Monica didn’t have a great start in life. She was in care from the age of 2 and she didn’t go to a great school, leaving with no qualifications. Fighting was part of her language – she used violence to settle disputes and disagreements. This worked for Monica amongst her peers, but not when she

Dennis has two minor convictions. The first was in 2004 when he was 17 years old – for criminal damage to a phone box for which he received a fine and community service. The second was in 2012 when he was 25 years old – for common assault after an altercation one evening with another

In 2008, after enduring more than a year of emotional abuse from her partner, the police came knocking on Teresa’s door. She had never had any dealings with the police before and she had no idea why they were there. They informed her that her partner had accused her of assault; she had pushed him

Aged 14 Helen was arrested and received a caution. It was around this time she started binge drinking which began a downwards spiral. Smoking ‘weed’ and drinking heavily at the weekends was pretty much the norm amongst the gang she hung around with and by the time she was 19 a deep depression had overtaken

At the onset of puberty Wesley had a lot of mixed feelings about his sexuality. Although he can remember attending sex education classes, he says there was very little information about being gay and this made him feel ‘lost and alone’. For a while, he explored his sexuality with a friend of his brothers who

In 1995 Marcus was convicted of 6 offences although he appeared in court only once. The six offences were committed between 1992 and 1994 when Marcus was aged between 14 and 16. He was arrested and charged when he was 17 years old but by the time he appeared at the magistrate’s court for sentencing

Whilst she was still at school, Diana was convicted of seven counts of theft from the school changing room and was sentenced to a 12 months conditional discharge and fines ranging from £1 to £14. Up until then, her childhood had been very chaotic having been taken into local authority care following regular abuse and

When she was 19, Hilary was found guilty of possession of a prohibited weapon and prohibited ammunition after her then boyfriend forced her to hide them in her handbag as they travelled in a car together and were pulled over by the police. When the case went to court, she received a 2 year conditional

At the age of 16, Kate took the decision to move out of her family home and began renting a room from somebody she’d met through a friend. After she’d been there for three months and, without any warning, she returned home from college to find that her landlady had thrown the majority of her

Larry only became aware that he had two offences on his record when he reached the age of 60 and needed an enhanced Disclosure and Barring Service check to volunteer with his son’s choir. When he was 16, Larry was convicted of possession of marijuana and received a one year conditional discharge. He wasn’t a