Legal advice - SOR police asking for partner info

[MusketeerMum]

Name changed and sparse details as you’d expect, but trying to establish what consequences there may be for providing or not providing certain info. It’s a really difficult situation.

Police have asked a young person who has just pleaded guilty to a sexual offence (committed when under 16), for their partner’s details - name, address, DOB, if they have younger siblings etc. The offence doesn’t involve a child.

Their partner is under under 18 (over 16) and knew about the offence before they began a relationship. The partner’s family/household also knows.

The partner, while wanting to support the YP through this, is extremely anxious about being connected to the case officially and does not want their details held anywhere.

I’m trying to find out if a) the YP is legally obliged to provide that information if against his partner’s wishes, b) if the partner is legally obliged to proceed their details themselves instead, and c) if there’s any other way to confirm to the Police that the partner and household are aware of the offence that doesn’t involve providing name & address, that the police would accept?

We know this is about safeguarding, but the idea of having their information in Police records when the case is nothing to do with them (and they have an intense distrust bordering on paranoia about authority and records, due to being let down in the last) is threatening their mental health, which is pretty fragile anyway and even more so right now.

Partner has asked if eg their therapist confirming in writing that they know about the offence would be acceptable.

The internet is of no use to me with this, it’s just too specific and I’ve only touched on about 20% of the levels of complexity 😞

As far as i know, unless there is an order in place to disclose the info:

A - She' not legally obliged to pass the details and can refuse them
B - He's not legally obliged either
C - You can pass intelligence/information to the police - and the reporting people's details will be sanitised from the information (ie no one will know where its from)

Its all about keeping vulnerable people (ie the children/younger siblings) safe.

You can see the issues - if something was to happen to the younger siblings at a later date by the YP or one of their associates, questions will be asked by the public (who the police are accountable to) as to why were they not protected.

If you refuse to provide the details it will also 'look bad' to Social Services & police that you're not helping the younger siblings by refusing their details, so SS can't risk assess them properly.

If the younger siblings are currently safe and the surrounding family are obviously well able to do this, then the information will be stored and never used probably as police & SS will happy that they are well cared for & safe.

But - you have to accept that every now & then such younger siblings slip through the net and you end up with a horror story in a few years time - Baby P, Star Hobson etc etc

I think enabling YP and their partner to withhold this info is reinforcing their mistrust of “authority”. Whether they can withhold or not, I think morally it should be avoided.

The parent/guardian of the person being asked needs to contact the police and ask these questions.

Thanks. NACRO has said the opposite this morning: that an offender must provide information requested. Other charities/helplines just don’t know.

In an ideal world maybe. But this is a situation where a) it’s about inherently not-rational paranoia due to poor mental health, & the person concerned (the partner) fully realises doesn’t make sense but they can’t cope with the anxiety and b) they’ve been repeatedly let down by authorities and orgs, so it’s their lived experience that’s exacerbating the situations.

Yes this was the ‘next best’ thought but partner is also panicked by this as then details of the parent will still be recorded.

And when I say ‘panicked’ I mean at serious risk of major self-harm. This isn’t a bit of anxiety that’ll fade after a couple of days.

It’s just a horrible situation. We all understand the seriousness of the results of the system failing to be robust enough, but if safeguarding a young person actually puts them at a different risk, there needs to be some flexibility in how it’s achieved.