Sara Sharif case - update - horrifying

[amIloud]

This case is just beyond the realms of horrifying,

www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cgl461xwg3do

This poor child.

Can we start a petition for the executive director to be sacked. This surely has to be as bad if not worse than Baby P!

Surrey Children's Services has been appalling for a long time.

SEN children are failed and services like the Children's Centres, which really helped families, we axed a long time ago to cut costs.

She got MBE instead. Whilst this case was going on and after the murder.
news.surreycc.gov.uk/2024/06/14/two-surrey-leaders-tim-oliver-and-rachael-wardell-awarded-orders-of-the-british-empire-obe-in-the-kings-birthday-honours/

😡

How do I create a petition petition for parliament?

https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/check

Do we want one person sacked or the system improving - or actually both?

This case is absolutely awful.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/12/11/sara-sharif-crime-child-abuse-hijab-will-forster-nspcc/
In the final eight months of Sara’s life, she was forced by the pair to wear a hijab after teachers noticed bruises on her head and neck.
Mr Forster, who became MP for Woking in July, said an inquest into Sara’s death should examine if concerns over cultural sensitivities meant teachers were afraid to question why she began wearing a hijab after being seen with bruises.

If you remember back to the Manchester arena bombing
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/oct/27/security-guard-avoided-manchester-arena-bomber-for-fear-of-being-called-racist
Security guard avoided Manchester Arena bomber 'for fear of being called racist'
This article is more than 4 years old
Kyle Lawler had a ‘bad feeling’ about Salman Abedi but ‘did not have anything to justify that’

We need to be able to say "Something is wrong and needs looking at" without fear of being called racist or generating fear over cultural sensitives.

The system should be reformed and paid for. What is the point of highly paid professionals and lawyers calling in after a death. These resources would have been better placed in prevention instead of the sloppy tick box exercise of social services and the family courts.

@Meemeows to offer a balanced perspective, I don’t think the comment made by officials that the “family went to extreme lengths to cover the truth” is wrong. The crux of the “heads will roll” reaction comes from knowledge that the same judge overseeing all of Sara’s previous family court hearings, made the decision to place Sara in Sharif’s care.

The judge had evidence of abuse against Sara by both biological parents - Sara was filmed by Sharif declaring that her mother had been abusing her, that would have held weight. It may be accepted that declaration was coerced by Sharif as part of the serious case review and he manipulated authorities.

Obviously looking back, the decision should have been made to remove her from Sharif at any point in the multiple court interventions. But I imagine the time, the ultimate scenario painted in court was that Sharif was finally looking after his child and escalating her concerns about her mother’s abuse. Sharif was directly using that, in a way to show he is a fit parent. The ultimate scenario was not that Sharif was abusing her, although that was likely the truth.

It has now come out that the sadist had been made to sign agreements not to use physical force on children.

I wonder how many other abusive people get their disgusting behaviour washed away by signing bits of paper.

He should have been prosecuted. This country needs a shake. What is wrong with us?

The court is absolutely to blame. Why they placed the child with an abusive father is beyond me.
It's up there with little Arthur abused beyond belief by the father while the stepmother stood by and watched.

Have there always been cases like these? I don't remember them being a thing in the 90s or did you just not hear about them?

Or was it Social Services removed more children?

There have been so many people coming out today blaming lack of funding. What has money got to do with such a stupid decision like this? Also what has funding got to do with closing the investigation after six days following the referral from the school? That is inexplicable given the history.

There is a petition:
https://www.change.org/p/block-the-obe-recognition-of-rachael-wardell-for-failing-disabled-children

She leads a service that gaslights, lies too and blames parents of children with SEN. I wouldn't believe it if I hadn't have experienced it myself.

There have always been cases like this.

The Children Act 1948 was inspired in a large part by an investigation into the death of a child at the hands of his foster parent in 1944. Numerous people had noticed issues with the setting, but the children were left there.

