11yo Girl held in custody for total > 60 hrs

[lljkk]

(very surprised MN not already talking about this?)

One report on the case.
The mom has been quoted saying how disgusted she was to see her child restrained... but the police haven't been criticised for that (I think).
Criticised for slow custody process, no appropriate adult found & using handcuffs (twice), but not for the spit-hood that mother was disgusted about.

I can't make up my mind about the situation. Where does the balance lie when dealing with violent but vulnerable people/children (in times of austerity, police can't be trained for every situation or set of needs, etc).

I suspect that the processes are robust enough (would be interesting to hear if this is not the case) but the crux of the matter is the police did not follow certain processes, such as recording why she was restrained, and that is unacceptable.

I'm not sure how much her disability impacts this tbh. For a start, it wasn't diagnosed at the time so for all intents and purposes it was nothing more than the mothers observation. secondly I don't think you can put special processes in place JUST because someone is disabled. If they need restraining, they need restraining. 11 years olds aren't often violent in custody (aren't often in custody relatively speaking (I don't mean this to include obvious adaptations to ensure they can exercise the same rights in custody as a non disabled person)

If her Mum saw her restrained why was she acting as an 'appropriate adult' or why didn't she speak to a solicitor?

I am not criticising the Mum I just don't understand this.

I presume the police took ages to find the appropriate adult, iyswim.
The experience would be distressing for any (decent) parent of an 11yo and for almost any 11yo, so I did wonder how much the disability was really factor, too.

How was it that a child with a disability was put in a vulnerable situation. My daughter is 9 and has ASD, an adult always accompanies her, the girl was 11 still young, probably due to her ASD more emotionally immature compared to her peers, so where was an adult with her.

I'm not sure how much her disability impacts this tbh. For a start, it wasn't diagnosed at the time so for all intents and purposes it was nothing more than the mothers observation.

From what I've read it appears that the police knew there were mental health issues, because on one occasion there were two attempts to do a MH assessments both of which failed due to the child being (understandably) too distressed.

I was really shocked by this story - the fact that she's disabled is a red herring really, because no 11 year old should be treated like this.