Would you think this is no coincidence? Accusation of serious assault.

[Treatscatscrave]

A close family member has been separated from his partner for 3 years.
He is lazy but good-looking and charming.
He basically lived with a woman who was nowhere as physically attractive as him that he was never really into in return for an easy life.

The price of this is that he had to deal with her obsessive jealousy of him. I witnessed this firsthand: he could not so much as say hello to another woman and she'd have a tantrum. I mean really lose it. Stormed into a family gathering once, totally blanked us all and glared at him.

I say this to show I think he is no saint.

Anyway, to get to the point: he has grown close to another woman lately and they bumped into her in supermarket.

Literally days later he has police asking him to attend the station. Turns out that she had made an allegation of a very serious nature over something that he supposedly did to her in mid-2000s.

This seemed really too much of a coincidence to me so I advised him that it would do absolutely no harm to mention the supermarket sighting that had occurred days earlier. He did. It seems to ME that nothing is going to come of this.

Anyway, am I right? It seems to me that the nature of the allegation is such that had she made it BEFORE the sighting ( it wouldn't have helped that he and his new woman were teenage boyfriend and girlfriend), they wouldn't have waited to investigate.

OR she'd made the allegation previously and the police thought it had no substance but, on seeing him with a new woman, she was on the phone pressing them to do something.

I have no idea how the police operate on this sort of thing, but if you do, please contribute.

I've changed some minor details of this. Namely place spotted, exact year of the time of alleged offence, and, of course, I'm not going to say what exactly he was accused of.

I'm asking here as I want clarity. I'm scared she'll do something else.

I don’t understand this, is it the woman who he saw in the supermarket who reported him?

False accusations happen but are incredibly rare. For me, I always believe the woman as my going in position. I can’t see how meeting in a supermarket would lead her to make that up. More likely it brought it back to her mind and she decided to act.

If it were not for the fact that I witnessed myself her obsessive jealousy coupled with the timing of all of it, I, too, would be believing her first.

Sorry reread, are you saying it’s his ex that made the allegation after seeing him with a new woman?

Bottom line is for me, I always believe the woman, false allegations are rare and you don’t know what he did behind closed doors.

@Treatscatscrave

If it were not for the fact that I witnessed myself her obsessive jealousy coupled with the timing of all of it, I, too, would be believing her first.

The bottom line is you don’t know. And irrelevant of her “obsessive jealousy” it could very well be true. I really would not be judging. She may be trying to protect the other woman, knowing what he is capable of.

What’s she accusing him of? Domestic violence, rape, both?

The police have a duty to investigate which will mean taking a statement from him and looking for corroborating evidence. If it was a serious assault, for example, she would have needed medical treatment. They may have enough to charge him while they investigate fully. The police are very used to dealing with malicious allegations but they do need to investigate.

Who made the accusation and what has seeing him in a supermarket got to do with it?

I believe it if someone says they've been assaulted/raped etc etc.

*He basically lived with a woman who was nowhere as physically attractive as him that he was never really into in return for an easy life.

The price of this is that he had to deal with her obsessive jealousy of him.*

You do see the contradiction you've made in a mere two lines, don't you.

Your relative sounds like a dick.

Your explanation is poor and I can't work out who has reported him but either was you sound deluded to me.

Either it's the girlfriend and she's put up with him knocking her about until she's finally come to her senses or it's supermarket woman and she's done it because she saw him and it's brought it back to her.

jellycatspyjamas got to say that it seems to me that they are not proceeding with this any further.

I don’t really understand your story and tbh I don’t see the point in it. It makes no difference why she’s reported it now or whatever. The police aren’t going to read this thread and say ‘oh yes, it’s jealousy, let’s stop’. They will investigate and if she’s found to be lying, she will be dealt with.

@Treatscatscrave

jellycatspyjamas got to say that it seems to me that they are not proceeding with this any further.

Unless she’s dropped the charges then they will fully investigate it. It just takes time.

