REPORT OF AN INDEPENDENT INQUIRY ... - Hundred Families

6. According to the family, the police officer treated them politely but he did not offer them any
practical assistance or advice as to how or from whom they might seek help. Sujita Trousdale
told the Inquiry Panel that nothing was done to help those family members who went to the
police station. The family’s understanding of that advice they did receive was that it was “advice
about going to the Council at the Town Hall”. Superintendent Smalley told the Inquiry Panel that
he would “surmise that [the] advice would be to contact the local GP and/or the mental health
authority through the local authority”. If that were the case, he considered this advice to be
correct.
7. Superintendent Smalley told the Inquiry that, if the family had concerns about Chandran, they
had an obligation to make contact with the relevant authority. The family say, in effect, that was
the purpose of their visit to the police station. They were trying to seek help for Chandran but did
not know with whom they should be making contact. Inspector Holland elaborated on this issue
when he spoke to us. He told us that, in a situation such as this, the police officer concerned has
to decide whether there is an immediate risk of harm. If not, he then has to consider the nature
of any future risk and should give advice to relatives and make an independent referral to the
mental health service, if that is appropriate.
Comment
(1) We have found it impossible to ascertain the precise nature of the advice given to the
family, particularly without being able to identify or talk to the police officer involved.
However, even if advice was in fact given in the terms suggested by Superintendent
Smalley, it is apparent that that advice was not clearly or sufficiently explained to the
family so that they understood anything beyond that it was a matter to take up with the
Council at the Town Hall (which strikes us as an unspecific understanding of the steps
they needed to take to gain help for Chandran, for example to trigger a Mental Health
Act assessment). They do not appear to have been left with the understanding that they
should contact Chandran’s GP (assuming they knew with which GP he was then
registered) or the mental health authority via the local authority.
(2) It also appears that they were not given any specific contact details of anyone to whom
they could turn at the local authority, e.g. a telephone number which would enable them
to gain out-of-hours access to the Emergency Duty Team given this was a Saturday.
8. For her part, Sonia Stewart told the Inquiry Panel that she knew nothing about the letter until we
asked her about it. She said she would like to think the information about the letter and the
family’s visit to the police would have been shared with her by the police and described herself
as being “taken aback” by the letter and the fact that the information contained in it was not
passed on to her. She regarded the police and the Probation Service as working as a multi-agency
organisation and would have expected to see the letter or to be told about it. She said she would
have taken the information to her line manager and would have expected it to trigger a risk
assessment by the Probation Service, particularly bearing in mind the fact that Chandran’s
conviction was for an offence of violence. At that stage, if there were a need for mental health
input, she would have expected that to be identified and acted upon.
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