Just out of interest is there a possibility that at least some cot deaths may have been included within fatal accidents in the home?
My first response would be "unlikely - as cot deaths are not usually subsequent to accidents.
But I checked http://www.babycentre.co.uk/a419/sudden-infant-death-syndrome-sids which says: "In less than half of all cases of SIDS, a health condition, illness or accident is found to be the cause" and http://www.babycentre.co.uk/a418/safety-in-your-babys-bedroom gives more information and some examples as to how accidents can cause cot death (as I understand the page) eg "If your cot is second-hand and painted, strip and re-paint it with lead-free paint. If your child breathes in lead dust, lead fumes or swallows anything with lead in it, he can get lead poisoning, which can cause learning disabilities and other neurological problems." and - (my addition) maybe cot death. Personally I would have though that a health condition or illness were far more likely to lead to a cot death for the reason I have already given
I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure that cot deaths are recorded as death by naturel causes by a coroner so wouldn't fall into an accidental death.
more figures:
I found this sight today
http://www.pact-online.org/index.php/taken/taken-study You can download a booklet giving information on child abductions in the UK.
They cover all types off abductions, but I'll post snippets of the data relevant to our discussion here.
Abductions by a stranger The police data included 247 cases (273 victims) where a child was abducted by a stranger. Three-quarters were attempted abductions.
(
273 divided by four = 68.25 successful stranger abductions)
Four attempted abductions by strangers occurred when an offender tried to deceive hospital staff, school staff or the parent themselves into releasing the child into their care. In 22 cases the offender attempted to take a young child in the presence of their parent(s) whilst in a shopping centre, supermarket, play area, other public places,
or – in one case – from their home.
(This was an attempted abduction)
Abductions by a stranger accounted for the single largest category of all abductions (42 per cent of all cases). However, in 186 cases, the offender failed to actually abduct the victim(s) and the case was an attempted abduction18. Therefore, three- quarters of stranger abductions were actually attempted abductions.
(Attempted) abduction with parent present
Two children were removed from their home address. In one case a neighbour entered the victim’s home, assaulted the mother, and then left with the victim, before the mother regained the child. In the other case, a person whose relationship to the
victim was not known removed the child from their home address while their mother was upstairs but was stopped nearby.
Completed abductions by strangers (sexual motive) 15 children, in 12 cases, were successfully abducted by an offender with a clear sexual motive.
The victims ranged in age from 7 to 17 years, with 11 victims being between 13 and 17 years old. Three victims were boys; the rest were girls. 12 victims were white, one was black, one was of other ethnic origin and the ethnicity of one was not known.
Five of the victims suffered a sexual assault as a result of the offence (see Table A6 in the Appendix)33. Two boys suffered a sex attack after being lured back to an offender’s house where they stayed the night. Three girls were raped, each in separate offences. Two had first met the perpetrator online (see text box for more details). The third was forced into a car whilst walking and was released after the offence.
Three other victims suffered minor physical injuries. In two of these cases the victim’s clothing was removed. The remaining seven victims suffered no apparent physical injuries (though it is very likely that emotional or psychological trauma did result from the offences).
All offences lasted for less than 24 hours, with the exception of one case which continued for between one and two days (in two cases this information was not available). Two cases involved the victim being abducted by more than one offender, though both resulted in no physical injury.
In four cases the victim(s) was abducted from a street, in three cases the victim was in a park, common or open space, two victims were in a bus station at the time of the offence, and two were near to their home address.
As a result of these incidents police recorded eight offences of child abduction, six offences of kidnapping and one offence of abduction (Scotland) (see Table A1, Appendix).
Abduction by stranger (unconfirmed sexual motive) Though unconfirmed, the motive in several other abductions completed by strangers appeared to be sexual.
In one case a registered sex offender befriended two young children and took them back to his house, where he gave them food and let them play on a games console. They left a short time later with no apparent sexual offence having been committed.
In another case, a girl was picked up by a man she met on a social networking site and was taken back to his home. The victim called the police and she was released without any apparent physical injury. In a separate offence, a girl was dragged into bushes but was released after screaming and alerting a passer-by.
So according to this information there were no successful child abductions from the home in the given period (12 months I believe, from 2011/2012, )
It's also worth noting that the mean age of a victim was 13 years.
The booklet is 82 pages long, I have picked very small points out of a lot of data. I highly recommend reading all the relevant passages and looking at the graphs in context.
Cariad.
