{"id":484150,"date":"2026-06-18T19:33:09","date_gmt":"2026-06-18T19:33:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/484150\/"},"modified":"2026-06-18T19:33:09","modified_gmt":"2026-06-18T19:33:09","slug":"family-of-autistic-11yo-girl-misidentified-by-police-injected-with-psychotropic-drugs-respond-as-damning-reviews-released","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/484150\/","title":{"rendered":"Family of autistic 11yo girl misidentified by police, injected with psychotropic drugs, respond as damning reviews released"},"content":{"rendered":"

In 2024, the woman was placed under a six-month compulsory treatment order and discharged to a supported accommodation service. She later went on leave and didn\u2019t return to the service or engage further with mental health services. <\/p>\n

The report, released this morning, detailed the incident, which began early on March 9 when Hamilton police received a 111 call about a person seen walking in the middle of the road just before the Fairfield Bridge, which spans the Waikato River, and then climbing on the rails of the bridge.<\/p>\n

The description included that the person was a woman in her early 20s.<\/p>\n

The girl was the subject of the 111 call but could not be identified by police, who later handcuffed her as she became \u201cincreasingly distressed\u201d. The inquiry deemed that action was warranted, given police concerns about her fleeing or self-harming.<\/p>\n

Officers who responded to the callout floated the idea that the girl could be \u201cPerson B\u201d, but that suggestion was seemingly dismissed.<\/p>\n

\u201c[Officers] noted similarities, but none of them thought they were the same person,\u201d the report said.<\/p>\n

Police contacted the woman\u2019s accommodation service and emailed a photo of the girl. The report stated the officer had said the service staffer told them they were \u201cconfident\u201d the girl in the photo was in fact \u201cPerson B\u201d.<\/p>\n

However, the staffer told the inquiry they \u201crepeatedly told [the officer] they couldn\u2019t be certain they were the same person\u201d.<\/p>\n

This then led to the officer informing hospital staff treating the girl that there had been a \u201cpotential identification\u201d and provided the woman\u2019s details, which then prompted the girl to be detained at Waikato Hospital because of the woman\u2019s medical history.<\/p>\n

The inquiry described the police actions as a \u201csignificant contributing factor\u201d in misidentifying the girl because the officer didn\u2019t convey the doubts of fellow officers about her identity. <\/p>\n

\u201cPolice Officer 1 thereby gave an unbalanced impression of the reliability of this nomination and, further, did not provide any details that would have allowed hospital staff to conduct any independent checks.\u201d<\/p>\n

The girl was then given \u201cintramuscular medication under restraint\u201d without her consent, which was deemed in line with Person B\u2019s medical history.<\/p>\n

However, the inquiry found the injections were administered \u201cwithout lawful authority\u201d, because they\u2019d been given more than a month after the compulsory treatment order was made and without a second opinion as required under the Mental Health Act.<\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t until after the injections that the girl was correctly identified and reunited with her mother.<\/p>\n

The girl\u2019s mother told the inquiry her daughter hadn\u2019t said anything about the incident, but there had been \u201cclear behavioural changes\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cPerson A\u2019s mother also said that she personally found it difficult to process details of the incident as it unfolded, but that over time, both she and her other children experienced a wide range of emotions about the incident.\u201d<\/p>\n

The mother told the inquiry: \u201cThis has had an enduring and detrimental effect on me and on all my kids.<\/p>\n

\u201cMost of all, it has made [Person A] feel unsafe in her daily life when we have worked so hard to help her to be okay in a world not designed for her.\u201d<\/p>\n

The inquiry, released alongside reviews from the Health and Disability Commissioner and Health NZ, made several recommendations, including:<\/p>\n

Updating national patient identification policies to account for \u201cprocess gaps\u201d identifiedReview guidelines for sharing information between police and hospital staff at a national levelReview the underlying legal reasoning for existing practice regarding detention in hospitalUpdate policy documents and guidelines to clarify expectations for medical assessments on admission and for charting and administering medicationIntroduce in-service training modules to increase awareness of autism and possibly other neurodiverse conditions<\/p>\n

Ministry of Health mental health director Dr John Crawshaw, who apologised to the girl and her family, said Health NZ had developed an action plan to address the recommendations and had \u201ccommitted to monitoring and reporting on progress\u201d.<\/p>\n

Adam Pearse is the deputy political editor and part of the NZ Herald\u2019s press gallery team based at Parliament in Wellington. He has worked for NZME since 2018, reporting for the Northern Advocate in Whang\u0101rei and the Herald in Auckland.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In 2024, the woman was placed under a six-month compulsory treatment order and discharged to a supported accommodation…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":484151,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[52495,72211,806,5993,112398,3595,77631,243064,797,3401,1757,13492,21040,2109,6868,6288,671,243062,1535,117866,111,43,139,69,1118,675,243063,13181,4491,763,17251,102],"class_list":["post-484150","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-11yearold","tag-11yo","tag-as","tag-autism","tag-autistic","tag-by","tag-damning","tag-detrimental","tag-diagnosed","tag-drug","tag-drugs","tag-effect","tag-enduring","tag-family","tag-girl","tag-hamilton","tag-incident","tag-injected","tag-march","tag-misidentified","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-of","tag-police","tag-psychotropic","tag-released","tag-respond","tag-reviews","tag-twice","tag-with"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/484150","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=484150"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/484150\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/484151"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=484150"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=484150"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=484150"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}