Analysis of the Inquiry of the Jasmine Beckford Affair - Case Study Example

The (Dis)function of the Trust: An Analysis of the Inquiry of the Jasmine Beckford Affair The death of a child is genuinely a tragedy; however, when it is a "child in trust" that is a child that has been recognized by the state as being at-risk, then that tragedy is paired with abject failure. That failure must be examined, dissected and analyzed-blame must be assessed and accountability must be assigned. In the case of Jasmine Beckford, the failures of social work practices were once again exposed and the subsequent inquiry in prolix detail attempted to place a framework around this tragedy and failure that going forward to could avoid such failures in the future, at least that was certainly the hope. In evaluating this critical incident there must be a consideration of the following: 1) what were the specific social work practices that failed, 2) what are the systematic or endemic issues generally associated with child abuse cases, and finally, 3) a consideration of the effectiveness and practicality of the substantive policy and legal recommendations that the panel inquiry generated. The nature of the panel inquiries that occur as a result of such incidents should also be appraised more thoroughly. Jasmine Beckford was unfortunately not the first or the last child to be abused and killed under the supposedly watchful eye of the magistrates and social services. Her case was certainly not the only such case to be at the centre of a high profile inquiry and finally, other such panel inquiries before and after have no doubt made similar policy recommendations. Social work professionals, citizens, and people in general must ask questions about the efficaciousness of these panel inquiries and the overall structure, function and value of the review process as currently constituted. At the instant that Jasmine Beckford's death became known on 5 July 1984 the series of events that precipitated this unfortunate end have been arranged to reveal a tragedy of errors. She was found dead at the residence of Morris Beckford and Beverly Lorrington, located in the London borough of Brent; and Mr. Beckford was subsequently convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to 10 years in prison. Years before that fateful day she and her sister, Louise, were made the subject of Care Orders due to reported injuries after being admitted to a hospital in August 1981. After being with foster parents until April 1982, Jasmine went back to live with Mr. Beckford and Ms. Lorrington on a "trial" basis (Parton 1986). Reports claim that there was significant evidence of chronic undernourishment and severe abuse during that "on-trial" time allotment. The report of her death was the subject of much discussion both locally in Brent and in Parliament (Parton 1986). An inquiry panel was convened, chaired by Louis Blom-Cooper, and the result was a wide-ranging and long report published in December of 1985, A Child in Trust. This 450-page inquiry which made some 68 substantive recommendations (Parton 1986) was not just focused on the unfortunate death of Jasmine Beckford, but attempted to synthesize lessons from other critical incidents and failures and sought a degree of comprehensiveness that had not been undertaken so vigorously by similar panels convened for these reasons. A cottage industry of commentary on this report developed and is included in the canon of social work practice analysis as regards this case. The report, A Child in Trust, is generous with its distribution of blame; however, one particular legal manoeuvre was called out for special excoriation and criticism. Along with the Care Order that prompted the removal of Jasmine and her sister from the home of Morris Beckford in 1981 an "extraordinary rider" was attached by the Willesden Juvenile Court magistrates that expressed their "earnest hope that the Social Services Department will do its utmost to carry out a rehabilitation programme to unite these children with their parents" (Bryant 1986). Though such riders carry little legal weight, this judicial disposition to actively seek rehabilitation of the parents was seen by the panel as possibly leading to the abrogation of the duties to the child on the part of Social Services. As we will see the recommendations that the inquiry proffered called for a revaluation and alteration of a decision-rule held by magistrates. Brent Social Services' was also held in special contempt for its lacklustre adherence and vigilance to the Care Order issued. This is partly justified by the unfortunate rider (Greenland 1986); however, improper and insufficient training, and failing to follow through completely on the dictates of the Care Order are more strenuously underscored. Interestingly, the inquiry does not cite callousness or blunt negligence in this case, but perhaps an extreme navet (Parton 1986). In November 1982, after a case conference, Jasmine and Louise were removed from the "at-risk" register (Dingwell 1986). This notably occurred a week after Jasmine stopped attending a day nursery (Bryant 1986). Later, Brent Social Services attempted to have the Care Order revoked in March 1983, the magistrates had refused this request; nevertheless, Social Services scaled down their work on this case. During this entire episode Jasmine's attendance at day nursery had been spotty and inconsistent. The panel suggests that Social Services acted as a poor liason to Jasmine's school and failed to diagnose her injuries that the post-mortem examination revealed were occurring during this time (Bryant 1986). Surprisingly, Brent Social Services did not discover Jasmine's shady attendance record for a full eight months afterwards, and