Child's friend parent on sexual offender register

[springisspringing1]

I live in a smallish town - only one primary school and only one class per year. My DC is in reception. One of the children's fathers was found guilty of looking at child sex photographs and online grooming of a young teen girl. He is on the sexual offender register. The mother has retained a close relationship with the father (they may still be together - I don't know her well enough). We have kids' birthday parties all the time and eg when she hosts one, the father is likely to be there. I don't want my children near this man. I just don't. I think she's keen for him to be reintegrated into the (quite small) community. AIBU is, I suppose, to make it clear I don't want him to bring their child to my child's party? (I will just make an excuse for their party). Also - is this unfair on my child's friend (who is obviously only 4 too). This is not something that is going to go away -- and want to work out how to manage it now. Please be kind - I absolutely know it is not the mother or the child's fault.

Totally with you on this. They’re the ones whose children are extremely vulnerable, frankly. Happy to have a convicted paedo in their child’s vicinity and thinking it’s okay?! Insanity.

Yeah. My mom was groped when she was 11 by her friend's older brother, who was 24 at the time. My mom spoke up, she was told that she was a slut who'd tempted him. Her best friend was abused by a teacher, her parents told her to keep quiet because otherwise she'd get a 'reputation'.

My best friend was abused in the worst possible way from the ages of 6-9 by the father of her brother's friend. She spoke up, her mother didn't believe her. Turned out he was also abusing her younger sister - they didn't know about each others trauma until they were adults. The paedophile was later convicted of offences against some different girls, and his son also ended up convicted of sexual offences. It's sadly not uncommon, and pretty much every generation of women will have a story of the local perverts.

It would be a cold day in hell before I knowingly let my child in proximity of a sex offender, and I'm absolutely gobsmacked by some people on here who are advocating allowing contact with a nonce. The OP - and her children - have absolutely no obligation to involve themselves in the social rehabilitation of a paedophile.

If you read the thread though, posters have made some excellent points re grooming.
You can supervise then at that age, but what happens when they're a bit older and maybe offered a lift?
"Oh, it's Johnny's Dad, he's cool, I know him."
<gets in car>
You don't want them to get the opportunity to become a trusted adult.
Edited to say this was in response to @Inthetyreshop 's post and should have been a quote to that.

To the school. Thought that was clear from the post.

”it’s okay to make kids sad” What the actual fuck!

Nah, if I were the OP and it was between little Timmy getting a birthday invite and keeping my own kid safe, there's no competition. Little Timmy being disadvantaged and sad is down to his parents' awful choices. Nothing to do with anyone else. And yes, staying with the paedophile father is awful.

Click on ‘quote history’ and you’ll see the ‘is your husband on the same page’ comment was to OP. The ‘report to what body’ was a question to @neverbeenskiing when she said she’d known a convicted paedophile complain that he’d not been able to join the PTA. I can see why the pp questioned your responses to these posts, they were very odd.

Of course it’s OK to make a child sad (about missing a party) if it’s in service of a more important aim

Yeah, it is okay for kids to be sad, especially if it’s as a result of keeping her own kids safe.

OP, I would honestly discourage any relationship between your two families. Her father is in her life and family home, and in her eyes he’s just ‘dad’, which is likely going to result in him automatically being considered trustworthy to her friends: ‘That’s x’s dad, he’s fine!’. He’s a pedophile, and he will use his daughter to gain access to children.

A similar situation happened with a friend's husband. Social Services got involved and he is banned from school can't do pick ups/drop offs or attend any events and he can't be around the younhest child unsupervised or do personal care. So any parties etc the mum has to come too. There is probably safeguardings put into place you don't know about. Please don't punish the child they can't chose who they're father is.

@qandatime

Do you have difficulties with context?

Because of course it's ok to make kids sad under these circumstances, and honestly, shame on your for putting a paedo ahead of the safety of your own child. Shame the dad didn't think about it being wrong to "make kids sad" eh

As if said safeguarding can always be trusted, and offenders never commit crimes whilst living under those conditions. Having no ties to him whatsoever is the most effective safeguarding.

It’s not punishing the child, it’s protecting her own children. If her children being friends with this child place them at risk- and imo it does, given that the mother appears to still be with him, and is pushing his reintegration as if everything is normal and fine - then OP should absolutely be discouraging the friendship and keeping distance. Including this child is not worth the risk to her own children.

Agree ! Not sure why anyone would need to support this? If there’s a party, take the mum aside and absolutely make it clear that it’s only her to drop and pick. What is she going to argue? She can hardly say I want my paedo partner around kids will she.

Holy Moly! Read the rest of my responses.. I agree with you!!! The dads a piece of shit and this boys mum is unfit to be a mother if she’s going to ignore her nonce partner.
I have suggested to op that she should speak to the mum and say she doesn’t want to leave this child out but she obviously can’t have this man any where near her child.
I was responding to the sentence “It’s ok to make kids sad” This poor kid is probably already screwed in life and has been massively let down by society.. He should have been removed from his parents care for obvious reasons. I wouldn’t want to leave him out of the invites if I were op, but like I’ve said I wouldn’t have his disgusting dad anywhere near any children, I’d pull the mother aside and explain.. If she refused to go along with my wishes then fuck her. I just feel sorry for the child!

