Boy taken into care over sex offender dad concerns

A young boy will be taken into care after a judge found his mother was incapable of protecting him from his sex offender father.

Slough Children First took the case to court over concerns about the contact the father, who was found to have sexually abused his daughter in 2021, was having with the boy.

The boy's two siblings, including the girl, were taken into care after she alleged that her father had regularly abused her.

The father was jailed for two years in 2013 for sexually assaulting a woman. A judge at Slough Family Court found the boy's mother was unwilling or unable to protect the boy.

Assessments found the mother's IQ was within the "extremely low range" and ranked on the 0.5th percentile.

Written agreements banned the father from visiting the mother's home but he was found to have gone there multiple times over a seven-month period.

The boy has significant speech and language delays and was undergoing an assessment for autism.

Judge Richard Case found on Thursday that moving the boy from his mother's care would cause harm "but that harm is less than the risk of harm in the mother's care".

The father had told social workers that "children can be at fault for sexual abuse" and had continued to deny the accuracy of findings and convictions against him.

The judge found that the mother had be unwilling or unable to engage in sexual abuse awareness work or deny the father's risk.

The judge said: "Should [the boy] come to read this judgement in due course I would want him to be aware that his mother loves him very much and has fought for him to remain in her care.

"But sadly her limitations, largely not of her own making, mean remaining in her care is just not possible for welfare reasons."

You can follow BBC Berkshire on Facebook, X (Twitter), or Instagram.