[Closed] Teenager arrested on suspicion of bullying

I hope it's taught her a lesson and she stops bullying people.

She's a bit Ramsay Boltonish isn't she? So my money is on just desserts.

my money is on just deserts.

...or no desserts.

No information on the actual bullying side of the story so sort of hard to make a judgement. At no point do her or her father deny the bullying though.

Rusty spanner +1
Presumably ther was sufficient evidence for the police to get involved in the first place. But not enough to go further. In which case 8 hours in cells and everyone knowing you did it is probably proportionate (reading between the lines I presume it was online bullying?)

😀

She was arrested and held for 8 hours. I appreciate that for a 16 years old that may well be the worst experience of her life (so far).

On the grand scheme of things thats not a big deal and if the accusations were legitimate then her treatment by the police was entirely appropriate. One slight question could be whether the accusations where false or even malicious.

One slight question could be whether the accusations where false or even malicious.

Well that's the worry though I suspect that the police are smart enough to make a judgement as to whether there is sufficient evidence to make an arrest. It's not something you just do on a whim.

She comes over as very controlled in the interview and is smart enough to know that manipulating small details makes a big difference. Her accentuation of them being 'male police officers' and highlighting that she was put in a cell next to 'other men banging and swearing' in order to try and manipulate the gender dimension are interesting and slightly worrying. It's classic manipulative behaviour. Ramsay Bolton is a good analogy!

Like others have said here, if she has been the ring leader of an online bullying campaign, eight hours in a cell is nothing like punishment enough.

The case was dropped. Am I missing something?

Am I missing something?

What do you think you're missing?

I hope it's taught her a lesson and she stops bullying people.

^This.
Smoke. Fire. Enough evidence to arrest. etc.

police are smart

You see I don't think that the Police, as an organisation not and individual, are smart at all!

What do you think you're missing?

"The reason she was arrested and why everyone thinks "good, she's been taught a lesson"."

Harassment & because she's had a good fright.

Arrested in the middle of a lesson??!? WT actual F. Would have made for an interesting stand off had it been attempted in one of my classrooms!
No problem with police involvment but if true thats just plain wrong.

Arrested in the middle of a lesson??!? WT actual F. Would have made for an interesting stand off had it been attempted in one of my classrooms!

She wasn't arrested in the lesson, the head teacher came into the class and escorted her to the police waiting on the drive. Don't know the layout of the school but even with her talking up her suffering it sounds as if it was probably as discrete as it could have been made.

 

The lady doth protest too much, methinks

get the feeling the bully is playing at being the victim here.

also lots of reasons for charges to be dropped, victim refusing to testify against his/her abuser/abusers is a common one.

I'd bet my house that wasn't the first attempt at trying to get her to stop bullying.

Arrested in the middle of a lesson??!? WT actual F. Would have made for an interesting stand off had it been attempted in one of my classrooms!

Ummm exactly what would you have done as part of this "stand off" with the police?

A few salient points have been missed:

1) The case has been dropped - but only after the girl was charged with harassment [b]after questioning[/b].

2) Neither the girl, nor her father made any attempt to refute the original charge of harassment. They merely allege that the girl's treatment by the Police was excessive. Indeed, the girl's father stated

I'm so frustrated and angry that it happened," he added. "They could have dealt with it so differently, just come round the house.

3) The allegations would have to be pretty serious for the girl to be arrested in the middle of class. At the very least, I would argue that the girl's school would have been aware of the allegations and would have consented to the Police's action beforehand.

4) We don't know the aggravated factors to the case, or any prior action taken by both families' parents and/or the school. The arrest may have been a 'last resort'.

Some personal perspective follows:

At sixteen I was the victim of prolonged harassment by a fellow pupil that resulted in the police being called, an arrest being made and the culprit interviewed at the station. I was given the choice to pursue the matter, which would have led to a caution, or to drop the case pending an assurance that I would no longer be subject to harassment.

I agreed, but I had a couple of follow up visits from our local village bobby to make sure that I was being left alone. It had the desired effect, nearly thirty years later the lad in question and I have been on very good terms for some years now.

Ummm exactly what would you have done as part of this "stand off" with the police?

I was wondering the same thing. Do police powers become void at the school gate? Actually the reports says the police did not come into the classroom.

We clearly don't know the whole story. You would hope the school had been involved in deciding the action was appropriate.

[b]IF [/b]she had been doing what she is accused of, the fact she has gone public and is focussing all the distress on her experience does not show an awful lot of shame or contrition in her actions that led up to the arrest. [b]IF[/b] she had been a nasty piece of work in the run up to this I'm also not too impressed with the BBC highlighting the her 'plight' as the focus of the story. An entirely different spin could have been put on this story - if you bully others this could be the consequences....

