Mediation over custody arrangements with abusive ex

[PistachioQueen]

I was married to an emotionally, psychologically and financially abusive man. Our 4 year old daughter and I moved in with my parents a few years ago, I have since spent the last few years trying to divorce him, while he ran rings around my solicitor and managed to avoid me issuing the divorce petition by threatening to contest it in court, unless I agreed to state that we were married for much less time, which would of course affect any financial settlement I might have been entitled to.

He has paid the bare minimum maintenance based on a salary which he isn’t actually on (as he’s running tax scams through his business) and is now taking me to mediation to discuss custody arrangements. He has chosen the mediator and I have been told that I must pay half or it will go straight to court, with a strike against my name for not wanting to cooperate. I work part time but I’ve spent every penny of my savings on legal fees for the divorce that never happened and have been left paying school fees which he is now refusing to pay. I’m not entitled to legal aid because I work.

On top of this, our daughter is currently on the waiting list to be assessed for autism, so would this affect any time that he might be granted? I realise that mediators and judges don’t care about what has happened between the parents, however, this all feels very one-sided and unjust. Any advice would be much appreciated, particularly reassurance as I have been dragged to hell and back by him and it seems unfair that I’ve spent so much in legal fees (being the petitioner) and now have to go halves on mediation which is essentially for him to get more time with our child!

You don't have to have mediation in cases of abuse. You won't get a 'strike'.

I don't quite understand how he prevented you issuing the petition?
Is the marriage a legal one - do you have a dated marriage certificate?

I was in a similar situation to you with abusive ex, I went along with mediation as I wanted to be reasonable but it was a total waste of time and money and didn't work anyway (as abusers are not reasonable people and mediation is not binding so he can move goalposts at any point). It was also traumatic as he used it as another way to control me.
I would recommend that you attend the initial session with the mediator (this will be a separate session for each party), explain that your ex is abusive and you wish to decline mediation. I did this the second time round prior to court, the mediator was fine with this and signed off the form after a few questions. You will have to pay but only for the initial session.
HTH

Thanks @Bedraggled2020 I think I will have to do that. We were legally married but he became abusive when I was prenant, so I moved out. We tried to make the relationship work after that, but of course, he didn’t change, so eventually I filed for divorce. He then refused to agree to the petition (unreasonable behaviour) and insisted that he would only agree if I agreed to state that we were only married for an extremely short period. I didn’t want to do this as I’d already spent a fortune on legal fees and had to pay the court fee, despite the petition never being issued. It all seems rather unfair that I’m paying for everything and now get forced to pay half of the mediation fees too. Of course, I would rather keep things away from court as I’m completely out of cash now, so wouldn’t be able to afford representation and given the nature of my ex (he’s already hired a Rottweiler divorce solicitor), I worry I’d get eaten alive and lose my child. I wouldn’t mind sharing custody if this were a normal guy who loves his child, but he seems to be using her as a pawn to get to me. He also feeds her with lies and nastiness each time he sees her, trying to turn her against myself and my family. I know that all of this is going to be hard to prove and he himself has bribed the child to say things about me which he’s filmed, it’s just all so stressful and feels like he’s been getting away Scott free with all this behaviour.

Holding your hand @PistachioQueen your situation sounds very similar to mine. My ex is an abusive alcoholic and compulsive liar who is threatening me with court for not allowing him unsupervised access to our 18 month old. He is a horrible nasty man and his mother is just as manipulative. He doesn’t care about my son he is just using him against me and I cry myself to sleep every night at the thought of handing my son over. I love my son to the ends of the earth but sometimes I wish he hadn’t been born because of the tie I still have with my ex and having my heart torn into pieces at the thought of him leaving me to go ex

@Partygirl2021I know exactly how you feel, it’s so heartbreaking, not to mention worrying about the damage they will inflict on the child. Please stay in touch and let me know how things go, or just rant about the injustice of it all. I’m still seeking out a success story where the abusive parent didn’t get their way and walk all over the other person.

