AIBU to question adoption checks after this safeguarding failure?

[User05677229]

I can’t stop thinking about little Preston Davey. That poor baby boy, taken into care as a newborn, seemed happy and healthy in foster care, only to be adopted by a gay male couple and then subjected to months of the most horrific sexual and physical abuse before being murdered. How did this happen? How did red flags get missed?

I’m a mum of two, and like many of you, I’ve always supported loving homes for children who need them. But cases like this shake me to the core. I’m not saying no gay men should ever adopt - that’s not realistic or fair. But we have to be honest: the data and repeated safeguarding failures suggest that male same-sex couples (particularly for very young children) need extra rigorous scrutiny, not less.

Social workers and adoption panels seem terrified of being called homophobic. So they bend over backwards to approve placements that might raise eyebrows in heterosexual couples. Fast-tracked approvals, ignoring instincts about motivation, lack of a female parent for a tiny baby - all while birth mothers are scrutinised to the nth degree. This isn’t kindness to adults; it’s gambling with children’s safety.

Baby Preston had injuries consistent with sexual abuse, multiple hospital visits, concerns raised… and still nothing stopped it. Eight missed opportunities, apparently. That’s not just individual evil - that’s a system that’s lost its nerve.

Can we please have an honest conversation?

Better psychological and background checks specifically for single men and male couples adopting infants.

Mandatory longer observation periods.

No more rushing through to meet diversity targets.

Social workers must be protected from accusations of bias when they flag legitimate concerns about any applicant, including gay men.

Children deserve the best possible chance, not to be experiments in adult validation. Every child in the care system has already been let down once. We owe them robust, evidence-based safeguarding - not ideology.

RIP little Preston. This should never have happened.

What do others think? Am I being unfair?

From MN in recent days, cameras in all adopters’ homes, physical checks of children’s genitals, random spot checks of hard drives, adopters to be shadowed by other parents, for us to have to foster first before proving ourselves (this does actually happen in early permanence) no gays being allowed to adopt, no men being allowed to adopt unless they are partnered by a female. I’m sure I’ve missed a few.

I think you misunderstood what I was saying. It was in response to the previous poster making it sound like the state should be prioritising providing babies to infertile couples over safeguarding. The state has a duty of care to the children. That has always got to be the priority.

Yes, I did misunderstand, sorry. I did apologise further up the thread when my mistake was pointed out to me.

Really, what we want is to be able to predict that someone won’t lose their temper and be physical and … we can’t, can we?

I never considered myself an angry person but having a child has sometimes turned me into a ball of absolute fury over really stupid and insignificant things, and that’s probably at least part of the problem; you can’t say how you’ll feel as a parent and how you’ll react.

Agreed. There’s a lot of hand wringing on here and demands for heads to roll. The reality is that we will never, ever eradicate risk because we are human beings, with all our unpredictability. We need a societal discussion about child protection because not enough people are stepping up to become adopters or foster carers. Everyone thinks it’s a great idea - for other people. I do understand the outrage about Preston’s death: one of my kid’s siblings was killed at 10 weeks by one of the two people they should have been able to rely on as a defenceless infant.

@myonly no we can’t (well in some circs you could) but the majority of child killers rarely plan it - it’s loss of control usually due to the demanding nature of young babies, crying, screaming etc the tiredness and so on

It is not surprising that you say you knew the killer but that you never could have predicted that he would become one

The fact they wanted to cut short the relationship with the foster carers is also not necessarily predictive of a killer and hence why a SW couldn’t have removed the child for that reason

One large red flag was that he reported his feelings to a colleague and she shared them with the HT - between them they decided there was no concerns -

I can see that as well though, as there’s a world of difference between saying and doing and even thinking.

I do think at least one of the problems is the use of adjectives like ‘evil’ and ‘monster’ which inevitably permeate discussions of this nature. I suppose as someone who did know Varley I can say he wasn’t either: he committed evil acts and monstrous ones if the verdicts are the correct ones, but people are incredibly multi faceted and more than a singular act.

That is to say that I don’t think the Varley I knew was insincere, just that it was one side of his character. Some of our own worst qualities might lie dormant throughout our lives as they’ll never be given the opportunity to surface.

But I certainly don’t feel there was anything at all which would have stopped them being approved as adoptive parents. I’ve been reading a lot about Laura Castle, who was convicted of murdering Leiland-James Corkhill in 2021, and in that case there appear to have been financial problems, a proclivity for physical chastisement and mental health problems which would have been red flags. Even so plenty of people have given their child the odd slap, suffered from depression and had financial difficulties and not murdered a child, so it’s not as if those things pointed automatically to the awful outcome.

Sadly, this. Its a pretty easy to find statistic that the vast majority of child sexual abuse is carried out by men.

So an adopting couple comprised of two men rather than 1 man and 1 woman should automatically be considered a higher risk for CSA.

