England’s former kids’s commissioner immediately warned extraordinarily susceptible kids like little Arthur Labinjo-Hughes ‘continued to slide from view’ through the coronavirus pandemic, sparking fears that lots of extra like him may have confronted surprising abuse throughout lockdown.
Anne Longfield immediately warned that measures had not but been put in place to take care of a ‘lack of co-ordination and lack of data-sharing’ amongst businesses coping with youngster safety in England.
Her feedback come as an MP and former kids’s minister immediately warned Covid had ‘exacerbated’ the problems round recognizing and coping with youngster abuse.
Tim Loughton, who served as Minister for Youngsters and Households underneath David Cameron from 2010 to 2012, immediately mentioned circumstances like Arthur’s had been happening ‘off the radar’ and ‘behind closed doorways’ throughout lockdown and that they could have been picked up in colleges or outdoors the house.
It comes as Arthur’s ‘evil’ step-mother Emma Tustin, 32, was immediately jailed for all times, with a minimal time period of 29 years, for homicide and his organic father, Thomas Hughes, 29, for 21 years for manslaughter following his merciless demise at their palms.
In the meantime, it was immediately revealed {that a} council boss in control of taking care of susceptible kids on the time of Arthur’s tragic homicide had left her submit earlier than the six-year-old’s mother and father went on trial.
She boasted on LinkedIn in August – three months after Arthur’s demise – that she is now ‘retired and loving it’.
Anger can be rising over the failures that led to Arthur’s demise regardless of being on social providers’ radar for 3 years.
The case, one of many worst examples of kid abuse in British historical past, raises severe questions concerning the actions of social staff, police and the boy’s lecturers. The alternatives missed to avoid wasting him included:
- Social staff had been despatched out to analyze bruising on Arthur reported by his grandmother however concluded there have been ‘no safeguarding considerations’;
- Arthur’s uncle despatched police pictures of the bruising however no motion was taken as a result of social providers had been already concerned – and officers warned the household they might be arrested in the event that they continued attempting to go to Hughes;
- A educating assistant who carried out welfare checks on Arthur – by phone – was fobbed off with claims that he had been having fun with enjoying within the backyard;
- When Arthur’s faculty reopened after lockdown every week earlier than his demise, no motion was taken when he didn’t attend;
- Tustin and Hughes’s former next-door neighbours and Tustin’s stepfather additionally mentioned they made referrals to social providers after fearing for Arthur’s security.
Emma Tustin, 32, (center) killed six-year-old Arthur Labinjo-Hughes by slamming his head on a tough floor after she and 29-year-old Thomas Hughes (left) subjected him to months of torture which included ravenous him and poisoning him with salt
Anne Longfield (pictured left) immediately warned that measures had not but been put in place to take care of a ‘lack of co-ordination and lack of data-sharing’ amongst businesses coping with youngster safety in England. Tim Loughton (pictured proper), who served as Minister for Youngsters and Households underneath David Cameron from 2010 to 2012, immediately circumstances like Arthur’s had been happening ‘off the radar’ and ‘behind closed doorways’ throughout lockdown and should have been picked up in colleges or outdoors.
Arthur was crushed to demise by 32-year-old Tustin following months of abuse by her and his father Thomas Hughes. His trial hear how relations repeatedly raised considerations with social providers and police however had been rebuffed
At the moment, former Youngsters’s Commissioner for England, Mrs Longfield mentioned very susceptible kids ‘have continued to slide from view’, and that she is ‘heartbroken’ and ‘sickened’ by the killing of Arthur.
She advised BBC Radio 4’s At the moment programme: ‘For anybody who seems on the severe case evaluations, or hears about them, that come after a baby’s demise, you will note the identical issues developing time and time once more – missed alternatives, lack of co-ordination, lack of data-sharing – the issues that professionals must have at hand to have the ability to defend these kids, which nonetheless aren’t in place.’
In the meantime, former kids’s minister Tim Loughton mentioned Covid lockdown had ‘exacerbated’ the kid abuse disaster. ‘There’s so many issues right here – there’s an actual sense of déjà vu,’ he advised At the moment. ‘I believe one of many issues is we have barely taken our eyes off the ball.
‘Circumstances similar to this may need been detected higher in school or outdoors, it was all happening behind closed doorways. This noticed a extremely manipulative, sadistic guardian and step-mother pull the wool over the eyes of the social staff. However that should not be an excuse… the system that has failed to guard this youngster.’
