Mental health services ‘let down young’
ONE OF the alleged kidnappers of British model Chloe Ayling is fighting extradition to Italy as his lawyer claims the entire case could be a “sham” invented as a “publicity stunt”.
The 20-year-old is said to have been snatched by a group calling itself Black Death after being lured to a fake modelling shoot in Milan in July.
Lukasz Herba, 30, is in custody in Italy, having been arrested after delivering Ms Ayling to the British Embassy on July 17 - six days after she was allegedly kidnapped. He has said he did not knowingly take part in any crime.
His 36-year-old brother, Michal Herba, was arrested by the National Crime Agency (NCA) on a European Arrest Warrant issued by the Italian authorities last month.
He appeared in custody at London’s Westminster Magistrates’ Court yesterday to fight extradition, having been in custody since he was apprehended in the Tividale area of Sandwell in the West Midlands.
Prosecutor Florence Iveson said Herba has been requested by the court of Milan in relation to a single offence of kidnapping arising from events between July 11 and 17. “The allegation is that Mr Herba acted in complicity with his brother, Lukasz Herba, and other unidentified persons to kidnap the victim in Milan,” she said.
“It is said she was drugged and kidnapped and a 300,000 euro ransom was demanded.”
But Herba’s lawyer, George Hepburne Scott, raised questions over the account given by Ms Ayling, of Coulsdon, south London, who claims she was drugged and bundled into the boot of a car after being tricked into attending the bogus photoshoot in Milan on July 11.
“There is a real risk that the entire case is a sham,” he said.
Referring to “open source material”, Mr Scott said: “The same complainant, it seems, generated publicity from the fact she was nearby the scene of a terrorist attack at the Champs-Elysees in Paris.”
District Judge Paul Goldspring pointed out much of the material relied on by Mr Scott came from press reports, which he said did not prove any of the theories in the case. He will give his ruling on Friday. AROUND 1.2M children who have suffered abuse are being let down by mental health services, according to a new report.
The study from the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (NSPCC) says that 83 per cent of local plans in England are inadequate, with one in five failing to give any detail whatsoever on how they will care for children who have been abused or neglected.
The charity estimates at least 1.2 million youngsters, who have suffered some form of abuse, live in areas with inadequate mental health plans, following its analysis of plans from NHS Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs).
This is despite research suggesting that children who have suffered abuse are twice as likely to develop clinical depression.
NSPCC Trustee and clinical psychologist, Professor Tanya Byron, said: “Failing to plan is planning to fail, and alarmingly most CCGs are setting themselves up to fail children who have already been through abuse and trauma.
“It is unacceptable that despite the huge number of children estimated to have been abused, and the known link between abuse and mental health problems, the vast majority of our health services do not have a proper strategy for how to take care of these children.”