I mean this very kindly: why does it matter to you?

If you are the kind of person to cut him off or treat a person differently because they have done this then yes, you need to accept the very likely possibility he has done this.

But ultimately if you judge a person based on they behaviour to you, then this is irrelevant. You can support the family member regardless of guilt or innocence. You dont need to make comment on the woman of the alleged incident at all

But you're already taking moves to badmouth the woman her "obsessive jealousy". So you're not going to take either of the above approaches and you want people to tell you that's ok.

Personally no I dont think it is ok and ime, the more the family blindly think their relative can do no wrong, the more likely he did it.

And yes he sounds like a dick from your explanation

So if you think they arent going to progress, what’s your issue here? Them not progressing doesn’t mean it didn’t happen it just means there wasn’t enough evidence. Even “obsessively jealous” women deserve to be safe in their relationship - you don’t know what happened here.

I agree he sounds like a deeply unpleasant person. And honestly you’re not covering yourself in glory here either.

The supermarket has no relevance. He shouldn't be trying to tell the police why she may have made the allegations.

He needs to answer the questions asked and can give details of the relationship dynamic when asked.

Perhaps bumping in to him again made memories of it resurface? Perhaps she knew he was local and how to trace him?
I think it’s unlikely that his jealous partner has reported him. Maybe I’m not understanding what you are asking.
He sounds like a prick.

Good point MrsSmith2021, they've a duty to investigate. Gotta say this happened so long ago that even if true, I don't see how they could proceed.
I don't think it's true myself but excellent point you make.

The police will investigate regardless. Thank you.

I think what’s she’s saying is he has split with his long term partner and she’s now reported him for a serious assault, so either rape or he beat her up.

She’s come to the convolution that because she saw him with another woman she’s making it up.

Which is statistically highly unlikely albeit possible.

The op has no clue what went on in their relationship and if he did or didn’t, and has elected to try to support him to make the woman out to be a liar.

Gotta say this happened so long ago that even if true, I don't see how they could proceed

Pictures of bruises she took, text messages between them she kept, text messages to a friend, a secret call to a doctor. There are many many ways.

Your relative has an obsessive ex girlfriend who has accused him of historic rape after seeing him out with a new woman.

And your position is the ex is making it up as she’s jealous he has a new woman and you think if she had been raped she’d have made a complaint at the time?

Is that right? It’s a pretty flawed argument don’t you think?

I don't 'get' whether the girlfriend is the one who made the allegation or the woman they bumped into in the supermarket.

Anyway if it has all been dropped, it doesn't really matter now.

I say this to show I think he is no saint
Your description of him, trying to illustrate his "Dirty Den" type character only serves to
indict his former partner with jealousy issues.

Agree, the description was not to show he’s no saint it was to paint the partner in a bad light.

It’s not been dropped. The op is just hoping it has been, the police will be investigating in the background.

There is plenty of ways this can be proceeded with. People she told at the time, a doctors appt she didn’t tell him about, text messages. Or even historical issues that provide context, where there may have been issues surrounding abuse in the past which makes it reasonable to assume he did it

The police will do their job and investigate but it takes months and months.

I’m just confused. No idea which woman is accusing this man of historic serious assault. The police will investigate and that will show if there is anything to back up the allegations. If they find nothing, that does not prove the assault never happened though. So it’s always going to linger.

Whether false allegations are rare or not, depends on the methodology used for defining “false” and at what point in the whole unreported, reported, charged, tried, convicted, appealed process that you count attrition of cases for lack of evidence. Researchers to date have all been led by their biases when calculating false allegations. Proponents of rare false allegations will count the % acquitted after appeal compared to convicted, with a healthy dose of arguing that “not guilty” doesn’t mean “innocent”. Proponents of many false allegations will count the #s reported to police but then fail to reach trial due to lack of evidence plus the #s found “not guilty” and the #s acquitted after appeal. So really, the truth is that no one knows how rare false allegations truly are.