More than 2,800 children, some as young as eight, were strip-searched by police in England and Wales between 2018 and 2022, according to a “deeply worrying” report.
Children were allegedly searched in the back of police vans, in schools and outside fast food outlets, the report from children’s officer Dame Rachel de Souza revealed, according to the BBC.
A total of 2,847 children were searched in this way between 2018 and mid-2022, 52% of which took place without a suitable adult being present at the crime scene. Almost a quarter of the children wanted were between 10 and 15 years old, the youngest just 8 years old.
Black children are also searched six times more often, according to the survey.
The report shows that the practice is widespread across England and Wales and reveals evidence of “deeply worrying practices,” the commissioner said, according to English media.
“Our children are being abandoned by the state institutions put in place to protect them,” pounded the Runnymede Trust, a racial equality charity.
The investigation follows a scandal that erupted in March last year when a menstruating 15-year-old girl was allegedly searched at school by two female Metropolitan Police officers.