What will Mr. Justice Hayden say if this young man whose life was saved at so much taxpayer expense decides to wage jihad right at home in Britain?
“Judge questions why taxpayers’ money has been spent stopping British boy travelling to Syria for jihad,” by Danny Boyle, Telegraph, October 5, 2016:
A High Court judge has questioned if an “extraordinary level” of state intervention was justified in stopping a 17-year-old boy from travelling to Syria amid fears he would wage jihad.
Mr Justice Hayden said he had wondered whether or not the “huge resources” deployed in the case were “proportionate”.
He said people often asked why time and taxpayers’ money was spent preventing teenagers from joining terror groups in the Middle East, adding that he considered the argument: “Why not just let them go?”
But the judge concluded that in the case of the boy, who had an uncle held in Guantanamo Bay, a young man’s life had been saved by the local authority’s intervention.
Mr Justice Hayden last year barred the teenager from travelling abroad following a hearing in the Family Division of the High Court after police and social workers raised concerns about him heading to Syria.
He made the teenager a ward of court – a move which bars him from leaving the jurisdiction of England and Wales.
And the judge said he has analysed the benefits of state intervention after reviewing the case at a follow-up hearing in London.
Mr Justice Hayden had been told that the boy’s two elder brothers had been killed waging jihad in Syria….
“There has been an extraordinary level of intervention,” said Mr Justice Hayden. “It has kept him alive.”
He added: “The thing that one hears most is ‘why is so much time, money and effort spent in these cases? Why not just let them go?
“There is no doubt huge resources have been deployed in this case. And I myself have wondered whether that was proportionate. But at the end of the day… they have saved a human life.”…