Friend in trouble, police at my door.

[Playgroundincident]

My friends daughter is in year five mine is in year 4. My friend is an black, Muslim Zimbabwean woman daughter is also. Daughter has been receiving snipey racist abuse from a child in her class. Always where teachers can't hear and it's been going on for a couple of weeks. Daughter is a wonderful, sociable intelligent sporty kid an absolute pleasure to be around. Friend had been in to school at the beans thought it had been addressed however over the weekend it emerged that it hasn't and the child is still doing it, daughter hadn't said anything to her mum.
My friend was so upset, we walked in he dropped the kids off his morning, she said goodbye to he daughter then we watched the kids line up to go in. My friend and I stood in another part of the playground till she saw the boy who had been racist towards her daughter. She flew at him shouting all sorts of profanities, told him she was going to hit him, fucking kill him. The child was understandably frightened and the dad of another child stepped in and tried to calm the situation down. I grabbed her and took her out of the playground so the teachers could deal with the child. I've never seen he do this before she is not normally this way inclined but has a shit year with a husband who thinks she is there to serve him, left her for another woman, both parents died so her threshold is low at the moment. I sat with her in the car to calm her down. I told her I can't imagine how she is feeling he daughter being racially abused, told her I understood that she wanted to protect her but threatening to kill a 10 year old was not on. She's now annoyed at me asI didn't stick up for her.
An hour later the police have turned up at my door looking for her asking had I seen her, getting a witness statement because school have reported her. Friend has phoned me saying that she knows it was me who told the police and how she thought I would have her back and the year 4/5 WhatsApp has lit up with comments about how I should have done something slagging my friend and me off. For the record I don't agree with what she did but I've now got her and police to deal with. and now he child who made the racist comments mum threatening me. He whole thins is absolutely zero to do with me. I feel sorry for the children but any advice on how to navigate this would be much appreciated. Not sure whether to go for radio silence with everyone but police and school or say something on WhatsApp. My son is in he school and I don't want any fall out on him or my friends daughter either. Any suggestions appreciated.

I would take screenshots of any abuse directed at you on the WA group

Post a message in the group: I am not responsible for the actions of another parent. Nor am I responsible for the racial abuse directed at a child within our school community which will also be reported. Please stop directing comments at me. Any further comments about it on this group will be reported to the police or school as appropriate.

Message to friend
Friend, it was not me that reported to the police, it was the school. I will step back from this situation now, as you are clearly aggravated by me somehow, despite me trying to help as best I could. Let me know if you want to talk about things later on. I hope you are ok.

Message to the mum of the boy in playground.

I have nothing to do with this situation other than helping police with any information I can give. So please stop messaging me about it. You need to speak to the school or police if you want to discuss further. I am blocking your number now.

I hope you will tell the police and school everything about the racial abuse too. While the mother’s behaviour is totally wrong I can’t believe the school just ignored it.

In terms of the racial abuse - only the friend’s child can testify to this. For everyone else it is hearsay.

This is the issue with mumsnet isnt it,

Me saying her friend shouldnt of behaved like that is now apparently me condoning abusing a child?

Why have you tried to gas light me like that when we can both clearly see what I've wrote?

People like you really wind me up on here, we can all see what I wrote in black and white 🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️

Edited to add: just makes you look foolish doesnt it. Pretend ding someone has said somthing so you can go on a moral rant? I dread to think what your like in day to day verbal conversations if this is what you do to people in written conversations

I would put this message (as above). I would maybe alter it to read, "She and her daughter have been going through a horrendous time this year, and the child has been racially abused in the school. Clearly, mum went too far... etc etc"

To the boy's mum I would say, "I am not involved in this incident, except as a witness. Your contact is not warranted, and your messages will be forwarded to the police." Then nothing more.

Honestly I'm glad the boy was frightened. Racism and bullying is unacceptable and if he carries on then one day someone will go for him and he'll end up badly hurt. If she scared him straight, good.

I'd put a message on the group saying 'Don't blame me for the actions of another adult. I was not anywhere nearby at the time, intervened as soon as possible, unlike the rest of you and I am nobodies keeper.

