'Slight damage' to Quran at school branded 'hate incident' by police
Four students were suspended at Kettlethorpe High School following the 'hate incident'
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Police recorded a “hate incident” at a school where four students allegedly caused “slight damage” to a copy of the Quran.
West Yorkshire police were involved in the case at Kettlethorpe High School, Wakefield after an autistic pupil from a non-Muslim family was challenged as a "dare" by a classmate to buy a Quran and bring it into school.
The book was damaged after reportedly being dropped in a busy corridor.
Four pupils were suspended for a week after the police intervened due to false rumours spread that it had been set alight.
Wakefield council said the Quran had suffered 'slight damage' (Image not of damaged Quran)
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The Humanists UK charity said the decision to suspend the boys was “horrendous” and the school had allowed itself to be “pressured into excessive disciplinary action by a religious group”.
A source close to the Home Secretary Suella Braverman said: “These are very concerning reports. The home secretary is clear that the police response should always be proportionate and consider the welfare of young children as a priority over any perceived insults.”
The case was recorded as a “non-crime hate incident” which means the incident did not meet the criminal threshold.
According to Akef Akbar, a councillor working at the school, a boy had taken the Quran into school last week and given it to another pupil to read out passages on the tennis court.
He said the book was then taken inside where is fell onto the floor before being put in a pupil’s bag.
Inspector Andy Thornton spoke to concerned parents at the local mosque who told them that the damage was being treated as a “hate incident”.
Tudor Griffiths, the headmaster, said there had been “no malicious intent” but the pupils’ actions were “unacceptable”.
Wakefield council said the Quran had suffered “slight damage”.
However, in a tweet which was later deleted, Usman Ali, another councillor, claimed the book had been “desecrated” and it “needs to be dealt with urgently by all the authorities, namely the police, the school and the local authority”.
In a recording of the meeting, the headmaster said: “If more consequences have to be followed, that will be the case.”
The mother of the boy who brought in the Quran said he was autistic and had received death threats.
She apologised at the meeting on his behalf and said: “He hasn’t eaten since Wednesday afternoon when this occurred because with his autism.
The mother of the boy who brought in the Quran has apologised on behalf of him
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“It’s put his anxiety to a level where he is beside himself. He is very, very sorry.”
The local imam said that anyone who resorted to threats “is not truly following the teaching of Islam”.
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