Advice please re. arrest and child access

[thesnailandthewhale]

I've changed my name on here just in case anyone from rl is hovering. I'm looking for some general advice please if anyone can help ...

Ex-dp and I don't get on, we are barely civil to each other and communicate only when we have to and only about ds.

2 months ago he was arrested for fraud. I was also then arrested as he has paid my child maintenance from this money. It looks as if he has implicated me as I had to send some of it back to him as he sent me too much and so it looks as though I've money laundered I'm currently on bail although solicitor is confident I will be cleared as clearly its nothing to do with me

Since this happened he hasn't paid any maintenance (have gone back through the csa on advice of solicitor when arrested). Csa are chasing him up on this.

Lots of friends / family keep telling me I should stop access to ds, I'm not sure that would be a good thing, but don't know where I stand with it all. A family friend who is a religious minister seems to think I can get a restraining order and can't believe I haven't already done so. Is this right? Should I be doing so?

Any advice would be very welcome!

[prh47bridge]

The first point to make is that access and maintenance are not connected. The fact that he isn't paying maintenance at the moment is not an acceptable reason to stop access as far as the courts are concerned. A lot of people seem to think its ok to stop access when the absent parent isn't paying maintenance. It isn't.

He hasn't been convicted of anything yet and I don't see that a fraud charge suggests he would be a danger to your child. I doubt that a court would see this as an acceptable reason to stop access.

A restraining order is only appropriate if he is harrassing you or acting in a way that makes you frightened that he will be violent. You have given no indication that this is the case.

If there is a court order in place regarding access you should apply for it to be changed rather than simply stopping access. If there is no court order you are free to stop access but he may then apply to the courts to have access reinstated.

You don't sound like you really want to stop access anyway. I think you should carry on with access for the time being.

[Gigantaur]

If there is a court order giving him access then the only way you would be able to prevent access is to return to court and ask the court to amend the order.

If the only thing he has done is commit fraud ( a white collar crime) then i can see no reason why the court would agree to this.

[thesnailandthewhale]

Thankyou, there is no court order in place, we agreed to every other weekend when he first left and that has worked fine. Tbh, I'm not looking to stop access its just everyone around me keeps telling me I ought to because of everything going on with the police etc.

I have always stuck to the arrangements we made (as has he) and see no reason to stop now, i just wanted some other perspectives on it as people in rl can't believe I still let him have access. I've tried explaining that whatever he may have done has nothing to do with his access as a father, but they just think I still have feelings for him Believe me I don't, that went a long time ago and being banged up in a cell for receiving child maintenance was not remotely fun, but I don't inted to use ds as a pawn in that.

Thankyou for the replies, its good to know I'm not going mad!

[Gigantaur]

you are absolutely not going mad.

I think it is a problem in our soceity where it seems ok to feel a child can only be loved by one parent.

His behaviour as a man may be questionable but if he has always done well by his son then that is all that matters.

[mumblechum]

PR47 is absolutely correct.

WTF would a religious minister know about restraining orders (ie injunctions)