You didn’t hear about it the same as there wasn’t 24 hour rolling news or social media. It would be on the news at 9pm or 10pm and then in the papers the next day.

That said the media pushed for the first ever inquiry in this kind of case in the early 70s with the death of Maria Colwell, so press interest has always been there.

Indeed. It has nothing to do with funding.

The decision making in this case was incompetent. At every stage.

There is a Childrens Welfare Bill due to go to Parliament. There is an opportunity to change this system. Email your MP about this. I did. It is not something that needs to be party political.

This made me think about how minimised his behaviour was. Go on sign an agreement not to abuse your kids and you can have them back.

A violent, controlling, coercive poor excuse for a human. He was an animal and that's doing animals an injustice. A despicable and disgraceful man. What's worrying is the kids in Pakistan with the very family that brought this man up.

I'm not saying that the judge's conduct shouldn't be reviewed. From the details I know just from the media it's clear he's incompetent.

My point was that simply removing incompetent people from the system after they have failed children (even if they actually were removed and there were consequences, which often doesn't happen) would not fix the problem.

The entire system is predicated on totally inappropriate principles, rules and procedures. The laws protection children need to be made far more robust. There needs to be a proper regulator with oversight of social services and the fines imposed on them, and personal legal culpability for staff involved, that they have sufficient disincentive to continue to treat children in this manner. We need to ensure the procedures are appropriate so that at least if they are followed an appropriate outcome is reached, i.e. if anybody has a history of abuse they have no further contact with their child, and no child is allowed to live in their home ever again. No exceptions, no bullshit reports/ opinions about how a child is clearly at risk with their parents but maybe we should just leave them there anyway because <insert bullshit here>.

Then have a proper system of oversight and review of decisions at the time so there is appropriate challenge with objective eyes and a child's fate can never be decided by just one judge. There will always be incompetent people and therefore the system must have controls in place to prevent harm from this, not deal with it when it's much too late and the child has been abused further/ is dead.

All of this is common sense and is how regulatory systems operate in other sectors. Decent children's homes MUST be provided and children at risk need to be removed. The presumption must be that if there is evidence of significant risk of harm then the child is taken away, protected and given a stable upbringing with highly-qualified long-term carers and appropriate therapeutic support and a decent life, replicating that in an average, loving family as closely as possible. For some unfathomable reason people in the UK seem to believe this is an impossibility despite the fact that - as I've stated earlier in the thread - we know for a fact it is not because there is decades of data from other countries who are already doing it, where children in state care have equivalent outcomes on average to those living with their families. It is entirely a choice for the UK to decide not to do this.

I applaud your post. This mess in the UK does not have to happen.

Are you also local?

This made me think about how minimised his behaviour was. Go on sign an agreement not to abuse your kids and you can have them back.

Indeed. So an agreement based on trust. With an abuser who is happy to beat up a child, break her bones, burn her, then try to conceal it. And yet these "experts" couldn't see any flaw in this plan?

Family court law and children's services' procedures need to be ripped up and rewritten from scratch. What is in place now is not ever going to protect children with any number of "amendments" to it, because the entire basis of it is wrong. It has no regard for he underlying principle that should be its purpose: to protect children.

@Meemeows are you volunteering to become a foster carer, work in a children's home or support one being set up on your street?
Because as much as there should be suitable long term homes to move children to, there isn't. Despite driver to increase the number of foster homes and adoptive placements, the numbers are falling year on year. Right now, even just for the children who are in the very narrow window of having a placement order, which means actively searching for an adaptive home, there are four times as many children as there are people willing to adopt. A lot of our foster carers are getting older and won't be able to keep going forever, young people aren't coming forward - how many 30 somethings do you know who can afford on person to not work, and to have spare bedrooms?

The poor experiences of those brought into the care system undoubtedly influences decisions about children staying with parents.

Obviously looking back, the decision should have been made to remove her from Sharif at any point in the multiple court interventions. But I imagine the time, the ultimate scenario painted in court was that Sharif was finally looking after his child and escalating her concerns about her mother’s abuse. Sharif was directly using that, in a way to show he is a fit parent. The ultimate scenario was not that Sharif was abusing her, although that was likely the truth.