The feedback come as immediately it emerged Solihull’s £122,294 Director of Youngsters’s Providers, Louise Rees, boasted on LinkedIn that she is now ‘retired and loving it’ after leaving her job in August – three months after Arthur was tortured and killed underneath the quilt of lockdown by Tustin and Hughes.
At the moment it emerged the 60-year-old took up the submit at Solihull in March 2019 – simply weeks after inspectors discovered ‘widespread and severe failings’ inside the kids’s providers division of Stoke on Trent Metropolis Council, the place she was the £140,000 director.
An Ofsted report concluded that, throughout her tenure, providers for kids in Stoke had ‘critically declined’ on account of ‘poor management, administration oversight and an absence of efficiency inspection’. Youngsters had been ‘not being protected’ and ‘widespread and severe failures’ had been leaving them at ‘danger of significant hurt’.
The authorities in Solihull failed to avoid wasting as soon as ‘chubby, comfortable’ Arthur from a relentless marketing campaign of each bodily and psychological torture, together with being poisoned with salt by Tustin, whereas Hughes inflicted ‘stress level’ torture methods as they made him stand on his personal for as much as 14 hours a day.
After involved relations advised the council about bruises on the teenager’s again, social employee Jayne Kavanagh and assist employee Angela Scarlett-Coppage visited Tustin’s house however reported ‘no considerations’ after finishing up cursory checks. Tustin and Hughes had ‘coached’ Arthur and one in all Tustin’s different kids to faux his accidents had been the results of a play-fight.
A day earlier than Arthur died of ‘unsurvivable’ head accidents inflicted by Tustin, he had been rendered ‘too weak’ even to carry a glass of water to his mouth. The 130 areas of bruising discovered on the little boy’s physique after his demise equated to ‘practically a bruise for every single day of lockdown’.
In the meantime, social staff needed to be nameless after they gave proof to the courtroom, it may be revealed.
Arthur’s maternal grandmother, Madeleine Halcrow, of Birmingham, mentioned she emailed footage of Arthur’s bruising to Solihull council in April final yr. She mentioned: ‘I’ve a background in nursing so I knew these had been non-accidental accidents and I advised them as a lot.’
However she mentioned that when she adopted up with the police to search out out what had been executed, she was advised Tustin’s home had appeared clear and tidy. ‘I requested them: ‘So simply because a home is tidy it doesn’t suggest abuse is not happening?’ Social providers failed Arthur – they will need to have seen how unwell he was. It was simply weeks earlier than he died.’
Solihull’s £122,294 Director of Youngsters’s Providers on the time of Arthur’s demise, Louise Rees, 60, (pictured) left in August earlier than the trial started
Solihull’s Native Safeguarding Youngsters Partnership is finishing up an unbiased overview of the circumstances surrounding the ‘horrible tragedy’, together with the actions of Solihull council’s social providers.
The Impartial Workplace for Police Conduct mentioned it had ‘performed and concluded’ an investigation into West Midlands Police’s involvement and would publish its report sooner or later.
Following the supply of verdicts after greater than six hours of deliberation, Coventry Crown Courtroom stood for a minute’s silence in reminiscence of Arthur on the jury’s request. The 11-strong panel mentioned Arthur’s ‘combat had touched our hearts’.
Hughes and his son moved into Tustin’s council home on the eve of the March 2020 lockdown – seven months after the defendants met on a courting web site.
However inside weeks of transferring in, the beforehand comfortable schoolboy regarded ‘damaged’.
The couple could be damned by Tustin’s own residence safety cameras, which captured a lot of the abuse.
‘Depraved’ Tustin known as 999 and advised the operator Arthur had ‘banged his head’. After police arrived at her house, the self-pitying stepmother cried and tried to persuade the officers who attended the stick-thin boy had ‘hit’ her (pictured)
Sick Tustin fetched her cell phone instantly after she beat Arthur to take {a photograph} of the teenager (pictured, along with his father Hughes) as he lay dying within the hallway of her house in Cranmore Highway, Solihull, West Midlands, in June final yr
This picture was taken by Arthur’s grandmother Joanne Hughes as a part of a determined try to persuade the authorities he was in peril
Tustin attacked Arthur for the ultimate time on June 16 final yr, the day earlier than her thirty first birthday, in between making preparations with a celebration organiser who was offering her with celebratory balloons.
