Teen loses court battle to return to UK after parents send him to Africa over gang fears

…The boy’s father said as parents they did not want their son to be “yet another Black teenager stabbed to death in the streets of London.”

A 14-YEAR-old British boy has lost a court case to return to the UK after his parents put him in a boarding school in Africa following fears over gang crime.

The boy – who cannot be named for legal reasons – started the family court case himself in an attempt to return to London – where he has lived since his birth.

The High Court in London heard how his parents were concerned he was being “groomed” into criminal activity and sent him to Ghana to protect him.

The teenager claims his parents took him to the West African country under false pretences and told him they were going to help care for an ill relative.

According to the BBC, in a written statement to the court, the teenager said: “I feel like I am living in hell. I really do not think I deserve this and I want to come home, back to England, as soon as possible.”

High Court judge Mr Justice Hayden described the ruling as “both a sobering and rather depressing conclusion.”

He said that he was satisfied that the parents’ wish for their son to move to Ghana was “driven by their deep, obvious and unconditional love.”

Protection not punishment

The Judge also said the schoolboy was at risk of suffering greater harm if he returned to Britain.

In a statement, the boy’s mother said sending her son to Ghana was “not a punishment but a measure to protect him.”

The boy’s father also shared similar sentiments.

He told the judge as parents they did not want their son to be “yet another Black teenager stabbed to death in the streets of London” as a result of gang crime.

James Netto from the International Family Law Group, who represented the boy, said the court judgement had been a “real shock” to the teenager – who is considering his next steps.

The court also heard the boy’s British school had concerns about gang involvement and had seen him in “expensive clothes and with mobile phones.”

However, the boy has denied being involved with a gang.

Last year, he also claimed he was receiving ‘inadequate’ food and tuition at the school, and is being ‘mistreated’.

The teen also said he has been studying online since last summer and his education was suffering as a result of being moved away.

The boy’s father told the court he had recently visited his son in Ghana and they had got on well. He added he had visited another boarding school which is considering offering a place to his son.

Last year, the teen contacted the British Consulate and a child welfare organisation after his parents enrolled him into a boarding school in Africa, before they left and returned to England without him.

Parental responsibility

According to The Mirror,  barristers for the boy claim his parents “physically and emotionally abandoned” their son over concerns he was involved in gangs in London, something the teenager “denies in the strongest terms”.

At a hearing for the case last year, his lawyers argued the boy finds the whole situation humiliating and his English friends are teasing him and are saying he has been “deported”.

Rebecca Foulkes, representing the boy’s father, also previously said that he should be allowed to stay abroad and that the decision to “relocate” him was “a proper exercise of parental responsibility”.

In court, the boy was described as “very polite and articulate” with a keen interest football and cooking.

The boy’s barrister described the actions of the parents as a “stark and quite brutal act.”

In written submissions, Ms Foulkes continued that the school “recorded concerns about (his) social vulnerability and susceptibility to grooming”, had been accused of stealing phones and had “a number of photographs of knives on (his) phone including photographs of his friends holding knives”.

She said: said: “From the father’s perspective, there was a clear deterioration in (his son’s) behaviours with a move towards criminal behaviours. There is no real acceptance from (him) of the risks to which he was exposing himself.”

She continued that “high-quality care and education in a boundaried setting” was available in Africa, “where the risks to which he exposed himself in the UK are not present”.