Mother left 'devastated' after teaching assistant is spared jail for beating autistic schoolboy, 11, who has the mental age of two in horror attack

A mother has been left 'devestated' after a teaching assistant was caught on CCTV violently beating her 11-year-old autistic son at school. 

The 19-minute video shows William Kevin Clifford, 61, pushing Tobie Orlowski to the ground before punching and kicking him in a prolonged attack.

Tobie, who has a mental age of two, is autistic and mute. 

Clifford, who was a classroom assistant at Tettenhall Wood School in Wolverhampton at the time, was handed a suspended jail sentence earlier this month.

But the disturbing footage has only just been released.

Clifford appears to punch and kick Tobie several times while he sits on the ground as other children play nearby.

Tobie tries to crawl away but the teaching assistant follows him, and knees him in the back as he is crouched behind a small gate in the playground.

Clifford was handed a nine month jail term, suspended for 18 months, along with 150 hours of unpaid work at Wolverhampton Crown Court on July 10.

Now, Tobie's mother Charlotte has called for all special schools to have CCTV following the shocking attack on her son in April last year.

She told the BBC: 'To see that man attack him in a place he thought was safe - it was just horrendous.

'I was devastated, I was horrified. For the life of me I cannot understand what would make a person want to do that.

'If that security camera had not picked it up, then we would never have known what had happened Tobie.

'If this could happen in Tobie's school, with a formidable team of staff, it can happen anywhere.

'We are not calling for CCTV in all schools, only settings where there are vulnerable children.

'So many of our children can't speak, they can't tell us what happened. They're not credible witnesses.

'If something has happened, there's nothing, there's no cameras, there's no footage, no evidence. We cannot get justice without CCTV.'

Charlotte said Tobie's whole world had changed and he now struggles to trust anyone but that he was still 'very resilient' despite what happened.

She added: 'I'm so proud of him, he's back in the same school, with his trusted adults - who I know and trust too.

'He's doing so well, despite what that man did to him.'

Samantha Pearson, Charlotte's cousin, criticised the sentence handed down to Clifford after the hearing.

She said: 'He didn't receive anything that could be even slightly classed as appropriate punishment.

'Charlotte collected Tobie from school as usual. She did notice his anxiety seemed heightened.

'But as he is totally non-verbal, Tobie couldn't, and will never be able to, tell his mommy what was wrong.

'By the time Charlotte got home with Tobie, she was called by the school head to be informed that Tobie had in fact been cruelly attacked that day by a teaching assistant.

'That day marked a total collapse in any trust and settled nature that Tobie had.

'Tobie had no say in the suffering he faced, and still does.

'The school have worked tirelessly with Tobie and continue to support Charlotte and Tobie to make him feel it's one of his safe places again.'

The judge deemed Clifford had already suffered for his actions, and spared him a lengthy jail term.

Passing sentencing, the judge told the court: 'William Kevin Clifford has several mitigating factors and a huge amount of suffering whilst waiting for this case to be concluded, including anxiety, weight gain and the inability to secure any employment.'

Ross Ashcroft, headteacher of Tettenhall Wood School, said in a statement: 'Following the recent prosecution and subsequent sentence of William Kevin Clifford we only wish to state that the person in question has not been in school since the day that the incident occurred and his employment was subsequently terminated.

'The school have followed all processes correctly in dealing with this matter with children's safety and wellbeing always at the heart of everything we do.'