Social workers got help for pet ape but left behind couple's
abused kid, A FIVE-year-old girl lay in agony and squalor after social
workers failed her.
But the same social workers did summon help for a pet monkey in
her house.
The couple who neglected the girl were jailed
for five years each, ministers called for a full report into the
scandal.
The girl, who hadn't been bathed or had her fingernails cut for
almost a year, was eventually found in a filthy bed with a
plaster cast on her leg that should have been removed 10
months earlier.
Lord MacLean said the crime of heroin addicts James Barr and
Karen Leask was "revolting". And he expressed shock at the lack
of action by social workers to protect the little girl, who
cannot be named for legal reasons.
But amid a mounting outcry, council chiefs insisted her ordeal
was not their responsibility. The girl suffered a broken leg and
collar bone when she was knocked down by a car near her home in
June 1998.
Two months later, social workers called at the house and spotted
the monkey running about.
They alerted SSPCA inspectors, but did not check on the child,
who was lying in filth in the next room.
The plaster cast put on her leg was only removed last March after relatives went to the girl's house. They were called in by
police after Barr was arrested on an unconnected offense.
The 10-month delay in removing the cast caused her leg muscles
to become so wasted she could not support herself. She even had
to walk with the aid of a zimmer frame until her muscles built
up again.
And cutlery and pens used by the desperate girl to try to
scratch her leg were found lodged inside the plaster.
She also had bed sores on her back and buttocks and her hair was
matted and full of lice.
Social workers visited the girl's house 18
times. But they got in on only five occasions and saw her just
once, on July 1, 1998.
Then, they were told by the couple that the girl would soon be
returning to hospital to have the cast removed.
But they made no further check on her welfare and the girl was
left to fester alone at the flat in Easterhouse, Glasgow.
Staff at the city's Yorkhill Children's Hospital alerted her GP
when she failed to arrive to have the cast taken off. A health
visitor was sent to the house but was fobbed off with another
claim that the girl would soon be going to hospital.
However, she, too, made no further checks to see that the cast
had been removed.
A Glasgow City Council spokesman said the social
workers who visited the house were assigned to the girl's two
sisters. He said they inquired "as a matter of course" about the
girl's leg when they saw her on July 1. He admitted there had
been a "breakdown of communication" between social workers,
the police and health staff involved in the case.
But he claimed: "I can categorically say that we were not
responsible for the condition the girl was found in.
"It was not the responsibility of the social work department to
ensure the cast was removed. That was the responsibility of the
couple. That is why they got five years each.
"The girl was not in our care or under our responsibility. Her
sisters were clients of the social work department. That is the
reason why social workers visited the house. They were there to
see her sisters, not her - that is why she wasn't seen."
The spokesman confirmed the social workers who visited the house
called the SSPCA about the monkey. He said: "When they visited
the house on August 20, they saw the monkey running around and
obviously had concerns about it. So they called the SSPCA."
However, the council's explanation did nothing to quell the
growing outcry over the scandal.
A Scottish Executive spokeswoman said they were "extremely
concerned" and added: "We will be asking the local authority for
a full report so that ministers can identify whether
procedures failed in this case."
Tory social work spokesman Ben Wallace described the council's
explanation as "simply not good enough". He said: "Time after
time, the social work department of Glasgow City Council has
failed young children and this is only the latest example. For
them to call for help for a monkey but not a child simply
beggars belief.
"Surely if two children in the house were under supervision, it
is common sense to check on the third. They should have used
their initiative."
The SNP's Nicola Sturgeon said: "This is a shocking case and we
need a full inquiry to get to the bottom of what happened. This
is not the time for the council to be hiding behind what
sounds like a very technical response."
And a spokeswoman for charity Children First said: "This
terrible case should have come to light much earlier. It
highlights the need for agencies involved in child protection to
work together."
Meanwhile, the couple were last night beginning their jail
terms, with the words of the judge, Lord MacLean, ringing in
their ears.
He told them the girl must have "suffered dreadfully" and added:
"This is a crime that in my view would revolt most people.
"What you allowed to happen to a five-year-old girl as a result
of wilful ill-treatment and neglect almost passes belief.
"What I find difficult to understand is how you could have left
her in bed for so long in such squalor. It was a total
abdication of your responsibility."
Talking about the role of social workers, he said: "To say the
least, I am very surprised the girl's predicament did not come
to light."
Barr, 40, and Leask, 36, both pleaded guilty at the High Court
in Glasgow to neglecting the girl to her permanent disfigurement
and injury between June 1998 and last March.
Defense lawyers claimed in mitigation that they had been unable
to take the girl to hospital because they were too dependent on
drugs to leave the house.
The court heard they spent their nights stoned on heroin and
their days finding the means to feed their habit, said to cost
around pounds 90 a day.
Leask, who walked out on Barr in September 1998 leaving him to
look after the girl, sobbed as she was sentenced - but her
partner showed no emotion.
*****************************
Notes:
This story comes from
http://www.record-mail.co.uk/shtml/NEWS/P1S2.shtml
*********************************************************