This makes me so angry. Sorry, not directed at you personally, but really?

Look at this article. Is it really plausible that anybody reasonable with no training ag all could have reached such a conclusion given the evidence? Yet we are meant to accept this from "professionals"?

What happened to Sara Sharif? The 15 missed chances to save her

https://www.thetimes.com/article/17381334-b08f-4531-8214-1d395361d3b3?shareToken=2a48a067242f1c8845a80f419f2aff5c

January 2013
From birth, Sara is made subject to a child protection plan. Her father, Urfan Sharif, had been arrested on suspicion of attacking three women including Sara’s mother, Olga Domin, as well as hitting and biting two children. But she is allowed to remain with her father. Police stated there was not enough evidence to charge Sharif despite each woman’s similar claims.

February 22, 2013
A month after Sara is born, social services and police are told that Sharif has slapped a child around the face.

May 7, 2013
A social worker spots a burn mark on a child’s leg. Sharif fails to report the incident and claims it was a barbecue accident.

October 7, 2013
A child is seen with a burn mark from a domestic iron. Sharif tells social services the child knocked into the iron. A child tells a social worker that Sharif smashed up a TV and punched Domin.

November 2014
Sara is taken into foster care for a short period after a child tells a social worker about a bite mark but is then returned to Sharif.

February 2015
A child tells their foster carer that Sharif used to hit them on the bottom with a belt. But Sara is returned to Sharif in 2015.

May 2015
Olga tells social services about Sharif tightening a belt around her neck and Sara is put into her mother’s care. Around this time social workers complain that Sharif is coercive and derogatory towards them.

2015
Sharif is reported to social services for waving a knife around at home in what he says was a “zombie” game. Social workers note that Sharif hit and kicked Domin at home and the pair threaten to kill each other.

December 2016
A child tells a social worker they don’t like Sharif because he punched them all over their body and gave them lots of bruises. Social workers observe Sara flinch when Sharif tells her off during supervised contact and seem surprised when he cuddles her.

October 2019
Sharif applies to Guildford family court for custody of Sara. Sara had made a claim of abuse by Domin and Surrey council supported returning her to her father. Sharif is given custody of Sara.

June 6, 2022
A teacher reports to the school’s online child protection monitoring system that Sara has a bruise under her eye. Sara initially will not say what happened, before saying that another child hit her.

March 10, 2023
A teacher sees bruises on Sara’s face. She says she fell on roller skates. When Sara gives a different story to a safeguarding lead, the school makes a referral to social services. Six days later social services decide to take no further action.

March 20, 2023
A report is logged on the school’s internal system after Sharif’s partner, Beinash Batool, is overheard referring to children as “motherfer, sister fer, bitch and whore” in the playground.

March 28, 2023
Batool claims a mark on Sara’s face was caused by a pen. The teacher tells the school safeguarding lead.

April 17, 2023
Sharif decides to homeschool Sara. The school rings the council for advice and is told it should make a referral if there are concerns. Staff see Sara later that day at school pick-up and she seems fine so they decide against it — but she had been beaten earlier that day.

She is never seen outside her home again.

The thing that strikes you is how normalized it must have been to each “professional” involved that children could and would be subject to violence but that in of itself was just a kind of procedural issue to be dealt with.

The lack of empathy, and the elevation of procedure is what enabled this child to be killed.

I feep comfortable in saying that not one of them would have tolerated this for their own children.

There are 403,000 children on active act risk registers, 50k childrens based social workers, in Manchester, the average case load is 18 children

They have to prioritise who they spend a lot of time investigating.

Do they screw up? of course but unlike most on here, any mistake that they make may well lead to terrible outcomes.
The man who wrote 2 reports into all of this, says funding is very much the issue.

The witch hunts that will now follow, just ensures less and less people want to be a child social worker.