It isn’t on anyone else to put their own children at risk to compensate for the myriad ways in which this child has been let down.

Feeling sorry for this kid should not cloud anyone else’s judgement when it comes to protecting their children.

Of course it’s completely understandable that people don’t want to put their children at risk.
Like I said In ops shoes I’d pull the mum aside and say preferably you can drop him off and pick him up. I was abused as a child and the moments I had of going to other kids parties or getting invited on days out with school friends families in the school holidays meant so much to me.
I just feel so sorry for kids like this boy, and I guess going forward not getting an invite to a party is going to be the least of his concerns.

The problem with encouraging a friendship at all is allowing this guy to be normalized as just ‘X’s dad’, and being seen as benign in the eyes of this kid’s friends. It would be one thing if the mother was of the same mind regarding protecting children from
him, but it seems that they’re still together and she’s actively seeking his reintegration (it’s very possible that she thinks he’s innocent and poses no threat at all, in which case why would she be mindful?). OP would be utterly foolish to trust her and any assurances she may offer.

This man is a pedophile, and intelligent pedophiles can be very patient and insidious in their grooming, building up trust for a long time. Unfortunately, he’s in a position where he can target children using his child, and that means he poses a very real risk to his child’s friends. The safest thing OP can do is keep away entirely. This is obviously very sad for his kid, but it is better than the alternative.

Thanks for this. Can I ask how you actually knew the limitations on what he was allowed to do? Because it wouldn't surprise me if this man does have limits on his activities but how would anyone know? For all I know, he may well be banned from events - and therefore if he did turn up, it would be much more straightforward. If I knew he was breaching the rules by even turning up, I would be much more relaxed about being very blunt.

@springisspringing1 it's worth calling the NSPCC for advice, but potentially by talking to social services, school, and/or the police they might do something if he has broken his conditions.

A Sarah's law disclosure from the police would confirm whether he is a risk or not (but you already know he is), but like all the other authorities they probably wouldn't go into any detail about the offences or his conditions as that's considered to be his private business (ridiculous I know).

Under the right circumstances, if someone you know is being sentenced for a crime, you can attend the sentencing by finding out when and where it is via LawPages (because sentencing are public), and pay for a copy of the transcript of the hearing (a written document confirming everything that waw said in the hearing ad verbatim, can cost hundreds of pounds dependingon the length of the hearing). You would have to have a good reason to recieve a copy of the transcript, I suspect just knowing the person and having a child the same age may not count. It's ridiculous how many hoops they make you jump through to safeguard your child

YOU set the rules here. It's your house.

The mother is just as dangerous as the father.
He is to young to be independent from his parents so unfortunately he's lumped in with them

@TessTimoney Please don’t call it CP. Pornography should be something that only fully consenting adults are involved in (even if we know that’s not always the case) and what happens to children is images of CSA. It might not seem like an important distinction but it really is to many of us. Thank you 🙂

@waterrat I really dislike judgemental vigilante style approaches. This man is being monitored by SS and police and those close to him know his risks You have a very misplaced confidence in the ability of the authorities to prevent him reoffending. Children, Waterrat. His risks are children. And the OP has both a right and a responsibility to keep hers safe and not knowingly expose them to someone she knows likes to hurt children. She’s not suggesting sending villagers to his house with lit torches and pitchforks. She’s very calmly and very quietly asserting her boundaries. And this is a very sensible one to assert.

These creatures cannot be rehabilitated. They just can’t. There might be the odd one here or there who manages not to offend, or they might be able to control themselves for a while, but they will either reoffend or they will be thinking about re offending. God forbid, but in those circumstances, how would you explain to a child that their friend’s dad had been in a position to abuse them because you hadn’t wanted to seem judgemental or encouraging anyone else not to talk to him?

OP, there’s a post above that advised to speak to the mum and be very blunt about it. I can’t find it now, but I thought it was very sensible. Tell her that she and her DS are welcome but her DH is not. Partly because you don’t want to knowingly be anywhere near a sex offender, and partly because you do not want your DS growing up seeing his friend’s dad as a safe adult.

She could be staying with him because she’s forgiven him, which I don’t understand at all. But if she’s staying with him to prevent him from having unsupervised access to her DS, then I completely understand that. That would be horrific for her and I’d try not to judge her until I knew which it was.

”I was responding to the sentence “It’s ok to make kids sad””

I think this was possibly poorly worded, @qandatime. Maybe a better way to phrase it would be, ‘in these circumstances, a child being sad is the lesser of two evils (the greater being exposing other children to a paedophile)’.

Its not tricky in the slightest.
He's a convicted sex offender. No need to be polite or accommodating.
He's not welcome. End of.

Its your event.
You can choose to ban him.

If he's on the sex offenders register , surely he should not be allowed to attend kids parties full stop!!! I would be going to my local police station and asking if this is even permissible. How she can even continue a relationship with him is beyond me.