My solicitor said mediation is pointless when abuse was present during the marriage. No advice OP just hopping on to let you know you're not alone. It's taken 5 years to finally get my exh to stick to some semblance of reasonable behaviour regarding our DC and even then it's inconsistent.

@HexWitch thanks, I’m being steered towards mediation as I don’t have the funds to hire a barrister should this go to court and my solicitor has said this would be cheaper and easier, however, given how difficult he’s made it for me to divorce him, I highly doubt that mediation will work unless I give him everything he wants. Some days I just feel so deflated, I wonder if he’d be happy if I just gave him the child and walked away without a penny.

Sorry but how can you lie about how long a marriage is/was? Isn’t there an official record? (I got married abroad so not sure about UK).

Mediation isnt cheaper or easier if one party is abuse as they will use the process to further abuse you and stonewall the divorce and mean you have spent potentially 1000s on mediation then end up before court anyway.

I think you need a different solicitor if you are being steered towards mediation with an abusive ex. Can you prove the tax frauds?

I'm still rather confused, sorry. The respondent can either agree to, ask for amendments, or defend the petition,
He can't set the condition of the marriage being shorter than it was and in any case, I presume there is a legal date.
If you are out of money look into McKenzie friends - a free legal helper.
But it sounds to me like your solicitor has been ripping you off/giving you bad advice.

@PistachioQueen - similar situation here and ex calling the shots.
I would do as advised above and refuse medications.

How do you know you aren't entitled to legal aid? Did you use some sort of online calculator or have you applied and found out this way? If you haven't applied I suggest you give it a try. Nothing to lose, a lot to gain.

It is so difficult but we will get there in the end

Thanks for the advice everyone, I will look into this. He claimed because I moved out of our shared property when he became abusive, that the marriage ended there. But we still tried again, despite not living together. We went on holidays etc so I have photographic evidence. He told my solicitor he would contest the petition if I went ahead with it, but if I agreed to a no-fault divorce where I said we were only married briefly, then he would pay half my fees, so she wanted me to go with that, even if it would’ve impacted my settlement.

He wants 50% custody of our daughter who has mild learning difficulties and I guess he’s hoping he can agree that at mediation.

I asked the mediator if legal aid was available; she did a quick check and due to the fact that I work, I’m not entitled to anything as I earn above the threshold. I’m being steered towards mediation by my solicitor as I no longer have any money so I suppose this is cheaper than going to court.

As for the fraud, he has bank cards in other people’s names and transfers money into them, so he can pay less tax. I’m not sure how I can prove this, however, he lives a lifestyle that could not be afforded on the salary he claims to be on.

Are you in the UK? Mediation can be cheaper than going to court, but is only useful if both parties are likely to be in close agreement to the outcome. The UK legal system put it in place recently to help people gain a good outcome at a lower cost I presume. But it is not useful for everyone and as I said is not compulsory in cases where abuse has or is likely to occur.

A marriage does not end when the couples are not living together. Marriage is legal until it is ended through legal divorce.

The reason for divorce, unreasonable behaviour or no-fault, is completely irrelevant to the financial settlement.

Regarding child custody arrngements, then if parents cannot agree then this would be a matter for family court. Again, McKenzie Friends are an option. I nearly went down this route but in the end managed to find money for representation. As it happens, apart from the nerves I could have done the job the hugely expensive barrister did myself!

@Twillow Yes, I’m in the U.K. I think my ex didn’t like the fact that I’d listed all the abuse on my petition for unreasonable behaviour, hence he insisted on a no-fault divorce where I agreed to a short marriage, which my solicitor wanted to agree to as well, just so we could get the ball rolling. I asked if this would affect any settlement and she said that it would, as he was claiming that it was a short marriage. His solicitor claimed he had texts of me saying I was done with him which they threatened to use in court to contest my claim that we were together for longer. I’ve been trying to divorce him for a while now, but he’s just run rings around every solicitor I’ve had. Thanks for the recommendation, I will try mcKenzie Friends as I’ve now run out of cash, paying thousands in legal fees to date for the divorce that never happened!