Family missing with newborn....

[ChocChocYum]

www.theboltonnews.co.uk/news/23233264.bolton-m61-appeal-help-finding-missing-family-newborn-baby/

Where are they? How can they go missing? Hope they are ok

Indeed, and there are no easy answers. I suppose the permanent and irreversible nature of adoption is what makes it such a huge step. It is an enormous thing to do to a child and his/her birth parents.

The legal standard for adoption without parental consent in England and Wales is that 'nothing else will do' to secure the well being of the child, given their need for identity of their birth family.

To over-ride the benefits of remaining legally linked to their birth family is quite a high bar.

There are lots of people making assertions, that aren't grounded in fact.

We don't know if they're living in a tent.
We don't know if she's with him willingly.
We don't know if previous children have been removed by SS.
We don't know why she hasn't sought medical attention (this doesn't appear to be her first child).
We don't know if she has substance/alcohol abuse issues.

We do know that the police are looking for them.
We do know that the police are dedicating (unprecedented?) resources to finding them (200 officers).
We do know the case has unusual levels of media attention and that doesn't appear to be warranted (based upon the information released so far).

For all we know, they're holed up in a B&B or AirBnB or have left the country. Or they're sleeping in a tent in the woods.

We just don't know much.

A baby isn't removed for adoption though.
They are removed to prevent them from harm or further harm.
A court decides later that they cannot be returned to parents and only then can an adoption plan be made......though of course if it is highly likely a child cannot return 'twin tracking' is usual with plans for return/adoption running alongside each other - to reduce the time in care for the child.

From my perspective, to leave children in a limbo where they don't belong anywhere - and have a right to belong - is worse. That they are constantly waiting for someone in their birth family to overcome their issues and be able to prioritise the child.

Well - that’s the generally held view, and I’m sure in many cases holds. But I am not totally convinced that is always the case and that errors of judgement are so tiny, one in a million really, that they don’t matter …

There have been some awful cases in recent years on both sides of this discussion. I suspect we will agree SS are underfunded and overworked.

I find it a bit of a low blow as she'd previously interned with the DM!

Don't know if this has already been posted but it seems a bit less sensationalist www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/constance-marten-mark-gordon-child-missing-b2268486.html

I agree awful things happen when a child is removed, and when a child isn't.
Baby P was left with his mother and killed, Baby Leiland-James was adopted and killed (highly unusual), but both mistakes by SS.
Failures by SS who yes are understaffed, underfunded and blamed either way.

They were known to have bought a tent and camping equipment on 7th January in East London.

Her Facebook pages refer to previous children - obviously SS won't confirm because of confidentiality.

We know they have lived in various AirBnBs and trashed them, and had a chaotic lifestyle.

You do remember the King Solomon story in full right?

He was able to accurately judge which woman was the baby's real mother because she was the one who would rather see her baby given to someone else, than to be chopped in half - i.e. die.

What you're saying here is you think it's preferable for this baby to die rather than be separated from its birth mother, and you would also prefer that option for yourself? Can I just clarify that?

For the avoidance of any doubt, while I would die to save my children's lives in an instant, absolutely no question whatsoever, I would rather they were taken from me than died in my care. And I find it frightening to have to say that

Literally no one has said anything remotely resembling this

"being taken from her is an inconsequential action that is all fine as long as ‘someone’ is meeting the child’s needs."

There is not a single post on this thread that trivialises the pain that this woman is going through or that minimises the significance of separating a mother from her newborn baby. I would guess that the overwhelming majority of people posting on this thread are mothers. We ALL empathise with her. You seem to think that only you have this special insight into the idea that separating a mother from her newborn baby is a terrible thing to do.

You really don't seem to grasp how terrible the current situation is for this baby. This is a life and death question.

Absolutely yes to this, I can't imagine a caring parent who wouldn't.

Yes. We know they bought camping stuff at Argos (in East London), but we don't know if they're camping.

All the arguments based around camping are basically pointless because we don't know if they're camping at all. It could have been a ruse or they could have changed their plans due to the weather. Or they could be camped in Epping Forest.

If they're camping, I would have thought they'd be fairly easy to find with thermal imaging cameras.

She’s also ‘likes’ ss exposed on Facebook

We don't even know much about his court case in the late 80s. We know the details of what he was convicted of, but we don't know the evidence. Was it based on DNA evidence? Circumstantial evidence? Did the neighbour recognize him (despite covering his face)?

