Originally Posted by
Loose rivets
TNo keyboard to do anything, let alone select the software button.
Sounds like he can't do that.
You can get pretty cheap (obviously not OEM parts) replacement screens, including the home button - if it is otherwise dead it might be worth having a go, and it is an interesting process. It should be fairly easy with an intact screen - I did it with a broken one and the only difficulty was retrieving all of the shards of glass.
If you need any data, that may still be recoverable via iTunes. Had an iPhone kindly put through a hot wash for me which appeared to be dead but which I managed to back up to my computer.