Judge halts FGM trial after photos show child to be unharmed

From the Times, the BBC and the Bristol Post

A father accused of allowing his six-year-old daughter to undergo female genital mutilation (FGM) has been acquitted. The 29-year-old taxi driver from Bristol is alleged to have confessed to a passenger that he had allowed her to be cut, saying it was a “tradition”.

A court order is in place to ensure the child’s anonymity, so the dad cannot be named for legal reasons. It is agreed until the report of abuse, no other reports had been made concerning the defendant’s children. When the dad was arrested his mobile phone and iPad had no evidence of FGM material. He has no reprimands or cautions to his name.

However, Judge Julian Lambert described the medical evidence as “wholly inconclusive at its highest”. He instructed jurors at Bristol Crown Court to find the defendant not guilty.

It was the crown’s case an injury to the girl’s genitalia was FGM. The court was told the case relied “largely, if not entirely upon, on an alleged admission made in a taxi journey”.

“There is no evidence put by the prosecution as to when or how any alleged mutilation is said to have taken place,” Judge Lambert told the court. He described the prosecution case against the man, who is originally from Somalia, as “deeply troubling”. He also said the account of the key witness – an anti-FGM campaigner – was “inconsistent”.

“X [the girl] has always denied she had any form of mutilation. The defendant says no such thing took place. The jury cannot convict the defendant of this offence unless they are sure that [the father] knowingly exposed X.”

Sami Ullah, who is a trustee of the anti-FGM campaign group Integrate UK, told the jury the driver had condemned the practice as “ignorant” before saying that he had had it done to his own daughter.

Photographs taken by a paediatrician in Bristol called in to examine the girl showed a 2-3mm lesion on her genitals. By the time she was examined by a specialist in London three weeks later the mark had disappeared.

A spokeswoman for the Crown Prosecution Service described the prosecution as unprecedented. She added: “The CPS considered this case in accordance with the code for crown prosecutors and decided that there was sufficient evidence to prosecute for an offence of child cruelty and it was in the public interest.

“The judge at Bristol crown court had the opportunity to hear the evidence live and challenged. He then made a decision to stop the case yesterday. We respect the judge’s decision and will not be appealing.This was an unusual and unprecedented case for the prosecution…”

DCI Leanne Pook, Avon and Somerset police’s lead for FGM and lead officer for this case, said after the ruling: “Our priority from the outset of this investigation has been to safeguard any vulnerable children and protect them from harm. “We carried out a challenging two-year investigation, supported by professionals from a range of partner agencies, which resulted in evidence being passed to the Crown Prosecution Service and a charge being authorised for a child cruelty offence.

A previous attempt at prosecuting an instance of FGM failed because the defendant, a doctor, showed that he was repairing his patient who, having endured FGM as a child, had to be cut open as an emergency in order to give birth. He was not performing the abuse, he was dealing with its unwanted consequences

That the authorities have chosen two such cases, both unlikely to achieve a conviction to prosecute goes to show their reluctance to deal with this wicked abuse of girls. This was a sop thrown to campaigners. For the two years that the prosecution was pending the police and CPS could point to a case or cases ‘in the pipeline’. Now it has failed, through being an unlikely example they can say ‘very difficult to prosecute’ blah blah, ‘not in the child’s interest’ blah blah, Judge very concerned –  censured us, etc.