Let parents read kids’ private Facebook posts
Coroner’s plea to tech firms over schoolboy who killed his teacher after sick online threats
PARENTS should have the legal right to supervise their teenagers’ social media after a pupil boasted online about murdering his teacher before killing her, a coroner said yesterday.
Social media firms should be required to set up a ‘supervision contract’ with parents of children aged 13 to 18 to prevent further atrocities, Kevin McLoughlin said.
The Wakefield coroner’s recommendation follows an inquest jury’s ruling that ‘missed opportunities to share and record problem behaviour’ were a contributory factor in the unlawful killing of teacher Ann Maguire, 61, by Will Cornick, then 15.
The jury also found the school did not follow its own safeguarding policy by failing to record Cornick’s use of alcohol, which was reported to a teacher.
Cornick told ten other pupils of his intention to attack Mrs Maguire on the morning of her murder.
He showed four of them a 13in knife before killing her in a Spanish lesson at Corpus Christi Catholic College in Leeds in April 2014.
The inquest heard some kept silent because they were scared and others didn’t think he was serious.
He also threatened to stab head of year Andrew Kellett in the throat, and knife teacher Sinead Miley ‘in the stomach because she was pregnant and wanted to kill the baby instead of her’.
In the event, Cornick, now 19, never attacked Mr Kellett or Miss Miley.
But none of the pupils has ever been asked why they didn’t report concerns to staff, it has emerged.
Police were told not to ask the question when taking statements from pupils in case it made them feel responsible.
Neither the school or an independent expert carrying out a ‘learning lessons’ review for the local authority has spoken to the children about what happened.
The coroner also refused to allow the children, now all aged over 18, to be questioned at the inquest. After the hearing at Wakefield Coroner’s Court, widower Don Maguire said the jury had gone where the police, city council and social services had ‘failed to’ and had ‘started the process of lesson learning’.
He said there had been speculation from teachers, police and Ofsted inspectors about Cornick not being reported when he showed his knife to other pupils but ‘none of those adults
have been able to explain why it was not reported’.
In an account of ‘contributory factors’, the jury of six women and five men recorded that:
No student reported that Cornick had a knife, or his intention to use the knife, to an adult;
Cornick ‘expressed his intent to kill by stabbing to other students days before and on the day of the incident’ and had ‘expressed a grudge’ against Mrs Maguire;
The school had no written rule or policy on knife possession or reporting the possession of a knife;
‘Overall communication leading up to the incident was inadequate’.
The coroner also called for further measures as a result of the murder – the first in a British classroom of a teacher by a pupil.
He will urge the Department for Education to recommend a nationwide campaign to promote the reporting of knives in schools by pupils, using a slogan such as ‘See a knife, tell a teacher’.
Mr McLoughlin said he would also contact Ofsted about making concerns of weapons being brought into schools a mandatory part of all inspections.
As well as the 13in kitchen knife used to stab Mrs Maguire to death, the inquest heard that Cornick also had smaller knife that may have been bought through Amazon.
The coroner said he made no criticism of Amazon but he would ask it to enforce a ban on children buying knives online.
The inquest heard how Cornick posted sinister messages on Facebook about his desire to kill the teacher up to four months before the murder.
He offered a friend ‘a tenner’ to kill her and in another post he wrote: ‘I want power.
‘I want the capability or choice in a sense to be able to get told off by Maguire and for me to turn around with skill, pride and power and axe her f ****** cockles with a long and shiny blade.’
Other similar threatening messages followed and Mr McLoughlin said he would be asking Matt Hancock, the minister responsible for digital media, to raise concerns about the need for parental supervision of child social media accounts.
He said: ‘Parental responsibility on social media transcends any teenager’s entitlement to privacy.’
Mr McLoughlin said a contract between parents and social media companies such as Facebook, Instagram and SnapChat was required ‘to keep children safe and not go astray’.
Speaking out about the dangers of knives, he said the message must go out that ‘carrying a knife could cost you your freedom – and maybe your life’.
In November 2014, Cornick was jailed for at least 20 years at Leeds Crown Court after admitting Mrs Maguire’s murder.