Prosecutors mentioned she shook after which repeatedly slammed Arthur’s head on a tough floor whereas alone with the boy.
Nikki Holmes, founding father of the Safer Collectively youngster safety consultancy, mentioned Arthur’s case confirmed how lockdown had ‘ramped up the danger in some households’ and left the professionals coping with such households with ‘restricted oversight’.
She added: ‘Lockdown made it more durable to identify when issues had been going incorrect. An examination is required of the broader system dealing with circumstances similar to this.’
Hughes, of Solihull, was cleared of homicide however convicted of manslaughter and two counts of kid cruelty. Tustin, of Solihull, was convicted of homicide and 4 counts of kid cruelty.
Mrs Halcrow, who sobbed through the minute’s silence, described the defendants as ‘evil’ and ‘chilly, calculating, systematic torturers of a defenceless little boy’.
Stepmother who tortured and murdered Arthur ‘had no maternal intuition in anyway, needed kids for the eye they introduced – and the kid profit’: Her ex offers a disturbing perception as social staff face damning questions
By Andy Dolan and Tom Rawstorne for Every day Mail
Arriving on the house of Emma Tustin and Thomas Hughes, social staff had been greeted by a ‘playful and boisterous’ six-year-old, his cheeks flushed from working round within the backyard.
As for the extreme bruising on Arthur’s left shoulder that had prompted his anxious grandmother to name within the authorities, all they later recalled seeing was a faint mark.
And, anyway, any lingering considerations had been calmed after they quizzed Arthur concerning the damage. He and one in all Tustin’s different sons claimed it had been brought on by a play-fight with boxing gloves.
For the social staff, that was ok. They concluded it was a ‘comfortable family’ the place everybody acquired on properly. Case successfully closed.
Lower than two months later, Arthur was lifeless, having suffered an ‘unsurvivable’ trauma to his head. A complete of 130 accidents, each outdated and new, had been discovered throughout his physique. He had additionally been tortured, poisoned with salt and compelled to face on his personal for as much as 14 hours a day.
A cheerful family? Extra like hellish.
The obvious failures of the authorities to safeguard this little boy had been quite a few and surprising. His faculty, the police and social staff all had alternatives to intervene.
Why they didn’t will kind the premise of a number of investigations. And at their coronary heart will probably be their interactions with one particular person. Not Arthur, however with Emma Tustin, his stand-in mum.
Tustin (left) killed six-year-old Arthur Labinjo-Hughes by slamming his head on a tough floor after she and 29-year-old Hughes (proper) subjected him to months of torture which included ravenous him and poisoning him with salt
An artist’s impression of Tustin and Hughes in courtroom not lengthy earlier than they had been convicted of killing him yesterday
Handout pictures issued by West Midlands Police of Arthur. The obvious failures of the authorities to safeguard this little boy had been quite a few and surprising. His faculty, the police and social staff all had alternatives to intervene
As a result of it was she who coached Arthur to mislead the social staff about the reason for his damage. And it was she who had ensnared his father in a twisted, poisonous relationship by which the pair had utterly misplaced their ‘ethical compass’.
That’s not to say Hughes will not be additionally responsible. However what has emerged is that he was removed from the primary man to fall foul of Tustin. In courtroom the 32-year-old was described as a ‘ruthless predator’. She noticed Arthur as her prey as a result of she needed one thing he had – his dad.
Talking completely to the Every day Mail, the daddy of one in all Tustin’s 4 personal kids makes use of an identical description. ‘She’s a black widow,’ he mentioned. ‘She sucks the life out of every man she will get along with.’
The person, who requested to not be named, added: ‘She had no maternal intuition in anyway. She needed kids for the eye they introduced her as newborns, and for the kid profit. However as soon as the eye died away and he or she was left at house with a child, she did not wish to know.’
Cash meant for the kids was spent on tattoos, clothes, jewelry and the newest smartphones for herself. As for the authorities, she was an outdated hand at coping with them. Forward of visits the house could be tidied and toys introduced out for the children.
When the ex-partner and his household alerted social staff to Tustin, she merely ‘turned on the water works’, inflicting accidents on herself and accusing him of beating her and the kids as a substitute.
