Schoolgirl took overdose after making sexual assault allegation, inquest hears
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A 12-year-old girl who overdosed on tablets after making an allegation of sexual assault “felt like she wasn’t believed”, her mother has told an inquest. Semina Halliwell died on June 12 2021, three days after she took her mother’s prescription medicine at their home in Southport, Merseyside.
At an inquest at Bootle Town Hall on Monday, her mother Rachel Halliwell said Semina had been a “happy little girl” but began to self harm after starting at Stanley High School. In March 2021 she told her mother she had been sexually assaulted in January that year.
Ms Halliwell was in tears as she told the coroner’s court: “It destroyed her mentally, physically. She changed into a different person.”. She said after reporting the incident to the police Semina initially withdrew the complaint. “She felt like she wasn’t believed,” Ms Halliwell said.
She added: “I think to say to a 12-year-old child ‘it is going to take 18 months to two years to go to court, do you really want it hanging over your head’ and ‘it’s your word against his’ is not what any woman or child who has been through sexual assault or rape needs to hear and she was 12 with autism.”.
She said there was not enough support from the police, social services or the school after the report was made. Asked by Harriet Johnson, representing the family, what difference there might have been if better support had been provided, Ms Halliwell said: “She’d still be here today.”.
