DS has been falsely accused of assaulting a woman at Uni - what can we do?

[RhythmNBooze]

My head is all over the place and I don’t know where to even start with this. Probably going to be a long post as I want to get all the details down.

Got a phone call from 19 year old ds yesterday asking if he can come home for the weekend. He is in his 1st year at Uni. He said he’s been to see the welfare officer who has suggested it would be a good idea and said he would tell us why when he gets here. Dh picked him up from the station at 9pm so we’d spent the afternoon and evening wondering what the hell was going on. All sorts going through our minds – he’s got a girl pregnant, he’s ill, he’s gay etc.

Upshot of it is the following. He got a call from the welfare officer at Uni telling him to go to the office as the Police were there and wanted to talk to him. When he got there 2 police officers interviewed him (he thinks under caution) and he was video recorded. He was on his own. Wasn’t told he could have someone with him. He has been accused by a girl he had been seeing last term of assaulting her by pushing her. He denies it and says he wasn’t even at the place she says it happened. They told him to stay away from her and that if she reports anything else he could be arrested.
She has also asked the college to move him from his accommodation as his room is opposite his and she can see him. This is not true and he does not overlook her room.

Background to all this is that he started seeing her during freshers week. He thought they were ‘exclusive’ but she was getting off with other people when she knew he was there, usually at clubs. He says he confronted her about it a couple of times and admits he did shout at her. By the time the Xmas holidays came round he believed they were not together while he was upset he was coming to terms with it.
Last week he says he was walking back to his halls from a club with his mates and she was walking in front of him snogging another student. He admits he saw red as he thought she was doing it deliberately to wind him up and so he confronted her and shouted at her. Apparently he said some nasty things to her but he didn’t say what. The guy she was with pushed him away but he says he didn’t touch the girl. This week her friends have been saying to him that he has treated this girl really badly. He then gets the call about the police.

Of course I only have ds’ side of the story but he says he has tried to tell us everything in an unbiased way as possible and whilst I understand there are 2 sides to every story I believe ds when he says he has not physically assaulted this girl. He says he can prove he didn’t do what she has accused him of as he has witnesses to say he wasn’t with her and there are cctv cameras where she says the assault took place. He does admit to verbally abusing her at other times. We have told him that when he goes back he needs to completely blank this girl and not engage with her in any way. When he spoke to the welfare officer about it afterwards she advised the same.

My question is what else, if anything, can/should he do now about the fact she has falsely accused him of something. Should we do anything? Should he have been allowed to have the welfare officer with him when he was questioned? He is already upset that his experience of Uni has been tainted by this girl’s behaviour in the first term. I don’t want his whole Uni experience being affected by it. Can we put something in place that stops her from going near him?

Any advice gratefully received.

Op.actually i agree with you, if she was going to make up a lie and go to the police, it is unlikely she would make something up which was immediately disprovable, so something is wrong with this bit of the story.

As for the recording of his interview he can request it, and may already have it, but you cannot as he is an adult. You can only have it with his permission.

sleepyhead
He needs to learn to ignore, walk away. This will help him in all sorts of situations going forward.
Someone spills your pint and gets mouthy with you? You walk away.
Someone treats you badly in a relationship? You walk away.
Someone starts egging you on to wind you up? You walk away.

This is solid advice for all young men, especially those who are inexperienced in with relationships and going "out" drinking.

involving the police for something which he can prove is untrue is disgusting and I can't see why so many people are defending this girl

Tbf we don't actually know for sure that he can prove it's untrue. Right now we're only taking him at his word that he can prove it. However if he is telling the truth then presumably he is chasing up that CCTV which will prove his innocence and hopefully chasing it up fast.

It does seem weird and pretty stupid of her to accuse him of doing something at a time when they weren't even with each other. Surely she understands that there is a chance there would have been witnesses and yes CCTV which would prove the fact he wasn't with her when she claims this occurred. Then again there are some very stupid people out there who just don't think...

Unless he did assault her however she has somehow mixed the dates or times up?

If there is CCTV then both the OP and her DS need to start demanding it if they haven't already. CCTV footage is automatically erased after a certain time.

Personally if it was me being falsely accused of something and I knew CCTV would prove my innocence then I would not sleep until I got hold of that footage. In fact it would be the first thing I would do when I realised I was being falsely accused.

If the OP's DS doesn't seem that bothered about getting hold of that footage then I would find that very suspicious tbh.

I'm not saying he isn't bothered btw. It's just I don't think the OP has mentioned.

I'n believing this girl for the moment if for no other reason than girls are so often not believed and because by the OP's own account her DS's behaviour has been aggressive to this girl.

As well as damaging every other real victims case.

It's funny how people only ever say this about (alleged) false accusations made by women towards men.

If someone makes a statement to the police and it is later shown that it is not accurate, it doesn't mean they were lying or making a false report. It could just be that they are mistaken. It could also be that op's ds is mistaken about the sequence of events. None of us know.

I just hope he reflects on his behaviour, feels some remorse and learns something from this episode.

This isn't AiBU I can't see any actual legal advice on here just personal opnion.

It does seem weird and pretty stupid of her to accuse him of doing something at a time when they weren't even with each other

It does, same with the room thing, it seems unlikely when she could easily have used a time and place it couldn't be disproven and given a valid reason for the room ie their paths crossed too often, so I'm not sure I believe this element of the story.

I'd assume the op has understood him wrong or her son has lied to her. If this girl has asked the uni to move him, she's going to give a valid reason for asking this to make it happen, and not she can see his room when any faculty member will know it's not true.

So something isn't right there.

This isn't AiBU I can't see any actual legal advice on here hmmjust personal opnion.

To provide legal advice on a vague second hand account is impossible. They should see a solicitor with the person concerned there to give proper instructions.