Pictured: Arthur’s mom Olivia, who’s presently in jail, described her son’s homicide as ‘harrowing and incomparable’
A handout photograph issued by West Midlands Police of Arthur. With colleges closed, welfare checks by Arthur’s lecturers amounted solely to calls, then texts and emails – exchanges by which Hughes claimed Arthur was ‘grand’
‘Social providers have blood on their palms,’ he mentioned. ‘If they’d heeded our warnings then little Arthur would possibly nonetheless be alive. Sadly, by way of youngster welfare and social providers, it’s a girl’s world. The person isn’t believed.’
Following the start of their youngster, Tustin threw herself out of the bed room window – breaking her leg – to cease her companion going out along with his finest buddy to moist the infant’s head.
‘I could not inform social providers about it as a result of I used to be anxious they’d take the infant away’, he mentioned. ‘She was unhinged.’ When one other lover left her eight years in the past, she jumped off the highest ground of a multi-storey automobile park close to her house within the West Midlands.
She spent 5 months in hospital with a shattered pelvis, fractured cranium, backbone and ankle. ‘She’s very manipulative and it is simple to finish up underneath her spell,’ the person mentioned. ‘Fortunately I got here to my senses.’
Tragically, Arthur Labinjo-Hughes discovered himself in a scenario over which he had no management – the ultimate misfortune in a life marked by misfortune. However it may have been so completely different.
His privately educated start mom, Olivia Labinjo-Halcrow, had the world at her toes. A former Solihull College pupil, the place sixth kind charges presently value £14,600 a yr, she was a proficient debater and eager cadet who went on to develop into a lance corporal within the Territorial Military.
Social staff had been known as two months previous to Arthur’s demise after considerations had been raised however no additional motion was taken
Hughes met mother-of-four Tustin (pictured) on-line earlier than the couple moved with Arthur into her house close to Solihull
However whereas learning philosophy, politics and economics on the College of Nottingham, she met Thomas Hughes by means of Fb, and dropped out in her last yr when she grew to become pregnant with Arthur.
The daddy-to-be was hardly a catch. After leaving faculty on the first alternative, he grew to become a Saturday morning soccer coach earlier than working as a plasterer after which a builder’s labourer. By the point Arthur was a toddler, his mom’s life had descended right into a world of drink and medicines as she struggled with declining psychological well being.
She started two-timing Hughes, however the brand new relationship was risky and violent and in February 2019 – in a ‘drink and drug-fuelled rage’ – she fatally stabbed her new lover. Her arrest and jailing for manslaughter meant Arthur discovered himself within the full-time care of Hughes, who’s now 29.
He and his son moved into an annexe of his mother and father’ house in Solihull. Hughes’s mom Joanne is a secondary faculty instructor.
However in August 2019 the fuse was lit when Hughes met Tustin by means of the Loads of Fish courting web site, shortly falling into her thrall. The courtroom heard Tustin had left faculty with no {qualifications} and by no means labored.
On the age of 14 she was reprimanded over a brawl with one other woman and on the age of 16 was cautioned for shoplifting. A yr later she had her first youngster. Her second arrived two years after that. She would go on to have 4 kids with three completely different males.
Arthur’s organic mom, Olivia Labinjo-Halcrow, 29, (pictured left) killed her companion Gary Cunningham (proper) by stabbing him 12 instances with a kitchen knife in a drunken rage in February 2019 and is presently serving an 11 yr jail sentence
After she jumped from the automobile park, the 2 older kids went to reside with their fathers. When the 2 youthful kids had been born, they stayed together with her and Arthur, however had common contact with their dad. The daddy who spoke with the Mail mentioned every relationship adopted a sample. ‘She will get pregnant in a short time after beginning a relationship as a result of it offers her a level of management over the person,’ he mentioned. ‘Then she isolates him from his family and friends.
‘From what I’ve learn of the courtroom case, she appears to have executed this to Hughes too.’
Certainly she did.
Hughes and his son moved in to Tustin’s council home in Cranmore Highway, Shirley, when the nation entered lockdown in March 2020. She shortly fell pregnant – later aborting her unborn child at 21 weeks when in custody.
Relations observed that each Hughes and his son’s behaviour quickly modified.
‘Arthur used to come back to stick with me,’ Madeleine Halcrow, the boy’s maternal grandmother, advised the Mail. ‘However when Tom got here to gather him Arthur would ask if ‘she’, which means Tustin, was within the automobile. He could be in tears getting in to the automobile, asking if he may stick with me. It was heart-breaking.’
