Review highlights safeguarding failures in case of girl convicted of manslaughter
Joe Lepper
Wednesday, October 11, 2023
A safeguarding practice review into the case of a teenage girl who admitted the manslaughter of her mother’s partner has found a raft of failures in the girl's care which led to a lack of protection for both her and the victim.
The review was carried out by safeguarding children partnerships in Birmingham, where the girl had lived most of her life, and West Sussex, where the family had moved to only months before the fatal incident in October 2020.
The review’s report details how her violent behaviour was identified at her primary school, including having “no compassion or remorse” for upsetting or hurting people and “going on a revenge mission” against those who “did something to her”.
But while her school called for a special educational needs and disabilities assessment “there was no consideration that her behaviour might be as a result of trauma”.
“This was a failure of the system as a whole. Other agencies were involved and there is no evidence any other agency considered the ‘why’,” states the review.
The review found that the girl “is more than a perpetrator of a terrible crime. She is also a vulnerable child who has been a victim of significant and horrific trauma and abuse in her short life”. Her mother was also the victim of domestic violence.
Another negative factor in the girl’s life was her father’s “long history of criminality and violence”. While there is no evidence he had any relationship with his daughter “he was a constant factor throughout her childhood and was likely to have caused her at the very least anxiety, but quite possibly trauma”.
In addition, the girl was at risk of exploitation and there was evidence that she was “physically and emotionally abusive towards her mother”, including threatening her with a knife.
When a need for trauma informed practice was identified, this was hindered as frontline professionals found she was “chaotic” and there was a need for “constant firefighting”.
“Sometimes, almost daily, they were responding to crises, there simply was not the time to do the preventative, strengthening, relationship-building work,” social workers told the review team.
A lack of information sharing by professionals in Birmingham and West Sussex, has also been highlighted.
The review cites West Sussex children’s services and youth justice teams’ lack of access to a psychological assessments commissioned in Birmingham in 2019. This “would have helped inform their practice”.
Another “missed opportunity” was children’s professionals disregarding the importance of the victim’s positive role in the girl’s life.
He would ask professionals for advice on helping the girl and had encouraged her to go to appointments. He also offered to be part of a children’s services assessment “but was overlooked”.
After his death, the girl has since told professionals that “she saw him as a positive influence in her life”.
In 2021 the girl, then aged 14, pleaded guilty to manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility
In a statement both safeguarding children partnerships involved said that since the incident “services and practice in both Birmingham and West Sussex have evolved and improved, especially in the area of criminal exploitation and contextual safeguarding”.
“All the organisations involved in this review endorse the findings and are committed to embedding the learning,” the statement added.
