuing sanctions if the child is lying) because that is a better option than potentially aggravating an injury.

I'm a teacher now and document everything, but it is something I was taught to do in my first job in a different field. Everything to or from a client should be in writing - even if that was just a short email documenting the outcomes of a conversation.

DS has ASD and I've had so many issues like this over the years. My DS is almost incapable of lying himself, but at the same time, he is very selective with his hearing sometimes. He will take one sentence out of context and imbue it with meaning that was never intended. He reads a particular motivation into the most simple of statements and gets himself in such a pickle with it all.

FWIW, I always believed him, as I knew he wasn't intentionally lying or trying to deceive me, but I would always wonder exactly how conversations had gone, rather than DS's interpretation of them.

More often than not I would have a chat with the member of staff at school. I wouldn't report exactly what DS said but I'd say that DS had reported conversation that he wasn't sure he'd understood and could they clarify etc. I could usually tell from their response if something was "off" and I needed to be more concerned. In the majority of cases there had been a misunderstanding or misinterpretation by DS and I could talk him through it, without having exposed him as a 'tell tale' to the teacher or caused any bad feeling with them either - IYSWIM.