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

Thanks for clarifying, I must have gotten as far as recognising it was AP and moved on!

I think it stands to reason that if he was enrolled at a EBD school (we call them SEMH in this area) then he was known to the LA, likely various departments, and realistically should have had active involvement.

What support do you mean? I challenge this word a lot at work, 'support', its just a word, a catch all, what exactly are you referring to and how do you think it would be implemented and what for? Did he have a diagnosis of anxiety, and what trauma exactly?

Even if he had 'anxiety', it doesnt necessarily mean there is treatment depending on the CAMHS team around him and no, disengagement would not result in more coordination at all, he wasnt detainable and had no criminal justice requirement at the time

I read these threads, theres a few running and amazed at the fantastical magical thinking that people think would have prevented or fixed this.

And no, emotional dysregulation is not worked with by CAMHS, its behavioural.

He was violent and posed a risk to his family and others. Of course there should have been more coordination between services, indirect support (to reduce not actually increase escalation), risk management, safety planning, information sharing. A lot of the issue is that there's no money and of course CAMHS are on their knees. Like so many parents I've been in this situation myself - it's absolutely terrifying, no one helps, you are left to it, told you hide knives and call the police. Who raise yet another safeguarding concern. Or you don't call the police because that escalates things even more. Everything you do is criticised and you are told that you are the problem when you just want compassion and are in fear of your life and terrified for your family. It's incredibly brutal.

What do you mean by indirect support.

You talk about safety planning, safety planning often involves not escalating, not calling the police because children with ND are escalated by authority or conversely are thrilled and motivated by professional involvement (ambulance/police etc) and so you mange that by not calling authorities (talking generally here not necessarily for this case). The police will say its a MH issue, MH teams will say its behavioural so they cant act. Right Care Right Person means this isnt a police issue but neither is it an issue for other services because those other services will see it as a criminal justice issue (which is my view)

The services appear to have shared the information as far as I can see.

Risk assessment - the problem here was that risk assessments were done and CAMHS concluded low risk, they are the guide to inform everyone else, professional judgement

People also are challenged by me when they use terms like 'risk management' because it seems to imply that the risk can be managed at lowered. It cant always, sometimes yes, sometimes no. Positive risk management is where you work to say that you accept there will be risk because either there are no alternatives (as I said this boy wasnt going to be locked up, sectioned, restrained, put in secure, he didnt meet threshold for those things) or because in other cases the alternatives are viewed as harmful to the child/not effective.

Risk management (in this case to reduce risk to family members) - risk can be reduced by providing carers for example. Providing respite for families. Advice on safety proofing your house. An action plan of what to do in the event of escalation and who to call. How to protect yourself, your child and others in the household. Helpful mental health advice provided to parents. You can't expect people not to call the police when they are in danger and the advice is usually to call the police.

Advice is always conflicting. Police may say restrain, but restraint is harmful for the child. But if you are in danger you have to sometimes restrain. But you are also told by others that you shouldn't. And of course no one will show you how to restrain as that isn't allowed. You are told by some to do everything to reduce escalation but are also told by others to do things that escalate the situation. Which is unacceptable. And you simply cannot win. This is what I mean by a lack of joined up thinking and coordination and risk management.

CAMHS often say social care responsibility, social care hope that CAMHS will support, police say it's social care (social care do seem to get held responsible for a lot).

Maybe not the ricin but the inquiry has said the parents knew he had a stash of weapons and also that they obstructed authorities dealing with the case.

Terrifying. Imagine living like that.

The parents absolutely should have reported the weapons but it’s not uncommon for families to accept a member having dangerous knives in their bedroom. The whole household becomes bent on appeasement as a coping mechanism. They rationalise that the person has them for defence purposes.

It’s a trauma response and difficult for ordinary people to understand.

Yes, it's so weird how everything just becomes normalised too, I think because you have to manage by yourself for so long as you're told you have to. It definitely has a strange psychological impact. I might be wrong but it looks like they did also hide knives too which is contradictory.

The stories of oil and weapons are terrifying but also not hidden. At various stages staff were asked to change language or police just took him home. Just because the parents were terrified by it it didn’t mean he wouldn’t do it elsewhere.

He was blunt about what he wanted to do.

It’s such a failing that the terrifying element was the reality in the end for those little girls. It’s unbearable to consider that they were at receiving end of such extreme violence.

I know it's hard living in a house with a violent child. I've been there, our adopted DD1 (17) has had violent meltdowns for years, though thankfully never outside the home. (She targeted me when she was younger.)

But we were begging for help! The actions of AR’s parents in covering up the risk posed to the public was just criminal and there should be consequences for that. Thankfully, we were never in their position with DD1, as her aggression was only ever directed towards us, but I used to really worry about her showing aggression outside the home.