not until May 1984, two months before her death. The last time a social worker explicitly visited and saw Jasmine was in March 1984 (Bryant 1986). Many of the visits between Jasmine's return to her step-father's guardianship were "fobbed off with implausible excuses on almost every occasion of her visiting the house about the whereabouts of Jasmine" (A Child in Trust quoted from Parton 1986, pp. 516). Another example of this naivet, as well as a clear deficiency of due diligence, is the social workers on the case never became aware of the fact that Morris Beckford was Jasmine's step-father (Parton 1986) Sadly, the last scheduled visit with her parents was for 5 July, the social worker was to inform her parents that they were again seeking to have the Care Order revoked by the judges; this message was never delivered as Jasmine was battered unconscious and was dead-on-arrival at St. Mary's hospital that day. The inquiry was set in order to determine the case specific reasons for failure and the circumstances surrounding her death. The report also offers an analysis of a number of general systemic issues related to the institution of social work in the United Kingdom; philosophical, educational, and legal ones count among the many substantive recommendations. Two major areas of inquiry that the report made are the educational training issues concerning front-line social work practitioners, and the institutionalized focus on the parents during these critical incidents rather than the children. This focus is directly related to the so-called "Rule of Optimism," which acts a general heuristic in child abuse and neglect cases (Parton, Bryant and Dingwell 1986). The educational issue is a multi-faceted and not entirely settled one as the literature claims. Initially, there is the typical excuse that there are limited resources in order to properly provide the sort of education necessary to deal with the extreme delicacies manifested in such situations. This does not really deal with the heart of the issue as many of the appraisals of the Beckford report intimate. Though education is generally a good thing, and something that one can never have too much of, the bald fact remains that Social Services provides many other functions than dealing specifically with child abuse cases and as a result the amount of education requisite to become an expert or even proficient in all of the appropriate venues, would leave very little time indeed to actually practice social work. Moreover, though the panel suggests that the Brent Social services agency failed to execute the authority granted to them by the Care Order, and failed to flag the medical symptoms manifesting in the child; it is really not feasible for social work practitioners to gain and properly appropriate the sophisticated legal and medical knowledge required to make such assessments (Parton and Byrant 1986). Greenwood (1986) points out saliently that the inquiry itself is composed of barristers, medical professionals, as well as social workers, and as a result this level of hindsight coupled with the expertise present on the panel would obviously point out significant flaws in the manner in which the Beckford case was administered. Since each case of child abuse and neglect cannot have a motivated and committed interdisciplinary panel patiently and thoroughly reviewing each piece of evidence; it is hard to square these recommendations of increased education without some degree of scepticism. The more pressing educational issue at hand is that the sort of models available to social work practitioners to predict or determine possible child abuse is at best only reasonably accurate, and not necessarily easy to apply. Dingwall (1986) claims that it is "incorrect to assume that there is a comprehensive and well-established literature on child abuse" (p. 496). It is also incorrect to assume that there is an accurate predictor or model for practitioners to utilize effectively in child abuse and neglect cases. The best models operate at 60% accuracy, meaning 4 in 10 cases are either missed as abusive or at-risk or falsely identified as such (Dingwall 1986). False identifications have clear drastic legal and personal consequences for families that might be unfortunately subjected to such accusations. Obviously, as the Beckford case so patently illustrates missed signs also have drastic and unfortunate consequences. Providing education is a resource intensive measure certain facets of which have uncertain results. The next major area of analysis to consider is the institutionalized focus on the parental figures in child abuse cases. The Parent-as-Client model presumes that the parent(s) are the main focus of Social Services' efforts and the main point of interface in the case. As children have dubious standing in most legal settings; therefore, many legal mandates must be mediated through parents and as a result it is bureaucratically difficult in an open society for a governmental agency or department to act in loco parentis. In these circumstances involving Social Services, parents, even when their fitness as such is called into question, have many rights and protections on their privacy. In a related note to the previous issue of education, Dingwell (1986) offers that while the knowledge regarding the legal rights of Social Services in the administration of a Care Order might be perfectly clear to the immediate social work practitioners on a case, they are nevertheless unwilling to flex their granted authority because of the long-standing tradition regarding and perhaps even principled commitment to the notion of an inalienable parental prerogative. This inalienable parental prerogative is subsumed under the general rubric of