[i] exactly what would you have done as part of this "stand off" with the police?[/i]

[img] [/img]

You'll never take us alive copper!

It's not the job of the BBC to insinuate guilt. The piece is ambiguous enough for most people to be able to read between the lines and draw their own conclusions.

Timing is important - there's a suggestion that access to GCSE coursework was denied for some weeks, so there may well be an appeal to the relevant exam boards. The fact that it's become a national news item nearly six months after the incident would suggest this.

If she had been a nasty piece of work in the run up to this I'm also not too impressed with the BBC highlighting the her 'plight' as the focus of the story. An entirely different spin could have been put on this story - if you bully others this could be the consequences....

Unless the BBC are waiting for the inevitable social media shitstorm to descend upon the (alleged) bully?

Timing is important - there's a suggestion that access to GCSE coursework was denied for some weeks, so there may well be an appeal to the relevant exam boards.

I'm not convinced an appeal would have come to much. Bearing in mind a death in the immediate family in the run up to an exam is worth circa 4% having your laptop confiscated in an ongoing investigation into your criminal activity 2 months prior to the deadline is not going to hold much sway.

Smoke. Fire. Enough evidence to arrest.

This in itself is an interesting aspect - arresting someone in this situation. Theres been a concern in recent years that theres a problem with the police making arrests when theres no real need to do so. In this case they've done so and then made no charge but the public perception is that - on a no smoke without fire basis - the arrested person is as good as guilty and that the arrest and detention is in effect punishment for something that intact they've neither been charged or convicted of. In the absence of any kind of trial theres no process in which that person can have an opportunity to be proven innocent. The press are very bad at following stories like this through to their conclusion - they'll report arrests but not charges (and in court cases they'll report allegations but frequently don't report the outcomes) - but that leaves the people who've been arrested, and the subjects of those reports with no means of redress.

Why make an arrest in this instance? Why not just talk to them? The arrest suggests the person would be uncooperative, needs to be physically detained, would abscond if not forcefully held - in other words that the person is behaving as if guilty. Its quite a big issue of personal and professional reputations being damaged by being arrested (usually with accompanying publicity in the local press) even though that arrest often leads to no further action and the police have been criticised for being a bit too free and easy with making arrests needlessly, when simply asking to speak to someone would be sufficient.

Ummm exactly what would you have done as part of this "stand off" with the police?
I was wondering the same thing. Do police powers become void at the school gate? A

I'd be checking ID, asking why no child protection officer was present, or no parent, I'd want to check the head had been informed by their superiors and enquiring as to why he wasnt present and I'd be telling them to piss off get properly organised and come back later otherwise they'd need to be arresting me too. A child in my classroom is my responsibility. They'll never take me alive!!!!

But as thats pretty much what happend it seems, its a mute point.

and then made no charge

Yes they did - read the BBC report, not just the headline. The case was just dropped before prosecuting- presumably a CPS thing.

But as thats pretty much what happend it seems, its a mute point.

Are you a teacher??

Age of criminal responsibility is 10 y/o (in England & Wales), so been 16 means you're an adult and will be treated as one.

Not saying I agree with it, just pointing it out.

It does though seem (a bit like the ebay story last week) that some police are 'struggling' with the correct response and/or the rules are too tight.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/07/17/toy-car-collector-arrested-and-held-in-police-cell-for-four-hour/

anagallis_arvensis - Member
......it seems, its a mute point.

You're not an English teacher, are you??

http://blog.dictionary.com/moot-point-vs-mute-point/

EDIT - 🙂

Dammit, I was gonna make the moo point reference...!

As a teacher of colouring in I am hardly one to talk about grammatical accuracy; but just to twist the knife a little further :-

its

😀

Reminds me of that girl that tweeted that she'd run a cyclist off the road, then when she was invited on to shows and the like because of the social media storm, she apologised for tweeting what she did.

This has obviously be sent to all the news outlets in the hope that they run with it as a waste for police resource, and how he's just a child etc.

Must be shit for the victim, seeing the alleged ringleader of a bullying campaign giving a sob story on national tv about how awful it is when the police [s]do their job[/s] were a bit mean to her.

Sounds like she is getting what's coming to her.

...or no desserts.

And let's not foget the lesser known error above.

They'll never take me alive!!!!

They would - you're thinking of America 🙂

Must be shit for the victim, seeing the alleged ringleader of a bullying campaign giving a sob story on national tv about how awful it is when the police do their job were a bit mean to her.

Very true. She'll just be wanting the story to disappear and not have her harasser become a celebrity and a 'victim'. The girl in the clip seems quite bright - in my experience the bright ones are the nastiest bullies.

