24 hrs in police custody. Rikki Neave

[QuebecBagnet]

Anyone else watching this?

while I have no sympathy with his mum for the way she neglected and physically abused the kids I’m not sure she deserved 7 years in prison for it. It’s like the police chucked her under the bus when they couldn’t find the killer and didn’t like her as a person. She wasn’t the brightest person in the world and she certainly treated her kids badly but she wasn’t beating them and thought what she was doing was ok.

my mum scrubbed my brothers mouth out with soap once, and she used to leather us with a belt, so if anything she sounds worse. However she was a teacher so would probably never have been at risk of getting into trouble over it. I ran away as a kid and when the police picked me up I told them and they just took me home. 🤷‍♀️ It was like it was more acceptable back then.

I've watched both parts so I don't want to give anything away but it's shockingly sad. Poor little boy. Whilst I agree that she should not have been fitted up by the police, the level of neglect that Rikki and his sisters lived through was dreadful. She had him going to get her drugs from some equally addled woman (who ironically was quick to condemn her) at 11pm somewhere across the estate.
He had to make his own breakfast that consisted of dry Weetabix and she certainly couldn't be arsed to take him to school because she didn't get up until late morning.
So, maybe the sentence reflected the level of neglect but that said the father of the children should also have been jailed even if he wasn't living there.

We watched the first part yesterday , assume it's finishing today? There was also a programme recently which used a lot of the footage.
I feel Rikki and society was let down by the police because of the singular focus on her. A lot easier to point the finger than to look out from under your nose. I read her kids don't have much to do with her. A very sad set of lives all round.

The neglect was certainly unacceptable. However there’s a lot of kids around the country living like that (more back then) and while that doesn’t make it acceptable at all I feel she was punished for the fact he was murdered. Like the police couldn’t (at the time) find the killer so concentrated on her.

i did read an article about her daughter a bit ago who was very angry towards her mum and how she was brought up/neglected. Those kids should have been put in care.

Watched it last night (haven’t watched second episode). I was torn between feeling sorry for her being framed for the murder, and for having her son murdered, against the child abuse. Conflicting emotions.

I haven't seen this but I did see a recent documentary, she was certainly vilified, the police couldn't be arsed looking for another suspect imo ,I'm not condoning her actions but they just decided she must have done it

I do think it's very disrespectful to show his body, even with the blurring it's very clear. Poor little boy.

I was surprised by that photograph. They are usually more discreet.

I've noticed a trend toward stuff like that creeping in. Body bags, blurry photos etc. It doesn't add anything.

I watched both episodes and although it kept saying he was 6 he really was only just into his 6th year which is even more shocking given the fact that he was so unsupervised around the estate etc. I have 5.5 year old twin grandsons and know just how impulsive they can be at times. Poor Rikki 😢

His mum might have been a terrible parent, but I'm glad she has closure now. And been fully vindicated.

Oh is this a new one?
I haven't been watching as radio times said it's a repeat!

I noticed one of the daughters only referred to their mum by her forename during the filming.

Just caught up with the second episode. Well done to the policeman who spotted the open alleyway. Heartbreaking story. Horrible to think a thirteen year old murdered a boy.

@JellyBellyNelly I wonder if that’s because her mum went to prison for eight years. She was young when Ricky was killed, so effectively didn’t live with her mum for all those years, so maybe didn’t have a good relationship with her.

I wondered what happened to the other children, Rikki’s 3 sisters? If they were fostered, adopted, cared for by other family members maybe.
Also thought what had the perpetrator done in the intervening years, despicable creature.

Good point. Or perhaps she thinks she’s not worthy of being called mum because of the abuse.

I haven't watched it but read all the comments on this thread and googled the article.
The 13 year old who murdered Ricky did he have a connection with him at all?

@salsmum agree I couldn't imagine my DS just going off alone and he is 7!

Tragic story. Poor Rikki.

It’s shocking they focused so much on his mum for the murder, that’s just lazy policing but they were right to charge her with neglect.

He was 6 and getting himself breakfast, she went back to bed and left him to go to school! And had no idea he had never made it until the evening! It’s just so sad. I also cannot believe the school didn’t call and try to find out where he was. Or maybe they did and there was no reply.

The stuff about the washing up liquid shocked me less tbh, my mum did that to me. I don’t think it was considered abuse so much as punishment. He was severely neglected though.

One of the sisters is on TikTok and has made a few videos about how awful their mum was.

The washing up liquid/mustard timing definitely happened amongst so of my otherwise nice normal parent friends. There was a lot of questionable discipline.

Schools didn't routinely call about absent children in the past. That's a relatively new thing, it wasn't the norm in the 80s and 90s.

Whilst I'm glad she and the family got closure, I still think she deserved her jail time too. She was neglecting and abusing those children, especially the little boy. Whilst others may have done it too to their children this doesn't resolve what she did, I firmly believe she deserved to be punished for what she put that child through and others who behave similarly to their children should face that too ideally.

I don't think the man (child at the time) knew Rikki beforehand, other than possibly in passing seeing him wandering around like many others in the community did.

In my experience it definitely wasn't the norm for 5yo to walk to school and be so independent on their own in the 90s.

This poor little boy was born the same year as my first child. What a sad, little life.

Scares me so much what could happen