the "Rule of Optimism." In other words, parents, broadly speaking, have significant latitude in adopting any rearing philosophy or technique they so choose with limited interference from the government. Sociologists talk about "Natural Love" in this light, i.e. that parents raise their children in such a way that best and most "naturally" fits the parent-child relationship (Greenland 1986). The parent-child relationship is defined in terms of the particularities of the culture with which the parents identify. Insofar as that is, it is improper then, even culturally imperialistic and oppressive to apply uniform standards on proper child care. This kind of cultural sensitivity and general acceptance of seemingly unorthodox or arguably detrimental child-rearing techniques might even be suggested as, without chance of hyperbole, a direct consequence of what it means to live in an open and liberal democracy. In such a state the social worker's position vis--vis social work is immediately placed in tension, as the job of the social worker is to necessarily cross that line of privacy while paradoxically maintaining the sanctity of the social institutions which established it in the first place by applying this "rule." This tension is further strained by such occurrences as the extraordinary rider placed on the Care Order in the Beckford case. The "Rule of Optimism" generally implies that the satisfactory resolution of most child abuse and neglect cases prescribes the rehabilitation of the parents and the return of the children back to the parents. This optimism is not always well founded and seems to force the hand of Social Services in a most disadvantageous way; the ultimate suffers being of course the children. The report was adamant about recommending that no such riders ever be placed on future Care Orders (Dingwell 1986). What the report seemed to bury, on the other hand, is the radical shift in understanding that such a banishment of such riders would entail. Indeed, many of our deeply held convictions about the sanctity of the family, the role of the government in our personal affairs, and our belief in the effectiveness of government would be called into question if such a policy were to be enacted and enforced properly. Another feature of this Parent-as-Client model is the assumption that parents are necessarily interested in the welfare of their family, and only because of unfortunate circumstances do they become negligent or possibly worse towards their children. It is the primary responsibility therefore of the social work practitioner to investigate the causes of the parents' untoward behaviour rather than alleviate the symptoms which are exacted on their charges. It was revealed during the Beckford affair that Mr. Beckford was also the victim of child abuse and that the depressed socioeconomic conditions in that borough of London exacerbated this cycle of victimization (Bryant 1986). While the intention of this approach is certainly not without its merits, what it creates is an attitude of passivity on the part of the social work practitioner. The emergence of a Care Order should act as a recognizable catalyst for Social Services to interpolate themselves between parents and children. In such incidents it is likely that this interpolation will be met with resistance and even anger on the part of the parents; yet, it is essential that the Social Services acts in such a way to genuinely place a child in trust. The model as it currently stands too easily closes off that avenue for interpolation and mediation and instead reduces any chance to expose improper or untoward behaviour. The focus must be on that specific child's safety and well-being in that specific case under those specific circumstances, rather than the blanket application of loose liberal democratic principles of privacy and traditional "family values." One criticism levied by much of the literature was that despite the relatively narrowly focused task of the original terms of the report, i.e. to inquire about the circumstances surrounding the death of Jasmine Beckford, that instead the panel transformed it into an indictment of the entire Social Work institution. Moreover, other panels responsible for similar inquiries seem to take the same path to mounting an excoriating polemic against those institutions. Problematically, this repeated crucifixion does little to offer substantive change as there is no systematic or sophisticated analysis of all child abuse deaths, just the few that are highlighted by the media. In the absence of such data, progressive steps towards actual solutions are instead replaced with grandstanding proclamations about the failure of Social Services and vague, abstract, unsubstantiated and qualitative recommendations are put forth. Instead Dingwell (1986) counters that a more broad and comprehensive approach be taken in order to gauge policy from a national standpoint rather than a very deep but very local and usually emotionally charged investigation of one specific case, such as that of Jasmine Beckford. It is acknowledged however, that public inquiries like that of the Jasmine Beckford incident are useful in illustrating the need for significant reform, so that we may in the future limit such avoidable deaths. References Bryant, Malcolm. "A Matter of Trust." Probation Journal 33, no. 1 (1986): 3-7. Dingwall, Robert. "The Jasmine Beckford Affair." The Modern Law Review 49, no. 4 (1986): 489-507. Greenland, Cyril. "Inquiries into Child Abuse and Neglect (C.A.N.) Deaths in the United Kingdom." British Journal of Criminology 26, no. 2 (1986): 164-173. Parton, Nigel. "The Beckford Report: A Critical Approach." The British Journal of Social Work 16, no. 5 (1986): 511-530. Read More