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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

To be amazed they've released Mairead Philpott?

874 replies

MarylinMonrue · 29/11/2020 17:02

After serving half her sentence for the arson attack? Apparently even a source from the prison was a shocked at the leniency and the fact she's going to get a new identity and protection. Six children in that fire - is there such a thing as justice in this country anymore?

OP posts:
OwlOneAmorFati · 02/12/2020 07:38

Living on benefits will be a safer more secure life. She never planned to kill her children. I feel sorry for. What a life.

Emeraldshamrock · 02/12/2020 07:40

monitored by police, and regardless of the new identity she will be identified by the public and will be in danger
Maybe not identified look at Maxine Carr hidden in society.
I rewatched the interview in case she pops in with her new ID in Dublin as a new neighbour I'll keep my eye out.

OwlOneAmorFati · 02/12/2020 07:48

How on earth maxine carr can be hidden anywhere is a mystery to me. I would recognise her anywhere

OwlOneAmorFati · 02/12/2020 07:51

Just reading that at the time of the fire mick philpott was on bail for a road rage attack. Not a road rage incident but a road rage attack.

No wonder mairead "from a troubled background" did what she was told. The fear was real.
What3ver fear she felt, she probably should have been even more afraid.

I did escape my abusive x but i was terrified in the run up to leaving that he'd know what i was thinking.

x2boys · 02/12/2020 08:05

According to Mairead ,s stepson she sexually abused him from the age of 14 ,she isn't the victim here ,the only victims are the children ,Mick didn't want to kill those children either do people feel sorry for him too?

OwlOneAmorFati · 02/12/2020 08:07

No that is not correct. She was a victim too.

x2boys · 02/12/2020 08:11

What is not correct ,that she sexually abused her stepson? She's not a victim she willingly went along with it .,her own family say she was having a food fight when her eldest son was dying ,both her in Mick were in the pub singing on Karaoke a few days after the fire ,hardly the actions of a grieving mother.

Belledan1 · 02/12/2020 08:12

I wonder if she will have the sense not to wear that yellow coat she had on in the paper. Easy recognizable. I don't feel sorry for her at all.Ok she might not have intended for her kids to die but all that covering up after she shows what she is like.

Parsley1234 · 02/12/2020 08:18

@Belledan1 yes I thought that I saw that coat and thought not the best choice

Wheresmykimchi · 02/12/2020 08:27

@OwlOneAmorFati

No that is not correct. She was a victim too.
She was and is not a victim.
randomer · 02/12/2020 08:39

@ancientgran,my apologies,I didn't watch anything.I dont wish to really.Perhaps her family did try to intervene. Just a sense of incredulity at the whole sorry tale.

Anordinarymum · 02/12/2020 08:57

Mick Philpott controlled Mairead in such a way that she obeyed every command in case she offended him resulting in punishment which could be anything from a menu of abuse on a sliding scale with the ultimate being death. She also wanted to please him and knew the consequences of failing to do so, having failed so any times before. He removed her powers of thought replacing them with the will to survive and not being able to reason or know wrong from right since he was master judge and jury over her sad life.
He treated her worse than a dog. The level of abuse was off the scale.
Sadly for her, and no doubt in my mind she would have ended up dead eventually when he could stand her no longer.
How to deal with her now? I am glad I do not have to make that decision, and neither do those of you baying for her blood on here.

x2boys · 02/12/2020 09:04

Not one person is saying Mick Phillpot is not a violent aggressive abusive bully ,but watching the documentaries and reading her family's views ,Mairead isn't quite the victim some posters would like to make out .

Emeraldshamrock · 02/12/2020 10:35

I believe it was a case of when evils collide there not the first fucked up weird couple to come together for a life of neglect towards their DC and crime.
She loved the attention as much as him.

Sheerface · 02/12/2020 11:40

It's totally abhorrent that she neither had the wit, the intelligence, the human decency, or a sufficient shred of love towards those children to alert the authorities to the fact that her husband was planning to set light to the house where they lay sleeping. Even if we give it a kind interpretation and say she allowed herself to be persuaded by Philpott, or was too scared of him to disagree, the plan had been in the making for six weeks and involved a third party. Surely it must have crossed her mind at some point that her children were in serious danger?

