Did police strip search a 15-year-old schoolgirl – who had her period – because she was black?

Thursday, December 3, 2020 and a 15-year-old schoolgirl arrives at her inner-London school for a mock exam; a scene played out across the country as pupils prepare for their GCSEs.

Only here, the day is about to take a disturbing turn. Teachers believe they can detect the strong smell of cannabis on this high-achiever. Concerned she might be carrying ‘weed’, they question her but she denies using or having any drugs. Still, they ask to search her bag, blazer, scarf and shoes, but nothing of significance is found.

That, however, is not the end of it.

Teachers believe they have smelled cannabis on her before. Someone she knows was previously excluded from the school for drugs.

So they seek advice from the Safer Schools Police Officer. Off-site because of Covid-19 restrictions, however, he recommends the school call 101 and ask for a female officer to attend.

Instead, four Met police officers turn up, two male and two female, to deal with one pupil. The teenager is escorted to the school medical room.

Worried about missing her exam, the black teenager — who is on her period — does everything she is told without complaint, but remains adamant she has no illegal substances on her.

She is not believed. Instead, she is subjected to a naked strip-search by the two female officers under Section 23 of the Misuse of Drugs Act, as if she were a suspected adult criminal.

No drugs are found on her, nor in the room she had been waiting in, which is also searched.

Distressed and humiliated, the schoolgirl is not even allowed to go to the bathroom afterwards before being sent back to her exam.

During the search, she’d been asked to remove her underwear and sanitary pad for a visual inspection of intimate parts of the body.

Now imagine this was your 15-year-old daughter, niece or grandchild. As a parent you might expect a phone call from the school and be given the opportunity to be present or challenge the decision to carry out such an intrusive search.

How would any parent feel for their child to arrive home by taxi later that day so distressed she needs to be taken straight to her GP, who refers the teenager for psychological support?

But, as a review — headed by Independent Child Safeguarding Commissioner Jim Gamble — this week revealed, this is exactly what happened to someone’s child in one London school.

Initiated by the City and Hackney Safeguarding Children Partnership, the review panel was of the ‘overwhelming opinion’ the search was unjustified and that the teenager, referred to as Child Q, had been ‘exposed to a traumatic incident’ and ‘had suffered harm’.

The child is said to be so disturbed by the experience she has self-harmed and the change in her, from a ‘happy-go-lucky’ girl to a ‘recluse’ has been ‘profound’.

As she explained in her written account: ‘Someone walked into the school, where I was supposed to feel safe, took me away from the people who were supposed to protect me and stripped me naked, while on my period.

‘I can’t go a single day without wanting to scream, shout, cry or just give up.

‘I feel like I’m locked in a box, and no one can see or cares that I just want to go back to feeling safe, my box is collapsing, and no one wants to help. I don’t know if I’m going to feel normal again. I don’t know how long it will take to repair my box. But I do know this can’t happen to anyone, ever again.’ The most disturbing question raised by the report is this: would this teen have been strip-searched had she been white?

The child’s family are convinced not, while the review panel concluded: ‘Racism (whether deliberate or not) was likely to have been an influencing factor in the decision to undertake a strip search.’

The report, which makes eight findings, adds: ‘The review is clear that the strip search should never have happened and there was no reasonable justification of it.’

Police officers can carry out such searches, if they have ‘reasonable grounds’ to suspect, but the PACE code states ‘searches involving exposure of intimate parts must not be conducted as a routine extension of a less thorough search, simply because nothing is found in the course of the initial search.’

In this instance, the panel indicated, officers had carried out the search based on what they’d been told and not because the pupil was acting in a way which might lead them to reasonably suspect she was in possession of any drugs.

The family’s solicitor Chanel Dolcy said this week: ‘This case is indicative of the adultification of black children undertaken by state authorities. The findings have recognised it is unlikely Child Q would have been treated in this degrading way had she not been black.’

Police in Hackney have since apologised, admitting the search took place without the presence of an appropriate adult.

Detective Superintendent Dan Rutland of the Met’s Central East Command said: ‘We recognise the findings of the safeguarding review reflect that this incident should never have happened. It is truly regrettable and, on behalf of the Met Police, I would like to apologise to the child concerned, her family and the wider community.

‘It is wholly right that the actions of officers are held to scrutiny and we welcome this review which was commissioned by the statutory partnership with the support of police. We have reminded local officers of the appropriate policies around searches in schools.’

An investigation by the Independent Office for Police Conduct, to which the family made a formal complaint in January 2021, is ongoing. The Met Police Service voluntarily referred itself to the IOPC in May last year and three constables were served with notices that they were under investigation for misconduct.

But once again the Met Police finds itself the focus of intense scrutiny over the conduct of some of its officers and facing accusations of institutionalised racism.

In a letter to the review, Child Q’s mother wrote: ‘Do you think it appropriate for a black girl to be searched without a parent or family member? Would you allow your child to be strip-searched and questioned without consent?

‘Why doesn’t my child deserve the same rights as every other? Is this because they think she is a girl with no respect for adults and no fear of consequences or because she is a black child in a poor city area?’

Her maternal aunt wrote that her niece, before the search, was ‘doing exceptionally well at school, top of the class and getting praised every day for her good work and good conduct’.

She added: ‘The family don’t believe officers would have treated a Caucasian girl child that way.’

And what of the school, which carried out an investigation following a formal complaint?

The review found the teachers demonstrated ‘good curiosity’ and an ‘alertness to potential indicators of risk’ when responding to concerns of the smell of cannabis.

However, school staff — it added — deferred to the authority of the police when they should have been ‘more challenging … seeking clarity about the actions they intended to take’ and mindful of their ‘duties to uphold the interests of children’.

They had ‘insufficient focus on the safeguarding needs of Child Q’, but the review concluded it was ‘unlikely’ the school was informed by the attending police officers of the intention to strip-search her.

A child had never been strip-searched on the school premises before, nor — as far as anyone is aware — in any other local school.

It appears to have been a highly irregular occurrence, but can the same be said of the way black and ethnic minority communities are treated outside schools?

During 2020/2021 there were 299 ‘further searches’ — which includes strip-search activity — conducted in Hackney by the Met’s Central East Basic Command Unit.

The review panel found that over this period 25 children under the age of 18 were subject to ‘further searches’. Nineteen were male and 18 were handcuffed. The reasons for the search primarily related to suspicions about drugs, followed by weapons and stolen property.

Twenty-two of the searches, 88 per cent, were negative and no further action was recorded in 20. Fifteen of the children searched were black, two white, six Asian and two Arab or North African.

Human rights solicitor Lawrence Davies, director of London law firm Equal Justice, told the Mail of an incident where a black boy aged ten was allegedly grilled by Met officers while walking home from his primary school in North London, in November 2020.

He said: ‘The boy was in Muswell Hill and had almost reached home when he was stopped by officers and asked what he was doing.

‘White pupils walked by while he was questioned, which left him distraught. When his parents rang to complain, the police claimed they had been concerned for his welfare.

‘Racial profiling is creeping into the operational approach of the police towards London communities. Child Q is the latest case.’

Commander Dr Alison Heydari of the Met’s Frontline Policing yesterday added that action had been taken to refresh the understanding of officers of policy for conducting a ‘further search’, with advice around dealing with schools to ensure ‘children are treated as children.’