7 police officers versus 1 autistic girl

[Green777]

https://metro.co.uk/video/teen-girl-autism-arrested-telling-officer-looks-like-lesbian-nana-2995683/

AIBU to think these Police officers should be disciplined for arresting this autistic

girl for a ‘hate crime’ then dragging her out of her home kicking and screaming?

The police officer who the girl said looked like her ‘lesbian nana’ seems very unprofessional.

Regardless of whether police involvement was reasonable, it did not need seven police officers.

I recognise the courts system is broken and has lengthy delays, but that should not stop the police using only the number of officers necessary, so others can be dealing with other criminal matters.

No, not really. That is what the police want you to think.

Facts of the matter are she was arrested and dragged away by 7 police officers for saying she looked like her lesbian nana. ‘Verbal abuse’ to the PO.

There is literally no other charge or crime or anything else that they can say or cling to because they would have.

They won’t turn up for real crime, this is a total disgrace. The gender nonsense is not the Police’s job

That’s quite a jump of reading something that isn’t there from a post! The pp asked what the police statement was, and I deliberately gave a summary without opinion.

Id hate to see a lot of posters on this thread do jury service!

And why didnt the family go to get her and bring her home, why phone the police to do that?

@Green777 We do not know for definite if that is what she actually said. We currently only have the mums account that the girl said that. It doesn't mean that the mums account is not true, but we cannot be definite unless we have the police footage.

But regardless, I cannot imagine anything anyone could possibly say to warrant such a heavy handed response from the police.

There’s absolutely no point in engaging with you now, your mind is made up and closed

If they felt they really had to arrest her they should have left the mother to calm her down and asked her to bring her in the next day, there was no need to do it the way they did.

At that point they would also have looked at the body cam footage, agreed whether what was said was homophobic or a misunderstanding, found a correct crime to charge her with (I have read that a public order offense cannot be one that happens in a private residence and it also has to be reported by a member of the public but IANAL) and sorted this all out without all the violence.

I think the officer involved needs to be investigated for her homophobic attitude, saying someone looks like a lesbian you know is not an insult, but this does depend on what she thinks she heard, at the very least she needs disability training, anger management and a removal from frontline policing until she learns how to behave, deescalate, not jump t conclusions and not abuse her position. She also needs to be arrested for assaulting the mother, unlawfully entering their home and possibly assaulting the daughter.

It's all appalling but unfortunately not surprising. I was told by a domestic abuse police officer that someone with autism is more likely the abuser in a domestic violence situation when ALL evidence points the other way, they are more likely to be the victim. What hope is there when the people whose job it is to protect you are under the impression that you are more likely to be violent due to your disability?

Who cares? Attempted murderers are allowed to publicly call for women to be punched, and that, according to the police is fine, but this isn’t? They’re huge power mad hypocrites.

That’s disgusting. I feel quite upset watching that.

The police need more training. I hope they are made to apologise for their lack of professionalism and for causing so much distress.

When my autistic daughter was brought home by police she was handled with nothing but kindness. Her disabilities put her at a priority, they certainly didn’t say they didn’t care about her autism. Quite the reverse. I have 2 autistic teens and the police have been very autism aware and kind in both our very different dealings with them.Thanking my lucky stars we don’t live in the same area as this story.

This story gives me chills in the same way footage of autistic youngsters bring deliberately heightened and abused in care does. Since when is it ok for professionals to say they don’t care about a protected disability?

The police in this country a joke. Only interested in protecting ‘their own’.

Secondary teachers will have experienced worse on a daily basis. Are they supposed to call for a public disorder squad every time?

Whilst lots of police are able to de escalate situations and would have managed this differently, what happened is not unusual in my experience.

It's not unusual for someone in distress to end up with criminal charges - often of assault against police - when the police have been heavy handed.

Happens frequently with women in a mental health crisis.

Exactly. And it shows ignorance. At its most basic level autism is a social communication disability...the teenage girl will have just stated whatever was jn her kind and would not have had the ability to understand the negative way in which it might be taken.
The number if officers for 1 teenaged girl cowering in a cupboard is just an aggression tactic.
I would hope the force have guidelines about dealing with disabled people, ypu would think informed hy an LD nurse or similar.
I am normally very sympathetic towards the police. Making split second decisions, however this is horrific and cased by ignorance.
I have a 14 hear old autistic daughter who can appear very 'normal' ( ie she has learned how to fit in and masks) but would behave in a very similar way to this girl if utterly overwhelmed).
Essentially what has happened as far as I can see is that the young girl has said she thought the female, short haired police officer is a lesbian (possibly linking to her nan's appearance) and the female officer has thought she was insulting her.
This could have been resolved with a conversation if those officers had acted professionally. They could have signposted family or made a safeguarding referral to school if they really felt there was some sort of homophobic issue.
Essentially the female officer felt insulted and and wanted to 'get her own back'
Disgraceful.