The thing that jumped out of that You Tube film was that she saw Philpott, unlikely as it sounds, as her "rescuer" because she had previously been in a very abusive relationship. Her previous bf had shaved her head as some sort of punishment. So she went from abuser to abuser.

It's interesting why she had such low self esteem in the first place that she was susceptible to that level of abuse, unlike her sisters who were brought up in the same environment. Perhaps her alleged low IQ might explain this? She claims that she was sexually abused by her father, but her father and her sisters categorically deny that this is true. And it's entirely possible she made up that allegation to explain and justify her own hideous behaviour.

Even allowing for all of the above though, and allowing for the possibility she was paralysed by fear - Philpottt seemed quite verbally able and quick thinking on that film, even if not intelligent in a traditional sense (the conversation in the van saying the police case only amounted to "a few discrepancies" struck me as quite articulate) and who knows what physical and emotional hold he had over her - this doesn't explain her behaviour after that night.

Once the plan had gone horribly wrong, once you realised your husband's actions (which you had helped with) had killed your six children, when you knew that he had plotted it all on the eve of a custody hearing for his other children , to make himself look like a heroic father, for financial gain, once you knew he was someone who was prepared to put his own, and your, sleeping children in mortal danger, why for the love of God would you still stand by him? Why would you not only stand by him, but go singing karaoke with him in a pub , and shopping with him using finds people had donated, shortly after your children had died?

You could argue she was still being controlled - and she most definitely was as Philpott made her have oral sex with their co-conspirator to keep him quiet against her will - but surely the death of one child, never mind all six, would affect some change in you?

I doubt any "normal thinking" woman would feel the need to protect Philpott or herself after they'd lost six children. Would you care what happened to yourself after that? I doubt any normal woman would care if she were to go to prison or not, as everything would surely be meaningless from that point on? And as for still being under his control, surely the worst thing that could happen to her, already had?

Emeraldshamrock · 02/12/2020 15:53

They stood in the garden watching the house burn, it is hard to believe they'd any intention of saving them lighting a fire at the stairs.
He previously served 3.5 years for an attempted murder and GBH charge in the late 70's with a string of crimes since. The justice system is shameful.

Cocomarine · 02/12/2020 16:13

An aside, but it makes me despairing and angry when people here have posted that she wouldn’t be able to return to Derby.

Yet these righteously vengeful people of Derby had no problem with Mr Philpott moving amount them after he’d been released for the attempted murder of his former girlfriend 🙄

randomer · 02/12/2020 16:29

Are there surviving siblings?

stairway · 02/12/2020 16:39

Randomer, there are quite a few other children fathered by Philpott. He targeted teenage vulnerable girls and encouraged them to get pregnant.

Housewoes23 · 02/12/2020 16:39

randomer None of the 6 in the fire survived but there will be half siblings to his mistress, and who knows,he's likely a father of others.

x2boys · 02/12/2020 16:46

I suspect that's because sadly the death of six children and the fact there are several documentaries about it is very notorious @Cocomarine ,I don't know how well know widely known the attempted murder of his former girlfriend was, despicable though the crime was .

jessstan1 · 02/12/2020 16:51

I don't see any point in people becoming uptight about this. It is what it is, accept and move on.

It reminds me of vigilante groups and those who stand outside courthouses in order to shout and pelt the police van when an accused or convicted person is driven away. In years gone by, people would go to hangings.

What's the point? It won't bring anyone back.

DubbinDobbin · 02/12/2020 16:53

He has older children. One of them gave an interview in which he said Mairead sexually abused him when he was a teen.

Housewoes23 · 02/12/2020 17:24

I do wonder what Mick Philpott is like in prison. His muse was abuse and control of those weaker than him. He doesnt have that now (or does he?).

Wheresmykimchi · 02/12/2020 17:35

@Housewoes23

I do wonder what Mick Philpott is like in prison. His muse was abuse and control of those weaker than him. He doesnt have that now (or does he?).
He must be on high security as I imagine every prisoner would try to kick his head in.