I R numberacy and literacyness expert!

Convert, for some reason I always thought you were a geography teacher, thats colouring round the outside, biology is colouring in!!

Design teacher - so I colour stuff in before hitting it with a mallet!

I R numberacy and literacyness expert!

Teacher or no teacher, 4 errors in such a short sentence is quite an achievement! 😆

As a Geography teacher I can tell you that we no longer refer to it as 'colouring in' it's 'chromatic differentiation'.

I'd be checking ID, asking why no child protection officer was present, or no parent, I'd want to check the head had been informed by their superiors and enquiring as to why he wasnt present

ID fair enough but I would imagine the uniform may be a giveaway!
Appropriate adult (whether a parent or someone from local social services etc) would be arranged for interview but not needed to be present during the arrest.
I guess the head depends on school policy or if they are that bothered ( I can imagine it happens more in some schools than others!).

No desserts I read as a reference to a popular thread and stw meme .

ID fair enough but I would imagine the uniform may be a giveaway!

I'm sure thats been thought before and people have been wrong!

Appropriate adult (whether a parent or someone from local social services etc) would be arranged for interview but not needed to be present during the arrest.

The head of any school or at the very least the most senior member of the child protection team would be present and if they werent I'd not let them proceed. You can mock all you like but any police officer who wouldnt take the time to do it properly would need to be arresting me as well.

guess the head depends on school policy or if they are that bothered ( I can imagine it happens more in some schools than others!).

Any head who wasnt bothered would not be fit to be head. It also doesnt happen much at all in any school and believe me I've worked in amongst the worst. I have been involved in pupils being searched by the police and its a very controlled and measured procedure, they certainly dont just come to a classroom and grab a kid.
As saidcthough its not what happend here so its a [b]MOOT[/b] point

so its a MOOT point

Almost there.. 😉

Seems to be some online bulling of a teacher on this thread. I'm dialling 999.

Almost there..

Painful, isn't it!

Here Analgallitis Arsevengence, have a few apostrophes... ' ' ' ' ' '

Just copy and paste them into your text, your apostrophe key is clearly broken... 😉

Seems to be some online bulling of a teacher on this thread. I'm dialling 999.

Justvtell them to bring ID and the bullies parent/headcteacher!!@

I dont need apostrophies for a cycling message bored if that upsets you youll grow out of it

It seems the prevailing attitude among police and stw is guilty until proven innocent and even then probably guilty anyway. Nice.

and the bullies parent/headcteacher

Must try harder...

I dont need apostrophies for a cycling message bored if that upsets you youll grow out of it

Dude, shhh now - I'm trying to give the impression we are not all thick as shit. You're feeding them all ammo.

Dude, shhh now - I'm trying to give the impression we are not all thick as shit.

I was hoping someone on this bored would pick up on a few extras! To be honest its not as much fun as Id hoped

" any police officer who wouldnt take the time to do it properly " doing it properly is heavily context dependant.
This story as reported seems very odd i can understand the very " soft " arrest procedure from the seizure of computers so the arrest was necessary to secure and preserve evidence rather than having her in by appointment and giving her time to delete evidence, but rond are way female and juvenile cells are not in amongst male adult cells. The length of time in custody is odd , either mum and dad did not rush to the station when called or the police were slow or went to cps for precharge advise while in custody or two different days detentions have been added together(short interview day one longer interview some weeks later when computer has been examined)
the no charge may have been a decision based on no evidence of wrong doing or a view that given age and shock of arrest no public interest in taking further action . The delay in going to the media may be a cynical decision to wait till the 6 month time limit for prosecuting minor offences was up.

[quote=kja78 ]It seems the prevailing attitude among police and stw is guilty until proven innocent and even then probably guilty anyway. Nice.

No its not and if you bother to read the article- I mean its not like you did an ill informed knee jerk reaction- you will note they[ child and parent] dont deny the claim merely that the reaction was "heavy handed"

School girls being school girls, one can't get the upper hand so strops to mummy and daddy who strop to school. Can't believe we have teachers and parents who are so incompetent they have to involve police in something like this.

School girls being school girls, one can't get the upper hand so strops to mummy and daddy who strop to school. Can't believe we have teachers and parents who are so incompetent they have to involve police in something like this.

It doesn't detail what actually happened so how can you say the Police shouldn't be involved?

They also had enough evidence to charge her with harassment, I would say that means it's not your average case of girls being girls.

Can't believe we have teachers and parents who are so incompetent they have to involve police in something like this.

Im both and cant even manage basic grammer!

