Court and everyone all wrong and I am right

[AtSea1979]

But how?

How is it possible that so many professional can be wrong and merely Joe Bloggs (me) be right? How on earth do I convince a judge that all these experienced professionals are actually wrong?

My DS has been abused my his DF, DF has played a blinder and everyone believes him and the more people who believe him the more other people think they must be right so they believe him and the court bundle grows with more 'evidence' and professionals saying XH is right and DS must have made it up.
Regardless of what I believe, I have tried to stay out of it, I have supported DS (11) but have never asked DS questions or advised him just reassured him that I'm here for him. XH is claiming that I put DS up to it, that I coerced him in to making allegations. Professionals say DS's account of things is inconsistent, in my mind that is more proof that he's being honest, if it was water right I'd be more suspicious that it was rehearsed. So far we have an SW, police, XH friends, CAFCASS and recently a psychologist all beleiving XH. The psychologist didn't even give it a chance, she just read everyone else's report and decide DS must be lying and filed a report saying this. I'm back in court next week and know the judge is going to think this highly paid, experienced psychologist must be right.
How can the justice system be so flawed? Totally lost faith is honesty prevailing

I was lucky with CAFCAS, etc and ended up being believed about the ex's treatment of my kids (not abusive but erratic and sometimes scary to the kids due to his mental health issues which only came to light after I'd got pregnant with child 2).

Police were behind me, and the psychologist, CAFCAS man very much so - but you know, it does seem that they take a side and then they would look professionally incompetent if they changed sides. That occurred to me, even as a 'winner' in the Family Court process. And I suspect that may have happened in your case, OP.

As others say - tread carefully, so things don't backfire even more on you and your DS.

I think SS etc pay lip-service to the whole concept of 'believing the child' but have seen, in our own recent experiences trying to convince the powers that be that next door's children are being emotionally (and possibly physically) abused, that really, now, they seem to do what is cheapest/most expedient/least paperwork. Rather than act in the best interests of the child. And that is expensive and a lot of paperwork to reverse a decision.

In our case the CAFCAS man was the kids' guardian ad litem and he was brilliant. But I can't help feeling that in the time since (over a decade) it's about £s now, and not children at all. Sorry not to be much practical help, OP, but just to say I believe you and your DS.

Vapours

Oh I never thought of it like that! You are probably right.

Tbh the solicitors advice at the time was that if it went to court the kids were probably eventually going back (indirect, supervised, then unsupervised) regardless of injury ( even though the injury wasn't anywhere near as bad as the circumstances surrounding it). Whilst we had to go through the process, in the back of my head I was very aware DD might be facing going back to her dad's anyway and I didn't want to make that any harder than it already was if you see what I meant.

So I suppose whilst I was fighting tooth and nail for them not to go into was trying to keep DD out of it as much as possible. The social worker had told DD there was chance of reprisals, she however know perfectly well otherwise

OP, guava's advice, you'll get a lot of that to keep you quiet. Just be careful not to reveal names, area, etc.

I can honestly, hand on heart, say that in my 5 years as a CP social worker our team never did what would have been the cheapest/most expedient/least paperwork. My TM always erred on the side of caution and pretty much always made sure that as far as was humanly possible that we had got things right for the child. In fact it was this that made me leave eventually because i could not cope with the never ending torrent of abused children, listening to child after child reveal horrific incidents, assisting the police while parents were arrested, then the huge amounts of assessment and paperwork that followed. I couldn’t keep up with it emotionally or physically.

Bluesky, you and TM are 2 of the good ones then. Wish you'd been on my family's case. Sorry you had to leave

OP, same here. Lots of lies, proof of those lies but no one listening. Heart goes out to you, wish I could help

bluesky, we haven't been believed about stuff that 7 of us have seen and heard - and the SS seem to have taken the word of the parents (who have convictions, the police told us) over us. (Both worked with kids, have DBS clearance, etc). It's made me feel that kids are no longer really important to the SS. We're now at the point we intend to record something and stick it on YouTube, to shame the SS into action. (As a lot of our neighbours' abuse of kids/pets happens out in the garden). The neighbours look them in the eye, deny it - and are believed. I think it's cheaper and easier for overworked, understaffed services, to sign them off the books (or keep a vague, distant eye on them).

When I was a teacher my only professional interactions with SS also convinced me of their indifference (skipping vital appointments when the school paid hundreds of quid for my cover, etc etc - turning up and having to look in their notes even to remember the name of the child they were there to discuss.... And these were seriously deprived kids). I don't have much time for the SS, given recent and historic experiences.

I don't have a solicitor, no legal aid these days. Left it too late as report only came out on Xmas eve and offices are shut. That's the other issue, no time to prepare anything, they will say it's been a year but up until now I've always believed the truth will prevail, now I'm terrified it's going to be turned on me and I'm going to be made to look like I'm abusing DS through coercion.

You really shouldn't post this stuff on a public forum. It's an offence to cause a child subject to these types of proceedings to become known. I wouldn't take the chance if I were you.

Also, what reason do you think all these professionals would have for falsifying reports?

