More State Sponsored Child Abuse From The Perverts And Paedophiles In Power.

Children in custody were involved in 43,000 strip searches in just two years

• Illicit items were found in only 275 cases out of 43,960 strip searches
• Almost half searched were from black and minority ethnic backgrounds
• One 16-year-old girl had been ordered to hand her sanitary towel to staff

Children in custody have been stripped naked and searched more than 43,000 times in under two years.

The Youth Justice Board promised to end the routine strip-searching of children in 2011. saying the practice was undignified and led to ‘feelings of anger, humiliation and anxiety’.

But an investigation has found children were forced to strip naked on 43,960 occasions in the 21 months leading up to December 2012. Illicit items were found in just 275 cases. 

The youngest child to be strip-searched was 12 and physical force was used on 50 occasions.

Tobacco was the most common form of contraband found in the searches with no recorded discoveries of knives or drugs.

The data come from a Freedom of Investigation request by Carolyne Willow, the former national co-ordinator of the Children’s Rights Alliance for England, who described the practice as ‘institutionalised child abuse’.

She said: ‘This matter is of such magnitude that ministers must amend the rules to prescribe the extremely limited circumstances in which it would ever be permissible to make children in institutions remove their clothes and underwear.’

She added: ‘This matter is of such magnitude that ministers must amend the rules governing secure establishments to prescribe the extremely limited circumstances in which it would ever be permissible to make children in institutions remove their clothes and underwear.’ 

The statistics reveal contraband was discovered in only eight in every 1,000 searches in young offender institutions, secure children’s homes and training centres in the course of one year, and just three in every 1,000 in the next year.

Almost half - 48 per cent - of children strip-searched were from black and minority ethnic communities.

In 2006, Lord Carlile QC conducted an inquiry into the use of restraint, strip-searching and segregation in child custody.

Then, as now, fewer than one in ten searches yielded a ‘find’ and tobacco was the most common item discovered.

One 16-year-old girl told the inquiry she had been strip-searched and ordered to hand her sanitary towel to staff.

Another girl recalled: ‘When I had my first full search it was horrible as I have been sexually abused and I didn’t feel comfortable showing my body as this brought back bad memories.’ 

John Drew, chief executive of the YJB said full strip-searches should only be used following an assessment of risk and this should be the starting point for practice in all secure establishments.


He added: ‘Where providers of STCs and YOIs consider it necessary to carry out routine full searches on first admission, this approach should be justified and will be kept under review by the YJB.’

A spokeswoman for the Ministry of Justice said a revised searching policy for young people was introduced last March that ensures their safety and security while not subjecting them to a full search unnecessarily.

She said: ‘Full searches will only take place when it is necessary and there is a clear justification or identified risk.

‘We have a duty to keep any item that could endanger the safety of young people out of secure establishments. We use a number of measures to disrupt their supply and searches are an important part of this.’ 

At the end of August 2012, there were 1,643 children in custody in England and Wales. There were 1,225 in 25 Young Offender Institutions, 269 in Secure Training Centres and and 149 in Secure Children’s Homes.

Of those, 64 were aged under 14 and two just 12. The cost of keeping children in the secure estate was £268.9million.

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