As mentioned at the outset, this study has not been focused on deterministic pathways or proving causal outcomes after the experience of childhood domestic abuse (DA). It is imperative to always keep in mind that most child survivors do not end up following the life paths of the participants explored in this book. However, what we need to grapple with is the relatively high prevalence of childhood domestic violence and abuse (DVA) among young men who do find themselves on-road and gang-involved. When focusing on the life journeys of the participants, despite the individual differences, there appeared to be a common pathway in terms of masculinities, which is visualized in Figure 10.1. What was interesting in this study is that, although based on a small sample, there was a pattern emerging that matched those which professionals working in outreach had mentioned to me. In order to test this, I conducted a deep-dive of Serious Case Reviews (SCRs) that had similar case characteristics to the life stories shared. This is synthesized in Table 10.1.

Learning from cases involving child deaths

SCRs are carried out where abuse or neglect of a child is known, and the child has been seriously harmed or has died. They obviously represent the tip of the iceberg, being mostly those children who experienced a tragic early death, they can tell us a lot about risk management and support of the most vulnerable in society. Out of an available 1,641 records on the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (NSPCC) National Case Review Repository, I searched for those that mentioned ‘family violence’, ‘youth offending’, ‘gangs’, and ‘county lines’. I initially identified 22 relevant cases, of which 13 showed both childhood DVA and youth offending, with a further three who were possible cases of DVA (mentions of multiple adverse childhood experiences and child protection plans but no details). Identifying relevant cases was made more difficult due to the disparate language and labels that were used both to refer to DVA and gangs: these terms were used in discretionary ways. DVA was coded in the NSPCC database as ‘Family violence’, which is an ambiguous term.