I agree it mat not be !00% correct to be discussing these things on here - but where else can people find support? If no one can be identified - surely that is ok? To go through this on your own is indescribable because it seems absolutely no one believes you - it's like screaming at the top of your voice into an empty void with no one to hear you.

Presumably you have altered the details so that no one can be identified? If not I would report the thread to mumsnet

You might be better posting in the divorce topic or legal topic as there are normally a few family lawyers around

If it was an offence to make children in such cases known, I'm wondering why a major broadsheet published a sad face article re. my ex, naming him (and therefore my kids as they're the only family in the UK with that surname), with a huge photo - and the words 'Names Have Been Changed' - when they hadn't. The 12 year old "reporter" cited 5 "facts". All were incorrect. This was a national paper. My kids were effectively named (and shamed for being related to such a lunatic) by a newspaper, and I couldn't even take it to the Press Complaints Commission, because I was a day late 'complaining' (it was a narrow window of opportunity and I only stumbled on the article weeks after it was published). I doubt discussing the general facts of a case anonymously, on an anonymous forum, is remotely 'illegal' if out and out naming kids (in an article whining about Family Courts secrecy) went without the reporter in question even being hauled up for it.

This is a forum where people can come for support, sometimes, in similar situations, from others who have been there and dunnit already. So long as they are not identifying the people involved, where is the problem? If a national paper could name my kids' father and quote him at length about his F4J style, egotistical 'fight' to see his kids and NOT change any names (but claim they had), then I don't see the problem here.

But please point me to that legiislation (if it exists) as maybe I could sue that newspaper retrospectively, then?

maybe I could sue that newspaper retrospectively, then?

You can't - but had the court been made aware of it, they could have taken action against whomever revealed details the of court proceedings to the journalist.
IIRC, it's an offence against the court, and the details of the relevant legislation are printed on the Family Court Forms and guidance notes.

My experience of court orders is that they aren't worth the paper they are written on. If your ex gets one and the child refuses to go with him nobody will enforce it. Ideally ex will call the police to try and enforce it, they won't but then you have independent witnesses to say you made child available for contact and child wouldn't go. If the ex goes back to court then you produce the name and number of the officers in attendence. I suspect they won't even come out though, in which case you need to record your ex contacting them on your phone - video it.

That is spectacularly poor advice new brummie.

They can and do enforce orders and make children go. What you suggest is almost exactly what happened as part of the first set of allegations. The end result was i was blamed for the kids reluctance to go and (one) of the points where I was closest to losing my kids.

Toffeelatteplease - they drag kids into cars do they ? I don't think so.

They can enforce them but my experience is that they don't and you cannot make a child go with somebody they don't want to you with ... You just need to document it

It's not advice btw - just sharing my experience.

How on earth do I convince a judge that all these experienced professionals are actually wrong?

Evidence. "Experienced professionals" do make mistakes, but their decisions are based on the evidence available to them. Unfortunately inconsistency indicates deceit more often than truth. A person who has been scarred by abuse tends to be consistent in what they know. Sometimes they remember things later, sometimes they have blocked things out - this is not the same as inconsistency with what they do remember.

Is there any actual evidence of the abuse other than the child's own inconsistent version? On the face of it, if that is the only evidence on offer, it is impossible to be sure beyond reasonable doubt that the abuse did occur.

It's shit if the child was abused of course, but the burden of proof is upon the person making the accusation, not the defendant.

No

They just switch residency . Or in our case leave the threat of doing so open and I increase the time they were meant to be resident with their dad. (It didn't happen that way because they did agree to certain conditions which dad didn't adhere to)

It also resulted in the most damaging situations emotionally for DD where some really quite unpleasant pressure was put on DD by people she should have been able to trust. I won't hold any further because I don't want to out myself entirely.

If you follow the case law you will also know there are cases where power of arrest is attached to contact. Certainly my ex was pushing in that direction.

I can only speak from my experience but the judge turned around to ex and said they don't want to see you. And there was no abuse.

The judge also threatened to award costs to me if the matter was pursued to draw a line under it.

Unfortunately inconsistency indicates deceit more often than truth.

That is absolutely bollocks. My ex gives the most fantastically consistent stories. That's because they are utter tosh and he can fit the stories to the circumstances and the hearer.

It's amazing how many officials prefer a complete consistent story, even when faced proof that elements are lies.

It's thinking like that led to the DC's being ignored first time round.

And yes it is shit when the children are genuinely being abused and they are ignored because they give an inconsistent story compared to an adult.

Toffeelatteplease: It is shit, but how else can we approach working out whether something is true? Automatically believing allegations can't be the answer, because we know that some allegations are false, don't we?

I would say then you have to err on the side of caution. If a kid says they are being abused then you believe them until it's provern they aren't. And protect them supervised contact for example. If the other parent is not abusive they will jump through the hoops to build the relationship because no kid is going to make it up against a brilliant parent are they, something is going on.

Newbrummie: You can't simply assume someone is guilty until proven innocent. If you investigate a claim of abuse and it is found that there is no basis for the claim, it is terribly unfair (and potentially very damaging) to curtail the relationship between parent and child.