Xs behaviour is not my responsibility; while I do not condone her actions, I do understand them. The boy has been racially abusing her daughter for weeks, the school have not stopped him and neither have his parents. If you want someone to blame, how about the boys mother since it's her badly brought up child who caused the problem.'

That would be my response but then I'm not one for not sticking up for myself. I would also point out that you did not call the police, the school did since it happened on school grounds.

So you disagree with her behaviour but do not think she should have to take responsibility for her actions, to the extent that you think witnesses should withhold their evidence?

I would keep as far far out of this as possible.

You are not responsible for your friend, or for the bullying, or for the police turning up at your door.

You also may not know the whole story about your friend, what action the school has taken, what the child said had happened or any of it.

Great advice above on how to shut down the Whatsapp, the other mum and I would let you know that you did not call the police yourself, but when they turned up on your doorstep you gave a statement.

I have felt like attacking the mum of my child's bully, I imagined doing exactly that, but bullying and racial bullying unfortunately is very common, like happening most days in schools, and you can't have parents taking it into their own hands in the playground. My other child also had racial bullying but the school did work to stop that quite proactively.

OP, you have done nothing wrong and if anything, they should all be apologising to you for dragging you into it. I would not want to be in the middle of this.

There is no excuse for an adult threatening and intimidating a child on school grounds. Threatening to kill him and swearing at him can never be condoned under any circumstance. I would advise you to step away from this “friend.” The boy might have been vile but this is an entirely different matter now. Don’t get involved.

@FrequentNameChanger2024
It's could have or should have hth

Again, that's not what I said is it? Are you going to keep doing this?

🤣🤣🤣

how bizarre
the police came
they came to your door?
very unusual

Personally I would send a message directly to friend and the group chat

”I’ve not reported anything to the police.
We all want to stick up for our own kids and I support X in keeping her daughter safe from bullies”

and I would message your friend and say “- I promise I’ve not said anything, let’s talk about this in person don’t want to write stuff down”

in person you can reiterate that it’s shit to threaten 10 year olds but that Y is a bully and you support her and you don’t blame her after all the stress she’s under. You can then say how it’s much more likely threat came from school or Ys parents.

She threatened to kill a child.

i had a family member who had police involvement after she rough handled a child bully.

Leave her to it. She lost any sympathy I had when she thought hurling profanities and threatening to kill a child was a reasonable response, rather than speaking to the child's parents.

but why did the police come to op's door?

She was a witness FFS.

OP just to say what an awful situation and I'm sorry you're getting judgy comments on here too from people who think you should be able to see the future or determine another adult's behaviour. I've seen situations like this before, where someone who is peripheral to the real problem becomes the scapegoat in a difficult situation.

Although it's tempting to just tell everyone that you're not the problem here and go silent, I think you'll be better off, since this situation is going to take some time to play out, to correct all the misstatements of fact. Tell your friend that no you didn't report her to the police and why would she think that, as her behaviour was public enough; tell the whatsapp group that you did what you could to defuse situation and could not have acted more quickly, tell the mother of the abusive boy that she needs to deal with her son's behaviour instead of randomly blaming you, tell the school that you don't condone your friend's actions but want to support her because you see the bigger picture. Tell the police what they want to know.

Ugh, it's a pain having to do so much justifying when you've done nothing wrong. Try to look after yourself, treat yourself, make sure you step away if you need to. This could become quite a drain on your energy. But kudos to you for trying to be decent and fair-minded here. I hope all the chatter stops.

in that case take the post down @Playgroundincident

Aside from the fact that I jut said what I'd seen. My job requires me to take hild safeguarding seriously regardless of he consequences to my personal relationships. I can't just dismiss that responsibility and what she did was wrong.

Because school reported to police and they were clearly told she was involved with the altercation.

So they came to see what she has to say - what she witnessed and what she says she was doing.

but you shouldnt be making posts about it @Playgroundincident

”But she could and should of said no to the police in my eyes”

she would no longer be my friend

Why on earth should she have any part of the blame ? Another parent simply stepped in before OP did. That doesn’t make any of this her fault any more than any of the other bystanders who didn’t step in before the parent who did.