Jaden Moodie death: Officials ‘missed opportunities’ to help save murdered teenager
Written by News on 26/05/2020
Authorities missed opportunities to intervene in the case of a 14-year-old schoolboy who was being groomed by drugs gangs months before he was stabbed to death on a London street, an official report has found.
Jaden Moodie was knocked off a moped and fatally stabbed in Leyton, east London on 8 January 2019.
Last December, Ayoub Majdouline was convicted of the killing. Another four men are still wanted by police in connection with the murder.
A serious case review found that three months before his death, Jaden was found with an older boy in a “county lines” drug dealing flat in Bournemouth, with 39 wraps of crack cocaine, a mobile phone and £325 in cash.
The report, which was carried out by the local council, Waltham Forest, found that although the teenager’s murder could not have been predicted, “there are lessons for local and national agencies working with vulnerable young people”.
A nominated adult who sat in on Jaden’s police interview after the Bournemouth incident described the youngster as “vulnerable and frightened” and someone who gave the impression that he wanted to find a way out of the situation he was in.
The serious case review found that, although Jaden was subsequently released and driven back to London by two Dorset police officers, specialist child exploitation workers were not involved.
The report said the teenager had begun getting into trouble shortly after he started secondary school in Nottingham, before moving to London to live with his grandmother.
The review found that he should have been more closely supervised in the two years before his death and had been out of school for 19 of 22 months.
Waltham Forest Council said it has accepted all the recommendations in the report and action had been taken to address the key local findings.
This includes a new service established in partnership with health and police services, to try to respond within 24 hours when a child is identified as a victim of criminal exploitation.
Walthamstow’s Labour MP Stella Creasy has written to ministers asking to discuss the issues raised in the report.
She described Jaden as a “much loved child with a future ahead of him” and warned that “no vulnerable child can slip through these gaps again”.
(c) Sky News 2020: Jaden Moodie death: Officials ‘missed opportunities’ to help save murdered teenager