Pictured: Arthur, pictured right here in his Spiderman hat, liked dressing up as superheroes in line with his organic mom
Arthur’s different grandmother was additionally involved. Following a row with Tustin, Hughes moved again in along with his mom for 3 days in April. Arthur advised her that Tustin had shoved him right into a wall and known as him ‘ugly’.
When Mrs Hughes checked his physique, she noticed extreme bruising from the entrance of his left shoulder to the rear, and photographed the accidents. The pictures had been despatched to Solihull Council’s social providers division and two social staff attended Tustin’s house for a spot examine the following day. However they weren’t proven the pictures upfront and the go to got here to nothing after Tustin and Hughes coached the children to play the a part of comfortable kids.
A key alternative missed – and, as we spotlight elsewhere, removed from the one one.
Lockdown clearly didn’t assist. With colleges closed, welfare checks by Arthur’s lecturers amounted solely to calls, then texts and emails – exchanges by which Hughes claimed Arthur was ‘grand’, ‘having fun with the backyard’ and ‘adorning his bed room’.
The fact couldn’t have been extra completely different and far of it was captured by Tustin’s personal safety cameras.
Coronary heart-breaking pictures present the six-year-old bedding down for the night time alone on the lounge ground the place he was made to sleep. Every morning Tustin would drag the covers off the bewildered boy to wake him with a fright.
Arthur along with his father. The teenager died after his head was repeatedly smashed in opposition to a tough floor
The footage additionally confirmed the defendants tucking into takeaway meals in the lounge whereas ‘remoted’ Arthur was disadvantaged of meals and water and banished to the ‘considering step’ on the foot of the staircase – his punishment for what they perceived to be his poor behaviour.
Throughout one two-day interval he was confined to a cramped hallway for 26 hours, whereas the defendants ate ice lotions or bathed in a sizzling tub.
Tustin recorded 200 audio clips of the boy in misery, which she gleefully forwarded to her lover.
Some had been of Arthur wailing whereas one captured him saying ‘Daddy’s going to throw me out of the window’. In different clips Arthur cried ‘no one loves me’ and ‘nobody goes to feed me’.
Prosecutors mentioned the systemic abuse meted out to Arthur, which included feeding him salt-laden meals, matched the medical definition of kid torture. By the top he was too weak even to carry a glass of water to his mouth. On the day he died – June 16 – prosecutors consider Tustin shook after which slammed Arthur’s head on a tough floor, presumably after pushing him down the steps, whereas alone with the boy.
Hughes was on the grocery store on the time however returned house seven minutes after the deadly assault. It was an additional 5 minutes earlier than the pair known as an ambulance.
Prosecutor Jonas Hankin QC mentioned the ‘pitiless’ father ‘inspired’ the killing in a telephone name lower than three minutes earlier than Arthur sustained his deadly head accidents, having beforehand despatched Tustin textual content responses, telling her to ‘fill him in’, ‘take his neck off’ and ‘get nasty’. Jurors had been additionally proven an image of Arthur, wearing Marvel Avengers pyjamas, slumped and crying by the entrance door – which Tustin admitted was ‘as a result of he had no energy left in him’.
It was taken simply minutes earlier than he suffered the mind injury which killed him.
Of their defence, the pair both claimed Arthur was an unruly boy whose accidents had been self-inflicted, or blamed one another.
Giving proof, Hughes admitted he was ‘besotted’ with Tustin, who threatened to finish the connection if he did not punish Arthur.
However Mr Hankin advised the courtroom that would not excuse his behaviour, describing him as ‘depraved’ and ‘completely ruthless’ in his willingness to hit Arthur ‘over and again and again’.
Hughes eliminated his son’s favorite teddy bear, reduce up his prized Birmingham Metropolis FC soccer shirts in entrance of him, and on one other event duped the kid into considering he was going to see his grandparents – earlier than turning the automobile round. ‘He was malevolent,’ the barrister mentioned. ‘He relished inflicting Arthur misery. That degree of cruelty is troublesome to understand, not to mention in a father in the direction of his personal son.’
Tustin, in the meantime, advised jurors Arthur was so uncontrolled he threatened to stab her with a knife. It was a part of a ridiculous defence by which she claimed Arthur ‘threw himself’ into cabinets or doorways.
Whereas on remand awaiting trial, Tustin advised a cellmate that Arthur died when ‘the little f***er tried to get out the entrance door and I finished him attempting to observe his dad’.
