Family Court Judges ignoring abuse

I'm sorry you're having to go through this. They claim to prioritise the child but in reality they prioritise perceived "fairness" between the mother and father. Nobody would award 50/50 or give unsupervised access to an abuser if it was really about the child.

It's all because of years of men (and their duped handmaidens) whining that courts favoured mothers. Hopefully in a few years sense will prevail.

op it must be horrible what you are having to endure. Hopefully there will be drastic change in family courts. So many horrific stories of women just trying to keep children safe and men using court as a form of control. Yes, I’m sure there is the occasional man stopped from seeing their children for no reason but I believe many more children are forced to have contact with men that they shouldn’t. The bar is so low for men parenting. Hopefully children once they reach 18 can sue for forced contact that wasn’t in their best interests. Good luck op I really hope a variation can be made or he loses interest.

The family courts can’t really win. Men say, women always win and women say, men always win, in the middle of this is the children. The judge has to make decisions on what is in the best interest of the child and often, one or both are parents won’t agree. The decisions also must be based on actual evidence and not just the strongly held opinions of another, even with good reason. For example, someone being arrested for DV is not definitive evidence of DV. This could be considered a risk which the judge must take into account when making decisions but it can’t be taken as fact if there is no other evidence , as difficult as that is. That is not always going to be right or fair but it is reality of balancing competing opinions against the best interest of the person who often has no say.

In any event, there is a pilot around bringing transparency into the family courts. If you can get media/journalist interest, they can apply to attend and report. I suspect it is something that will be happening a lot this year.

In my personal experience?

Because he molested a girl and he had boys it's "rare" to molested both sexes apparently

Like I should be happy about this

I suffered this back in the 1980's OP. I had a "progressive" families need fathers type of female judge.
Judge Norrie if you are reading this I hope you had a miserable life because you ruined ours.
Anyway I just kept fighting and fighting until I got sole custody. It was a long hard slog but I did it in the end.
I had to give up my wonderful job to get legal aid.

Yes I carry a little rape alarm with me. Also it might worth it to find out how to do a "silent call". I don't know if it's the same as I'm in England. Here you tap 55 when unable to talk.

This really needs a media campaign and a similar to post office drama just to hit home what is going on. It’s shocking and I feel for all of you mothers going through this. 🙁🌹🌹

Definitely highlight the dv evidence during the assessment. But after what I've learned from my own story, I also won't put too much hope on overturning the court order.
Doesn't matter which way it goes, please please try to protect you and your child. Alarms/recording devices during handovers might be needed.
I was a bit careless with just one handover, and I ended up in A&E. All my previous reports said mother doesn't want to stop the contract between child and father, but worried about her safety during the handovers. There were previous arrests as well. The court didn't care.
Look after yourselves.

Did cafcass do a report?

This! I'm in a miserable relationship with a pedophile and can't leave. I called NSPCC when I found out he was watching child abuse images (newborns, toddlers, all the way up to teens) when I was very heavily pregnant. He was set free after they didn't find anything on his phone (he had deleted everything). I was told he could apply for custody and the only thing I could say against it was that he has an addiction to regular pornography.
He reoffended a few months ago, I called ss, case is now closed again.

They "reassured" me that if he was a pedophile, they'll find out in 10 years time. How will they find out in 10 years? After how much damage?

I know of 2 women who have lost custody when they left because of reported sa by the fathers. They were both accused of alienation. Courts sacked ss, won't let the children have therapy nor believe their allegations and the women have to tell there children how great the dads are in order to have contact. It's beyond a joke.

I suggest getting in touch with
https://childlawadvice.org.uk/

e.g.
Is it possible apply for a variation in the Child's Arrangement Order & ask for contact to be supervised?

@SewingBees we were in and out of court for 5 years. As soon as it ended, he gave up fighting for DD as she was the one kicking off about contact. DS still followed the court order until covid, then ex stopped bothering for almost two years, using furlough as the reason. DS has started going back recently for just the odd afternoon a month, which I can see has impacted his behaviour but DS wants to see him (I think because there's no other males in his life). DD is an adult now.

@daffodilandtulip I am so sorry to hear this happened to you. It's just ridiculous and must have been incredibly hard and upsetting for you. What happened in the end, if you don't mind sharing?

There was a woman on woman's hour a few weeks ago talking about this.
She had split from her partner and he had contact with their daughters. She became worried and the daughters told her that their father was sexually abusing them, they reported this to the police. The father claimed this was parental alienation on the part of the mother, and the court ruled that the mother lose custody and the daughters were to live with their father. It was only because another child (not a relative) came forward with allegations against the father that this didn't happen, and he was then convicted and sent to prison.
When he came out, she had to go to court again and again to keep him away from the youngest child, despite the fact she was one of his victims (I think the oldest was an adult by this point).
It was just an awful story.

I did this and nearly lost the children for "not supporting contact". Someone else anonymously did the same via NSPCC, for which I was given the blame and again, got reprimanded for not supporting contact.

I then ended up stuck in a ridiculous cycle of court saying I would lose the children if I didn't support contact and social services saying I would lose the children if I did send them to contact.

Children have rights, not the parents. :)

And this is why women stay with abusers as there is a good chance if they leave their abusive ex will have unsupervised access with the child. Family court is a disgrace and doesn't give a crap about the children, only men's rights.

Until a few of the children grow up and seek financial compensation for being forced to see their abusers this will continue.

The threat of compensation is the only thing that will cause change.

But I guess the damage and mental distress caused may make it hard for victims to fight through the court system for justice.

Not like that, no.
any application like this would either have cafcass or social work involvement and they would have already submitted a report. If the report is considered inaccurate the OP would have had the chance to provide evidence in court. If the order has been finalised the OP could make a new application if she has new evidence but not just on the basis that she's not happy with the outcome. She can appeal the judgement. Nobody can just contact social services and ask for a report for court.
The sad fact is that in this case the judge has seen a report and made a decision based on that. Whether that's the right decision or not is a different matter but when a judge has made an order there isn't much that can be done.

How is this even possible? Boggles my mind that a judge would rule that a convicted pedophile would have access to a potential victim? We protect other children from them but not their own children? It's absolutely vile why we allow men who have proved themselves dangerous to have unsupervised access, the rights of fathers overrule common sense and a just outcome.

WandaWonder · would just like to point out that you’re entirely wrong.

Parents don’t have rights, they have responsibilities. Only the child has rights.

you’re welcome.

Completely horrifying but not surprising.

As a family court advocate I've now seen two occasions where convicted pedophiles are given unsupervised access to their children.