What happened
A boy was placed at the Mulberry Bush school in Standlake, Oxfordshire, at the age of nine in June 2008 and withdrawn in September 2009. It is a residential special school, run as a therapeutic community, for children with emotional and behavioural difficulties.
He had been restrained 117 times in 15 months. The claim concerned three face-down restraints by a member of staff, and a towel across his bedroom doorway. The false imprisonment happened 14 times, including nearly five hours on 15 May 2009. Staff kept using the towel after a social worker warned against it.
His father wanted him moved but could not find a local placement. He described the boy as “extremely scared and very distressed”, particularly when restrained face down on a bed and struggling to breathe.
The outcome
After a nine-day trial spread over a year, Ms Justice Obi gave judgment on liability on 10 June 2024 and on damages on 8 November 2024.
She found that each of the three face-down restraints was a battery, and that the towel method was unlawful imprisonment. Damages were awarded in a second judgment on 8 November 2024, itemised across the batteries, the longest false imprisonment and aggravated damages.
The press reported the total as £18,900. The record notes that the Court of Appeal later reduced it to £6,000, a figure not in the sources read for this entry. The school said it was considering an appeal.
What went wrong
The aggravated damages are the finding to read. They were awarded because of the school’s “failure to appreciate the significance and seriousness of a member of staff using a face-down restraint”, when senior staff knew it had happened.
A face-down restraint on a child was not treated by the school as inherently serious. And the towel was used again after a social worker had warned against it.
The judge declined to find negligence, because the restraints were in the main “a last resort in the context of a well-managed school environment” and the school had been rated outstanding by Ofsted. Good overall practice did not prevent three batteries and fourteen unlawful imprisonments.
What it teaches
A school can be well run, well rated, and still get this wrong. That is the uncomfortable part, and the reason it belongs here.
Counting restraints tells you the volume. Each decision tells you whether the restraint was lawful, and three unlawful holds among 117 suggests nobody was reading them individually.
Face-down restraint on a child is a serious act every time it happens, and staff at every level need to know that, not just the person applying it. “Last resort” describes when a hold may be used, not whether it was safe.
Questions for the room
- 117 restraints in 15 months, three of them unlawful. What does that ratio tell you about how the decisions were reviewed?
- A social worker warns that the towel is wrong and it is used again. What should happen the day after that warning?
- The judge found the school well managed and still awarded aggravated damages. What must “good practice” include?
Evidence and limits
Confidence: confirmed, with two limits.
Both BAILII pages returned an anti-scraping block, so the judgment text could not be read. The findings here come from the vault record’s summary and from The Guardian’s report of 20 December 2024, not from the judgment itself.
The £18,900 total is the press figure. The record notes a Court of Appeal reduction to £6,000, which was not in the sources read, so the page gives the award item by item and flags the total rather than asserting it.
A court order prevents naming the pupil or his father; he is FXS here.
Our school training at positivehandling.co.uk covers restraint in education settings, and how to reduce how often it is used.
Sources
- BAILII, [2024] EWHC 1406 (KB), 10 June 2024 · https://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/KB/2024/1406.html
Reviewed 20 October 2026.