The boy’s life assist machine was switched off at 1am on June 17, 2020, the morning after he was brutally assaulted for the ultimate time.
Based on a supply, Arthur’s physique nonetheless lies in a hospital morgue as relations of his incarcerated mom and father battle one another for the correct to bury him.
Even in demise, the harmless, defenceless little boy can’t discover the peace he was denied in life.
The little boy who by no means stood an opportunity: How authorities missed FOUR key alternatives to avoid wasting Arthur
Relations of tragic Arthur Labinjo-Hughes immediately hit out on the failings of social staff and police who missed a raft of alternatives to avoid wasting the six-year-old’s life.
His maternal grandmother Madeleine Halcrow advised MailOnline: ‘Arthur was let down by social providers and the West Midlands Police. There was a chance to avoid wasting him and it wasn’t taken.’
The nurse spoke out as Emma Tustin, 32, was convicted of murdering Arthur on June 17, 2020, through the Covid lockdown. Arthur’s father Thomas Hughes, 29, was additionally discovered responsible of manslaughter for encouraging the killing, together with by sending a textual content message to Tustin 18 hours earlier than the deadly assault telling her ‘simply finish him’. However he was cleared of homicide.
They had been each discovered convicted of quite a few youngster cruelty costs after subjecting him to systematic abuse which matched the ‘medical definition of kid torture’, together with being disadvantaged of meals, made to face for 14 hours a day and poisoned with salt.
The boy’s household squarely blame Solihull Council’s kids’s providers, which didn’t grasp a collection of probabilities to cease Arthur’s ‘unimaginable’ torture earlier than he was murdered with 130 separate accidents.
MailOnline can immediately reveal the surprising record of failings by the authorities at each stage of Arthur’s life, together with permitting him to reside along with his father when his actual mom was convicted of stabbing her lover – a choice that will have been made by a household courtroom.
With seemingly little oversight from social providers, he then moved him into the home of a lady he had simply met regardless of her beforehand having two kids taken away from her.
Within the months of lockdown whereas Arthur was being abused, social staff and police missed 4 alternatives to avoid wasting him, brushed away pleas from his household and even threatened them with arrest underneath Covid guidelines.
Arthur died on June 16, 2020 after struggling an ‘unsurvivable head damage’. These are the 4 key probabilities the authorities missed to avert the tragedy:
- ONE – Arthur’s grandmother, Joanne Hughes, known as social providers on April 16 to say she had seen the teenager lined in bruises. Nonetheless, social staff failed to identify them throughout a go to to his house.
- TWO – On April 20, Joanne additionally advised Arthur’s faculty what she had seen. A member of employees known as social providers however was advised the bruises had been brought on by ‘play’.
- THREE – Arthur’s uncle, Daniel Hughes, experiences his considerations to police however is threatened with arrest if he tries to return to the teenager’s house.
- FOUR – John Dutton, Emma Tustin’s stepfather, makes an nameless name to social providers weeks earlier than Arthur’s demise.
MISSED CHANCE 1 –
Grandmothers experiences bruises to social providers – however they fail to see them throughout go to
Arthur’s paternal grandmother, Joanne Hughes, made a name to Solihull council’s emergency workforce on April 16 to report bruises on his shoulders.
She additionally advised them Arthur had mentioned the accidents had been brought on by Tustin, who ‘grabbed him to the face, known as him names and pushed him and he bumped his head on the steps’.
In response to her report, social employee Jayne Kavanagh and assist employee Angela Scarlett-Coppage had been dispatched to the household house in Shirley, Solihull, the next day.
Mrs Kavanagh advised jurors she arrived to search out Arthur enjoying outdoors and he appeared ‘clear’, ‘very comfortable’ and ‘boisterous’. She was unable to identify any bruising apart from a ‘faint yellow’ mark in the course of his again.
After talking Tustin and Hughes, she and Ms Scarlett-Coppage fashioned the view that Arthur was being cared for in a ‘comfortable family’ who had been ‘all getting alongside’.
They reported ‘no safeguarding considerations’ and the case was not referred for a full social providers evaluation. As an alternative they supplied to place a assist employee in contact underneath the Early Assist scheme, however no work happened.
Mrs Kavanagh mentioned she was left ‘in shock’ when she finally noticed the photograph of darkish bruises on Arthur’s shoulder blades.