When I was at university one of my flatmates (female) behaved in ways to young men that, nowadays, would raise serious concerns including threatening making allegations. As a result I am very aware that these things are not always as they appear, either side could be true, or parts of both
I would be finding out exactly what the position is with the Police and the university, chasing any CCTV evidence and why it has arisen at this point.

I wish you luck with supporting your son OP.
It is tragic if young women have theirs lives scarred by abuse and equally tragic if young men have theirs scarred by false allegations

Yes the room thing is weird too. If the OP's DS is being honest here (and the OP hasn't misunderstood him) then it is just stupid of her to lie about that because it's so easy to prove she that she is lying. And if she was going around lying about the position of the rooms then why haven't the university gone "hang on a sec.".

That's why I think either the OP's DS hasn't been completely honest or someone has got the wrong end of the stick and misunderstood something.

This isn't AIBU I can't see any actual legal advice on here hmmjust personal opnion.

2xboys you have a ooh t in that there isn’t much, but it’s not true there isn’t any. There’s some good advice above about contacting a local lawyer and asking whether he refused a solicitor.

OP, the best thing you can do now is to try and remain impartial and not emotional. It’s feasible the girl is not telling the truth. It’s even more feasible your son isn’t telling you the whole truth, even if he didn’t physically assault her. Get him a lawyer ASAP if only because he is more likely to be honest with the lawyer, without you present, as they are not emotionally involved and will ask him questions that will get to the hub of things in an unemotive way. And they’ll be able to write and request the police obtain the CCTV and that they get to view it.

"If someone makes a statement to the police and it is later shown that it is not accurate, it doesn't mean they were lying or making a false report. It could just be that they are mistaken."

I think that rather depends on the nature of the report. "I was hit at X place by Y person", when CCTV footage clearly places the complainant 8 miles away from X place and Y person is placed 10 miles away from the for the entire evening with 15 witnesses, is a false complaint. That's not a mistake.

Getting small details wrong, or misinterpreting a situation is different.

I’d also be advising your son to speak to his personal tutor and get their support and advice. That is what they are there for. The personal tutor should be able to look into the room change request and whether it is deemed necessary.

Yes the room thing is weird too. If the OP's DS is being honest here (and the OP hasn't misunderstood him) then it is just stupid of her to lie about that because it's so easy to prove she that she is lying

Exactly, if she's went to thr effort of asking the uni to move him, then unless she has some significant additional learning needs she is going to give a valid reason to make it happen. So it's highly unlikely she'd say her room over looked his as the reason to move him when it didn't.

Re the room request - is it possible that your DS’s room is opposite the room of her new partner, or opposite or overlooking a communal area or path that she frequently uses, and that she’s seen him looking or seen him in his room, and that is why she made the request but the specifics have been jumbled in the retelling?

Tbf the OP has had some legal advice on this thread.

The only real advice I can give is what I said previously. If the OP's DS knows that CCTV will prove he didn't do what he is accused of doing then he needs to be on the police's back and doing whatever it takes to get hold of it before the footage is erased.

And honestly, if the police are aware of the accusation and the DS has told him there will be CCTV to prove his innocence then they will (should be) focusing on getting hold of it ASAP anyway.

I would stress the importance of him seeking help for his aggressive nature around women. maybe counselling? What good male role models as he had in his life?
I'd have reported too if it took a new bf to get an aggressor off my back.
Let's hope he has learned his lesson, and ditto to staying away from her, or blanking when he sees her.

By the time the Xmas holidays came round he believed they were not together while he was upset he was coming to terms with it,,,,Last week he says he was walking back to his halls from a club with his mates and she was walking in front of him snogging another student. He admits he saw red as he thought she was doing it deliberately to wind him up and so he confronted her and shouted at her. Apparently he said some nasty things to her but he didn’t say what

Other than the bits that don't add up and the welfare officer asking him to tell his parents, these bits would concern me as a parent,

What does he mean he believed they weren't together, if someone tells you you're not together, you're not, it's not a case of it you believe it or not.

And freshers week was likely September, and then all this occurred, so he was hardly with this girl at all, this was not some long term romance for him to get obsessional about. This is someone he hardly knew. And who obviously made it repeatedly clear they were not a couple.

The fact he then went on the attack, knowing they weren't a couple in his own head, simply because he saw her up ahead snogging a boy, is deeply concerning.

So on top of the aggression and arguing or abuse, I think the obsessional and controlling behaviour he has demonstrated is what would give most parents cause for concern. It's not normal behaviour.

She made the accusation afterwards about an incident that (according to ds) never took place.

And yet the student welfare officer took it seriously enough to call the police. I wonder why?

And yet the student welfare officer took it seriously enough to call the police. I wonder why?

Because that’s what you do when you think an assault has been made? It’s then up to the police and the university to investigate.

We can’t condemn the son without all the facts. For a start, some of this info is coming via ehat the welfare officer told the DS. The welfare officer may have got some of the details accidentally wrong, hence the discrepancies.

There are two separate issues here: yes the son may have concerning difficulty in controlling his emotions or coming to terms with someone ending a relationship, but that doesn’t automatically mean he did what he’s been accused of. Just because he did X, doesn’t mean he did Y.

we can't condemn the son without facts

Errr by his own admission he verbally assaulted this girl (knowing they were not an item) when he saw her snogging someone else to the point the boy she was with had to push him away.

That sounds like he was very nasty indeed and the person with her had serious concerns about his physical proximity and behaviour.

This incident alone is enough to warrant this girl approaching Uni Welfare and the Police.

It's wholly appalling behaviour.

On that basis what does she stand to gain from inventing another incident, when what she can already prove with witnesses is damning in and of itself?

Get a lawyer OP. I'll bet good money your son is going to need one.