We shouldn't forget that he was a black boy in the US. 34 years ago. Potentially facing an all-white jury.

I am not saying that this is definitely the case here as I don't know the details. But he wouldn't be the first innocent black man to spend a long time in an US prison.

Too many unknowns to make a judgement.

My empathy and concern are with the tiny baby, born without medical intervention or checks, at present reliant on the care of a chaotic mother and convicted sex offender.

No loving parent would subject their child to such danger and hardship, just to "beat" the authorities and that is what this is.

His half sister has said he was wrongly convicted , I posted it back in the thread not sure if anyone saw it though

If a mumsnetter came on here asking if she should start a relationship with a man who had spent 20 years in prison for rape, is that what you would say to her? Or would you more likely say to her that she shouldn’t take a chance? Genuine question

In the UK you would need very strong evidence to send someone to prison for 20 years for rape. Such a lengthy prison sentence in this country also means that the crime must have been especially appalling and violent. Based on that, I probably wouldn't advise her to be in a relationship with such a man.

In the US, however the justice system is often working against black people. It is a bit fairer now, but if you google there are lots of cases of innocently convicted black people.

Like I said, I don't know if that is the case here. Maybe he is a monster.

All I am saying we shouldn't take everything coming out of the US justice system as gospel.

It is certainly true that there are many innocent black men convicted wrongly in the US, but from the detailed accounts around this man, I'm far from certain that he is one of them. In any case, what he and the mother are doing is utterly neglectful and unreasonable.

The rape committed at 14, I mean assuming he did it, it was a horrendous thing to do.

But if it had happened in the UK there's no way a 14 year old would have been sentenced to 20 years. It is assumed that juvenile offenders can be redeemed, and they should be given a chance to turn their lives around. For example the killers of James Bulger were released on licence at about 20 weren't they? And that seems to have worked out for one of them, he has not been in any further trouble so I perhaps kids are redeemable...

It's only in the US they give out these amazingly long sentences, 100 years or more sometimes and have this thing of trying kids 'as adults', which I don't get. They're not adults. Plus the racial element.

So not really fair to keep stating that he served a 20 year jail term, as a measure of how awful he was, as that just wouldn't have happened over here. And it was a very long time ago, he was very young, he could have changed.

If you assume he was guilty then he's quite possibly still an awful person, but we just don't know.

Well we don't know the whole story do we? But it's a terrible situation for baby and parents and very sad all round.

Anything is possible (social services got their file mixed up/the US conviction is unsafe/etc) but the most likely explanation is that he was convicted correctly and social services are involved because they can’t safeguard their baby. There’s a range of evidence for the most likely explanation and nothing but a biased statement from his family to support the alternative. If it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck it is probably a duck.

Two of his victims (the lady he raped and the neighbour he hit with a shovel a few months later) told the media about their experience. That’s quite unusual so they must feel very confident it’s him and very strongly about sharing their experience.

I've also known of cases where birth parents have had previous children removed. The parents are pregnant again and the baby is planned to be removed from the parents at birth. That baby is then put into 'temporary' foster care for a year. Even though the plan is for the family who have the older siblings to adopt the baby.

I'm completely supportive of SS but why why why do they do this. The baby is first removed from birth mum =trauma. Put with foster parents and presumably forms an attachment and then is removed from them = more trauma. By the time the adoptive family have the baby they have a very damaged child on their hands.

I know of two occasions of this in a small village so I assuming this is more widespread but I'd love to think I'm wrong. Can anyone tell me this isn't what normally happens.

Recognising this issue you describe, there is now a scheme known as early permanent planning / concurrent planning.

Essentially where it's thought that a baby is highly likely to be adopted, they'll send them to live with a family who start off as foster carers, but if the baby becomes adoptable they'll adopt them. But - there is a chance the birth parents will get their act together and the courts will return the baby to them.

If they've got older siblings from the same birth parents, I can imagine that the fallout from a baby being returned to the birth parents would be huge. The older children would be asking why they couldn't go back to their birth mum, why their birth mum got her act together for the new baby but not them, and if the new baby would suffer the same things they did. They'd also be unable to see this blood sibling they've now bonded with.

So, I could understand if the adoptive parents prioritised the emotional wellbeing of their older children.

Of course the examples you cite might have been a long time ago, or the baby might not have been considered suitable for early permanence planning for another reason.

@LastOfTheChristmasWine thank goodness there's something in place now. These cases are around 9 years ago now.