Its nothing to do with homosexuality at all.

The police would have searched his house and his car and forensically checked every device once he'd been arrested though.
Any check before the adoption process would have relied on him handing things over.
What makes you think something would have been found before if nothing was found after?

@myonly

Thank you for posting, you have a really valuable perspective.

My son's birth mum has lost 4 sons to adoption and foster care. My son is the eldest and was left with her the longest of the 4, even though he was considered at risk before birth. I think from what I know, my son sailed closest to the wind in terms of ending up as another statistic.
Over the years I have felt every emotion going about her.
Now I just feel desperately sorry for her. She was failed by her own family and the care system. She has lost 4 children - for all her flaws, I can't imagine how devastating that is.
But I know that people who don't know her story will just see a stereotype and judge her harshly.

This

Also if checks were standard predators would known to eras stuff and not download CSAM.

@Ted27

It’s one of the most disturbing cases I can think of. I’m not sure what to think.

It’s true though; there was nothing on Varley’s devices which was indicative of a sexual interest in children. Or on his partners.

OP, did you even read your AI answer before you posted it? It literally calls the claims 'hard to substantiate'. You (or AI I guess) are agreeing with the poster you are arguing with that there is no evidence.

This was abuse Plus.

Two apoarently normal men adopting a baby to rape it.

I think the more alarming possibility is that they weren't previously dedictaed paedophiles seeking out a baby to abuse, but maybe just opportunists and once they allowed themselves to physically abuse the baby then nothing was off the table.

So, I’ll talk frankly now about my suspicions assuming the jury returned the correct verdicts.

I for one don’t believe it was as calculated as this. I think men who colluded together to get through the adoption process with the aim all along of sexually abusing a child would almost certainly have had extensive and warped pornographic material, illegal searches and downloads on their devices and be part of a chain of abusers.

My belief is that they went into it with good intentions. I believe that this quickly evaporated when confronted with the reality of caring for a baby and resentment and anger crept in, but this took a sexual nature. After all, power and sex are interlinked, hence why female prisoners of war are raped, aren’t they: it isn’t just a desire for sex but for dominance.

So one incident happens and maybe Varley is shocked and disgusted and horrified himself and vows never again but he does. And then again and again and again. It becomes a horrific habit.

So that’s my take, which was painful to type. It wasn’t premeditated in the sense but crimes don’t have to be to be in order to be horrific.

This is my line of thinking.

@myonly

I think you may be struggling to come to terms with the person you knew with the person you now know has committed the worst of crimes.

Most people think of child abusers as monsters with 2 heads, that somehow you can pick them out in a crowd. Because it must be obvious surely.
But of course its not obvious, and we can't pick them out in a crowd. And sometimes they will be our neighbours, or someone we have worked with, or knew from down the pub or the gym or whatever. And that's hard.

Its understandable that you will have followed this closely.

But I'd suggest you maybe take a step back from it.
I attended a foster carers training course where we were given a lot of information about some of the highest profile cases in recent years. We weren't given information that wasn't in the public domain, but you would have to have dug deep into the serious case reviews.
I'm not sure it what that achieved really, it certainly didnt help my own mental health.

I haven’t followed it all that closely, to be honest. I have followed it but not in great depth and certainly haven’t dwelled on the injuries or the abuse.

I have considered that he may be innocent, of course, but I have to trust the judicial system. It’s been wrong before, though.

@myonly
I've just seen your last post. I think you were very brave to post that.
It probably won't be a popular take on what's happened but a hugely valuable perspective. We will probably never know the truth.

Look after yourself - you are clearly giving this a lot of thought and I understand why. But protect yourself

What is chilling is to think that must have gone through that process in order to abuse a child! That is truly sick and calculating on another level!

it’s scary that people can fall through the cracks and say the right things to pass checks which from other couples who have adopted say are quite rigorous and gruelling.

also the post adoption visits, what was said or witnessed by professionals then. I don’t want to blame them for missing things but the young baby wasn’t with the couple for long. It would be interesting to see the social workers didn’t go with their gut in case of being called homophobic etc.

As although OP has had some stick there is still some of this fear of being labelled racist or homophobic which has caused major events to be missed or swept under the carpet.

Being infertile doesn’t necessarily make you the best person to be an adoptive parent either. I don’t think the vetting procedure should be any easier for infertile couples and I say that as an infertile woman.

I disagree with your comment that the desire to become parents is equally valid to the child’s need. How can it be? It is a desire, while the child’s need for a safe and loving family is the most basic and fundamental need a human can have. We don’t need to become parents, but wish to.

But agree with you about our adoption system being far from perfect, but it being the best option we have available for kids who’s parents can’t care for them.

I agree that adoption is there primarily to find safe loving homes who need them, rather than to fulfil the desires of would be adopters.