Requested in courtroom if she may clarify why she was unable to identify bruises which had been noticeable a day earlier, she replied: ‘No’.
She added: ‘I used to be shocked and in disbelief that these pictures may have been taken the day earlier than and my colleague and I hadn’t seen something the day afterwards.’
Arthur’s maternal grandmother Madeleine Halcrow, mentioned Joanne Hughes and her husband, Chris, visited her at her house in Birmingham in April to indicate her the photograph of Arthur’s bruises and ask if she knew how Arthur had acquired them.
She advised MailOnline: ‘I had no thought in anyway as a result of I would been blocked from having any contact with Arthur by Thomas and I hadn’t seen him since October 21, 2019.
‘I instantly known as Solihull social providers however they advised me that they’d already been to see Arthur they usually did not have any points.
‘I despatched them the pictures of his again after which known as the police who mentioned they’d additionally gone to the home and like social providers they’d no worries because the property was ”immaculate”.
‘My response was to say ”so an immaculate home does not represent youngster abuse then?” So far as I am conscious there have been no extra visits after that.
‘Each the police and social providers had been lied to by Thomas and Emma who advised them that the bruise was from ‘boisterous play’. I do know it is troublesome as a result of there hadn’t been earlier contact with Arthur however nothing was executed when it ought to have been.’
The nurse added: ‘The entire social providers division failed Arthur. They will need to have seen how poorly Arthur was, how fatigued and weak he was. He died simply eight weeks later.’
Solihull’s £122,294 Director of Youngsters’s Providers on the time, Louise Rees, 60, left in August earlier than the trial started. Rees’ LinkedIn profile boasts that she is now ‘retired and loving it’.
Arthur had been on social providers’ radar for 3 years. In 2018 he was referred to them twice over considerations about his mom, Olivia Labinjo-Halcrow, an alcoholic and drug person who was finally jailed for stabbing to demise her lover.
MISSED CHANCE 2 –
Frightened instructor calls social providers about bruises – however is advised they had been brought on by ‘play’
On April 20, a determined Joanne Hughes advised Arthur’s faculty concerning the referral to social providers she had made 4 days earlier.
Michelle Hull, safeguarding lead at Dickens Heath Neighborhood Major College, then contacted social providers to alert them to Joanne’s report however was advised they’d ‘no considerations’.
Ms Hull advised jurors: ‘[Mrs Hughes] phoned to make us conscious she had considerations about Arthur and made a MASH (multi-agency safeguarding hub) referral.
‘She mentioned that she had seen Arthur and he had bruises on, I believe, it was his again. She mentioned she had seen bruises.’
Ms Hull mentioned Arthur’s grandmother had additionally voiced considerations about Tustin’s ‘psychological well being’ and mentioned that she was a ‘coercive’ companion.
She added: ‘She was involved the connection wasn’t a constructive one.
‘She was anxious about Thomas and Arthur as a result of the companion that he had – she was anxious about her psychological well being. She felt his companion, Emma, was coercive.’
Jonas Hankin QC, prosecuting, requested Ms Hull whether or not social providers had defined to her the character of the checks they carried out on Arthur whereas visiting him at house.
‘What, if any, info had been you given concerning the nature of the checks that social providers mentioned had been carried out?’ the barrister requested.
Ms Hull replied: ‘They mentioned they’d seen Arthur and that the accidents had been from boisterous play.
‘That the household relationship appeared OK. They usually had no considerations.’
Requested if the assist employee had given additional element concerning the accidents she had seen, Ms Hull mentioned: ‘I believe she referred to the bruises on the again.’
Ms Hull mentioned the social employee ‘did not have any considerations about parenting’ by Tustin.
The instructor added that social providers advised her she ‘wasn’t allowed to share any info with Arthur’s grandmother as a result of (parental) consent hadn’t been given’.
As an alternative, Ms Hull volunteered for the varsity ‘to remain concerned and simply do check-ins with the household’, which Mr Hughes consented to.
Requested why she had made that provide, Ms Hull mentioned: ‘As a result of they had been a household we had taken in and nurtured and that is very a lot how our college works.’
Dickens Heath had beforehand raised considerations about Arthur’s psychological state.
He began on the faculty in February 2019. On the time he had been advised that his mom, on remand for killing her boyfriend, had left to affix the military.