School girls being school girls, one can't get the upper hand so strops to mummy and daddy who strop to school. Can't believe we have teachers and parents who are so incompetent they have to involve police in something like this.

not.a.clue 🙄

I do hope you are not given too much to look after in life. You might be ok with pencils or bollards or other inanimate stationary objects but I suspect humans are not your strong subject.

t doesn't detail what actually happened so how can you say the Police shouldn't be involved?

Don't feed the troll people

Not trolling, I was recently wrongly accused of something, that could quite easily been sorted by a mature robust conversation. But the other person was too cowardly and involved the police. Fortunately the judge was a bit more savvy than the copper and threw the case out.

We live in a society where people with responsibility, teachers, doctors etc are encouraged not to try and sort problems themselves but to go to the authorities who shoot first and ask questions later.

All this 'no smoke without fire', ' they didn't deny it' is deeply disconcerting. As has been said we have no idea what went on, so how on earth can any of you judge this girl?

according to the program and the police statement there was an investigation on going, at which point what were believed to be credible threats of immediate violence were made .This led to the decision to make the arrest at that point from school .
The subsequent investigation demonstrated that the complaint was false at which point the case was dropped .
So aside from the queries about length of time in custody an everyday story of police doing their job.
What would be the alternative story if they had ignored complaints and an allegation of threats and some child had ended up battered or committing suicide ?

so how on earth can any of you judge this girl?

Because the police arrested her and charged her with a crime?

As has been said we have no idea what went on, so how on earth can any of you judge

True; and yet you are able to conclusively say :-

Can't believe we have teachers and parents who are so incompetent

How do you know that in this case is was not appropriate to involve the police? What makes you the only one that can make assumptions?

Convert, I was using rhetoric. You lot were being drama queens so I thought I'd join in.

No, you were making yourself sound like a knob.

All this 'no smoke without fire', ' they didn't deny it' is deeply disconcerting. As has been said we have no idea what went on, so how on earth can any of you judge this girl?

Because we're (mostly) all grown ups with respect for law and order, living in a free country, so if the police appear to have had evidence, we're happy to believe that it exists an that a crime had been committed.

And importantly, she/her dad admitted as such on live TV.

t the other person was too cowardly and involved the police.

Fortunately the judge was a bit more savvy than the copper and threw the case out.

We live in a society where people with responsibility, teachers, doctors etc are encouraged not to try and sort problems themselves but to go to the authorities who shoot first and ask questions later.

All this 'no smoke without fire', ' they didn't deny it' is deeply disconcerting. As has been said we have no idea what went on, so how on earth can any of you judge this girl?

you are free to ignore all this evidence and insist we "dont know" when really you mean you are willfully ignoring the known facts

The charge was dropped and as per crankboy's post the allegations were found to be untrue. Seems thst you're doing some evidence ignoring of your own.

And yes, a professional not challenging another professional about a perceived issue but going to the police is to me cowardly.

The charge was dropped and as per crankboy's post the allegations were found to be untrue. Seems thst you're doing some evidence ignoring of your own.

the no charge may have been a decision based on no evidence of wrong doing or a view that given age and shock of arrest no public interest in taking further action

[img] [/img]

Tinas, I genuinely hope you are never on the receiving end of a false allegation, you will learn the hard way that your beliefs about the police are unfounded .

Ah, the personal insults have begun. For a group getting uptight about online bullying you guys are ace.

I think they began when you called someone a coward

Anyway it was amusing you criticised us for ignoring the evidence and cited a post that did not support your view

Sorry you are angry with the police but this does not mean every arrest is wrong nor that everyone not charged is innocent

I think she's guilty because of the way she looks.

Do I win a prize?

Tinas, I genuinely hope you are never on the receiving end of a false allegation, you will learn the hard way that your beliefs about the police are unfounded .

I genuinely hope so too.

However, in this case the accusations appear not to have been false. If they were false the story would be "I was falsely accused of bullying and had to spend 8 hours in a cell", not a very carefully worded interview where you focus on your treatment and skirt around the issue of guilt.

The charges being dropped could be that the accusation was false (although seems unlikely, or they' be saying that, and the accuser would be in trouble), or it could be as JY said that the shock of arrest was deemed probably proportionate punishment and going further wasn't in the public interest. It could be that the evidence wouldn't stand up to scrutiny in court, witnesses/victims might have withdrawn their statements, or she might just have lawyered up and found some procedural issue causing the case to collapse.

I didn't call anyone on here a coward now did I jy?

Crankboy's post explicitly states that 'The subsequent investigation demonstrated that the complaint was false at which point the case was dropped.'

My concern is that you and others seem to be revelling in the fact that this girl somehow got her just desserts, when in fact a. The allegations against her were found to be untrue, and b. The behaviour of the police during her arrest and subsequent detention is questionable.