Southport killer enabled by father

[crowsfeet57]

The evidence given by the school and the social worker highlighted how Axel Rudakubana's deteriorating behaviour was blamed on everyone else by his father. Now the father's own evidence is damning. surely this man should be charged as an accessory to the murders which he had many chances to prevent.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/c20e8qd5d53t

Can you provide any evidence for that assertion?

It says so in the inquiry report that escalation happened which put the family at risk. Violence increased and family were not protected. This is unacceptable.

There is plenty of literature about the dangers of doing this.

The report also said that they didn’t call the authorities even though the only time he ever left the house was to assault other people violently.

For a parenting website, I find it pretty chilling that there are a number of parents who seem to think no matter how dangerous their children are, protecting themselves is the main priority. His father repeatedly challenged interventions. He did not plead for AR to be taken into custody to protect his family. He did quite the opposite.

Of course there were multiple failures of the agencies involved but we have a responsibility as parents too. It’s not good enough to bury your head in the sand.

I don't condone that at all but ultimately the family did try to get support. Quite possibly challenged interventions that led to escalation. And if services were that concerned about the parenting then they should have forced removal.

Right, so the authorities bear all the responsibility. The fact is that if his parents had called the police when he left the house that day, those children might still be alive. They chose not to.

Do you really think if the parents had called the police that morning when he left they would have a) taken it seriously enough to treat it as an emergency b) been able to track where he went and find that he got in a taxi c) been able to identify the taxi he got into and d) locate that taxi - within the space of forty minutes?

Given the police had already found him with knives and just returned him home, I doubt we'd have cleared point A.

Services had YEARS to intervene. They did nothing.

Well the inquiry team certainly thought so and my inclination is to believe them

they were given an entirely false picture of his mental state and blocked by the parents

No, they already knew that he posed a significant risk. There had been a lot of agency and police involvement. And a lot of opportunity to intervene earlier. They could have removed him if they wanted to from the care of his parents, there had been a lot of police call outs, it wasn't safe for anyone. They knew that the parents weren't equipped to manage the situation and there were other children in the house at risk.

I know people that taught him, he was a risk for a long time

At least one of school names that was mentioned in news reports is a PRU, you don’t get sent to one of those for no reason.

It is quite common (having worked in one) for the children in PRUs to have parents who either underestimate their risk level (“not my Timmy”) or struggle with their children to the point they disengage. We had parents wouldn’t answer the phone, or tell us to deal with it because they’d had enough, etc etc.

We had kids who would threaten to come to your house and burn it down, and if they knew where you lived I have no doubt they would have.

All of them though, are struggling families, and those children don’t present any less risk in the home than they do outside of it.

I just don’t think many can fully comprehend the absolute terror of your own child presenting you and others with that level of threat, and don’t really know what they’d do or how they’d cope in a similar situation.

The inquiry has revealed that a headteacher was accused of 'racially profiling' the Southport killer and she toned down her assessment of how dangerous he was as a result. It was a social worker who made the accusation.

Therefore another opportunity to deal with him appropriately was missed.

But everyone knew how dangerous it was anyway? All the agencies knew, it wasn't exactly a well kept secret that he was a very high risk child.

The parents were partly to blame for what happened according to the inquiry.

The Southport killer and the Nottingham killer should have been detained indefinable from a young age and it seems like there was enough evidence for them to have been detained.

I don't think that's the case. The inquiry states that the police didn't search his house after they found him on a bus carrying a knife. They thought he was just another kid carrying a knife. Therefore they didn't find the cache of weapons and the ricin that he was making in his bedroom. The parents didn't alert the authorities to this either.

Yes and he smiled and said he will kill someone to the police. They could have searched and found the items.

I think he poured oil over his dads head and threatened to set light to him. Not sure you can judo out of that.

They knew years before that he was a risk though and that the parents just couldn't manage him. No one wanted to take any responsibility. If they'd wanted to something would've been done.

It was an EBD school where he went after Range, the pru in that area is Waterside. This was 2019 and lockdown happened shortly after meaning he never went.

You think the parents knew he had ricin? The inquiry didn’t find that at all.

He didnt have a treatable MH condition by all accounts. What MH 'support' would you have suggested? Given he was somehat reclusive and likely to reject any interventions.

YANBU

Iirc, a father was recently jailed for something similar to accessory / enabling/ failure to seek appropriate help in the US after his son was convicted in a mass shooting.

It should be done every time, imo, and I suspect the horrific incidents would become fewer and further between if parents realised they would be held to account.

No-one wanted to take responsibility because it meant risks. Like the teacher accused of racial profiling. Attitudes and training need to be overhauled. This softly softly approach and excuses for extreme violence needs to stop.

Maybe mental health support for high anxiety, I suspect he had trauma, emotional dysregulation etc. They all fall under mental health. If he wouldn't engage this should have led to more coordination, not less, given the known risks that were posed by him.