By October 2019, his instructor Aileen Carabine mentioned that he had discovered that his mom was in jail and had develop into extra ‘reserved and anxious’. She mentioned he had develop into ‘fixated’ along with his father disappearing from his life, being taken away from his father and his father killing him.
Hughes and his mom had a gathering with each the varsity and a paediatrician in November 2019 at which they spoke of their considerations for a way susceptible Arthur was, how he was clingy, babyish and obsessive about cuddly toys.
They had been advised by each the varsity and the medic that these had been regular signs for a kid in Arthur’s scenario and they need to reply with love and understanding and to not punish him or take away his toys.
The college made a referral to psychological well being providers and in March 2020 Arthur met with Kerry Forsyth-Benson, a CAMHS (Youngsters and Adolescent Psychological Well being Providers) practitioner.
MISSED CHANCE 3 –
Teenager’s uncle tells police about his accidents – just for officer to threaten HIM with arrest over Covid guidelines if he goes to examine on nephew
Arthur’s uncle, Daniel Hughes, mentioned he additionally had pictures of the teenager’s bruises and confirmed them to police, however by no means heard something again.
Daniel mentioned he and different relations tried to go to Arthur at house to confront Tustin and Hughes.
After the tried go to, he contacted West Midlands Police to report his considerations, however as a substitute of taking any motion an officer threatened him with arrest for breaking Covid guidelines if he tried to go to the home once more.
The Solihull house the place Arthur was abused, which his uncle, Daniel Hughes, tried to go to with different relations to confront Emma Tustin and Thomas Hughes about what they had been doing to him
Daniel advised jurors {that a} reluctant police employee finally agreed to obtain pictures of the kid’s bruises however he by no means heard something again.
He mentioned: ‘I went on the police webchat to investigate as to what I may do for the protection of my nephew.
‘I had a webchat with an operative. He gave me a case quantity and inside ten minutes a personal quantity known as me.
‘A police officer recognized himself, who mentioned he had been round to the deal with and spoke with Tustin and Tom [Thomas Hughes]. We had been suggested if we had been to return to the deal with we might be arrested.
‘I mentioned I had pictures of Arthur’s accidents and I did not consider that if he had seen these accidents, he could be comfortable that he was okay. He reluctantly acquired the pictures and mentioned he would communicate to his sergeant and get again to me. He by no means did.’
Daniel didn’t reveal the particular date of the decision and it’s not clear who took the pictures.
After Arthur’s demise, a neighbour wrote on Fb claiming they’d additionally knowledgeable police he was being abused.
They wrote: ‘I rang the police! I rang youngster providers! They did nothing and because of this the toddler has died. Solihull youngster providers make me really feel sick.’
Apart from the failings of social providers, West Midlands Police have been investigated over their dealing with of the case by the Impartial Workplace for Police Conduct, who at the moment are because of launch their findings.
MISSED CHANCE 4 –
‘He was in peril’: Nameless name to social providers by Tustin’s stepfather weeks earlier than tragic boy’s homicide
John Dutton, Tustin’s stepfather, advised jurors he made a name to social providers simply weeks earlier than Arthur collapsed with deadly mind accidents on June 16, 2020.
Requested why he made the referral – which he selected to maintain nameless – Mr Dutton mentioned: ‘I assumed he was in peril.’
Mr Dutton mentioned Hughes ‘dished out the self-discipline’ on visits to his house and admitted slashing Arthur’s beloved Liverpool and Birmingham Metropolis soccer shirts.
Days earlier than his demise: Arthur makes an attempt to select up a cover from the ground the place he slept in CCTV footage proven to Coventry Crown Courtroom
He additionally mentioned that in one go to through the first Covid lockdown, Hughes confessed how he had ‘gone to city’ on the teenager.
Mr Dutton mentioned: ‘He advised us that he had gone to city on him and when he had executed it he went as much as the bathe and cried his eyes out.’
Requested by prosecutor Jonas Hankin, QC, what Mr Dutton took that to imply, he sobbed: ‘Belt the life out of him.’ He added: ‘I used to be simply shocked. He did not appear the kind.’
Mr Dutton advised the courtroom that after the decision, he stopped permitting Arthur into his home as a result of his spouse was ‘distressed’ at how he was being handled.
He mentioned Arthur was ordered to take a seat at a desk and face the wall ‘for hours’ like ‘a zombie’ at any time when he was introduced over to their house.