The police can't reveal all information due to data protection laws. I'm sure they'd love to share their side!

If 7 officers have attended it's likely due to a history of violent behaviour from the individual. Sorry- but the police aren't there to be punched so perhaps 7were required to minimise risk of injury.

In addition - the police will have been contacted to be there (in order to be verbally abused) ...so why was that?

AND since when is it ok to verbally abuse people? The public have a right to charge someone for verbal abuse - why not the police? It's very likely been a 'tag on' charge to others.

AND sometimes a record of these police incidents ends up being helpful for the family who can evidence the support needs and access funding.

She’d followed her 18 yr old sister, who was going on a planned night out.

Teens go out, get drunk, even those with lovely engaged parents. It’s too easy to blame parents for behaviour that’s as old as the hills.

There’s nothing to say that there’s more to this. Even the police statement backs up the mother’s account.

It’s just another day in clown world where the police are taking advantage of their power.

I’m now waiting for the announcement that the police officer is a trans man or NB, and that’s why the comment that she looked like a lesbian was ridiculously deemed homophobic. The only homophobia is from the police woman who was so triggered by overhearing that she looked like a lesbian that she had to race back into the house to arrest the teen 🙄

They don't count/deserve it/chose to work with teenagers...

The girl likened the police woman to her lesbian nana - how is that verbal abuse?

The police statement is clear that this is about a homophobic comment.

The original police woman called for back up after the lesbian comment upset her so much and triggered her to run back into the house (illegal surely?) to make an arrest - surely this is the issue to focus on - why is a grown adult woman so triggered by being likened to a lesbian? What’s going on there? Why did this comment merit such an OTT reaction? Why did the other police not de-escalate the situation, instead of behaving as they did?

Measures should be put in place to avoid these situations.

In my autistic son’s situation, the only times when he kicked off in class was when a teacher escalated it by deliberately ignoring his needs, which were set out in his EHCP.
People have perceptions of autism that lead to some young people being treated appallingly. If you don’t “look” autistic, or if your autism means you’re challenging, no one wants to help, and some people (teachers, police etc) will go to lengths to try to punish them, to discipline. Which works just as well as punishing an amputee into regrowing a limb.

The police response is typical, and pathetic. No wonder there’s little trust left.

Autistic or not this is horrendous state power misuse in the name of "tolerance".

This is awful to watch and has really affected me. Nothing the girl could have said would warrant this behaviour. As others have said if she has verbally insulted the officer and it warranted arrest it should have been handled very differently. Asking her to attend the next day with an appropriate adult.
I presume many call outs involve people with mental health issues and the basic lack of understanding and training here is very frightening.
The girls screams are horrendous. The way she was handled outside too despite the mum saying she has scoliosis’ and it would cause her severe pain.
it seems the young girl pushed the wrong button here which is wrong but not an offence.

Another one who hasn’t bothered to read what actually happened, please take the time to so you avoid looking like an idiot Witt these comments.

Back up was called by the PO in question, which is why so many police ended up there.

She reported a hate crime or speech then the other officers attended to help remove the girl from her home.

All of it hinges on the lesbian comment and the Police haven’t said anything different. She was arrested for only that reason.

Whilst I don’t disagree with your sentiment, because it’s been enshrined in law, unfortunately Police do have to deal with it…and because it’s deemed a hate crime, it gets prioritised above a lot of “traditional” crime, including violent crime because ya know “hurty feelings”

As others have said if she has verbally insulted the officer and it warranted arrest it should have been handled very differently. Asking her to attend the next day with an appropriate adult.

That's assuming she has an appropriate adult. We know nothing about this family except what we have seen which is that they let a vulnerable, disabled 16 year old go out drinking to the point the police need to get involved and instead of calmly trying to de escalate the situation or focus on their daughter in anyway they were shouting and filming the police. Do we know if they are known to the police? Do we know if they have tried this tactic with this family before and been ignored so know it is pointless because they will have to physically bring the daughter in anyway? We don't know anything, we have no background at all.