To feel disturbed by how this was allowed to happen?

[Onthebeachin97]

I don’t want to post links to the articles for various reasons.

When I was a teenager I went a bit off the rails and had a relationship with an older man. I was under 16 so underage. My parents found out and called the police.

To be blunt the man was a complete mental case and was well known to the police.I can’t imagine that he was the only underage girl he was involved with and it’s lucky I wasn’t killed as he was crazy. I saw him beat up a man and he held me at knife point.

My parents wanted him arrested ,but for whatever reason (I can’t remember) he wasn’t, but I do remember the officer suggesting that my parents meet him if it was what I really wanted. They didn’t meet him and I had some therapy and life went on.

Years later I was curious so I googled his name, only to find out that he’d gone on to serve prison time for stabbing a partner.

That’s not all, he’d been released and had gone on to meet another woman. She had a child and within a month of meeting her he’d killed her.

He's now serving life in prison, but I cannot get over how he was allowed to be near a child.

I haven’t given all the gruesome details but he was a maniac and I cannot understand why he was ever allowed near a woman or child after his first attack on a woman.

It wasn’t even news that would have made the front page, but I constantly think, how many women could be saved if these violent men were stopped sooner, why is it always waiting until they take someone’s life. It’s so sad and frustrating.

I agree but I suppose they can't imprison anyone for a crime they may commit, until they've actually done it. It's probably much easier to see this in retrospect.

The sadder fact of the matter, is that if every man who sexually assaulted, harassed, stalked, threatened or hurt a woman or looked at child abuse images, was locked up, the economy would collapse because of the shear number of them.

She had a child and within a month of meeting her he’d killed her.

He's now serving life in prison, but I cannot get over how he was allowed to be near a child.

This is a good reminder of why parents shouldn’t introduce new partners to their children so quickly. Assuming that this woman had done so.

I never really understood why he wasn’t arrested for having sex with an underage girl. It’s like the police just were t interested.

He should have served a longer sentence for stabbing his partner. He also shouldn’t have been allowed anywhere near a child after he’d been released for stabbing a partner.

I've experienced something a little similar and I quite agree that it's absolutely disgusting!
So much so that I've had to report my own mother to the police in anticipation that she may harm a baby in my family.
I'm sorry you were so badly wounded and not enough was done, it's actually quite scary, especially when the receiver is greatly vulnerable!

She would have known he’d been in prison. I guess he might have spun her a line that he didn’t do it.

But the probation service knew he’d moved straight in with a woman and child.

It shouldn’t have been allowed.

I’m sorry for what you went through OP. However, to charge him with having sex with a child they would have either needed you to make a formal statement (which your parents would have had to consent to) or other independently corroborated information. They couldn’t have had a statement from your parents based on what you’d said.

Also, you can’t ban men from having contact with women, who want to have contact with them. Social services would have been involved and potentially would have considered removing the child if the woman was knowingly having a man around her child who had stabbed his previous partner, but they can’t actually stop it happening.

It’s actually harder if he is honest about it. We can’t stop people who have been violent from having relationships full stop, so if he was honest he was living with a woman with a child and she knew his previous conviction, there’s not much anyone could do as she was choosing that situation. As much as obviously it feels wrong and led to horrendous consequences.

Think I've seen this in the papers, his mother helped him?

Do you know for sure he was 'allowed' to live with her? People can and do hide stuff from probation all the time, especially men staying with single parents (impact on benefits etc). The fact that he was there doesn't necessarily mean it was condoned by professionals.

I don't know what era you're talking about, but from the perspective of someone working in children's social work, if a single parent moved in someone who had committed an offence like this and we knew about it, it would be child protection minimum, and potentially seeking removal depending on the advice from police/probation about the level of risk. Stabbing a partner is pretty high on the spectrum of what SS worry about for domestic abuse.

The newspaper article describes how they met after he absconded from an open prison, then within a month of his release they’d married and were living together. It also says that the probation service deemed him not to be a risk as he was attending his appointments and had undergone rehabilitation courses in prison.

So I can only assume that the authorities knew that he was living with a woman and child.

It wasn’t decades ago it was recent enough that it should have been on someone’s radar that he was a risk to this woman and her child.

I know people will say that it was the woman’s choice and he’d served his time but sentences need to be longer in that case after he ferociously attacked his first partner.

He had a history it was only a matter of time before he killed

I am so sorry for your experience OP, it sounds like you were really let down by the adults around you.

Would you consider making the police aware and providing a statement at this point?

You were a child and in no way responsible for this. It is terribly sad.

He might not have been deemed a high risk of reoffending by probation but if that were the case they would have had minimal follow up/monitoring. Which makes it seem even more likely to me that he could have moved in with a new partner without professionals being aware. SS don't rely on someone being classed as high risk by probation, in fact I'd say thats the minority - many abusers aren't charged so aren't on probations books, but SS still get involved. However they can only get involved if they knew he was there, and the fact this all happened within a month makes me think it's possible they didn't. They would have been reliant on someone referring in, or him giving his new address to probation + details of who he was living with and them deciding to refer.

Yes I get what you’re saying.

I can’t understand why the probation service DIDN’T deem him a risk. If they knew he’d moved in with a woman.

From my memory of him he was a terrifying character who didn’t really hide the way he was.

It's still really horrible that it happened. Again I'm not sure what era, but probation have over the years been massively underfunded, and the system isn't fit for purpose. I know many people who left the service because they felt it was so unsafe. I appreciate that doesn't make it any better, but it's unlikely any individual in probation looked at this guy and thought 'oh he's fine!' More likely they had to prioritise the ones who (on paper) were even more risky. It shouldn't be that way though

I did actually think of doing that in the hope that it would add weight to him never being released, but realistically are the police going to be interested after all this time. They weren’t interested then.

In a weird way which I know is ridiculous, I feel a tiny bit responsible. Perhaps if I’d tried to press charges or told the police that he was violent it might have made a difference to his future path.

But I was a troubled and deluded kid and he was already known to the police. The police suggested that my parents could get to know him.

In summary:

Shrug

Hand wring

Shrug.

You definitely were not responsible.
I think growing up in the 90s and 2000s those "age gap" relationships were much more normalised although that in no way made them more OK. But the police were much less bothered by it, even though it was against the law and there were things they could do. I would at least hope attitudes would have changed by now. But at the time I dont see how you could have done anything that would have prevented him hurting another woman. It's preposterous that the police had the attitude they had - firstly because you were a child and secondly because the man was clearly a danger. But it's not that surprising.
If you want to tell the police for your own peace of mind then I would say do that. But equally, don't feel obligated in any way. You aren't responsible for him or what he did and the police should have enough evidence about him already todo their job.

A woman who gets with him is likely to have poor judgement on all fronts.
Sad but true.

You were a child. A child who should have been supported and were clearly let down massively.

Try to be kind to yourself, imagine if I was telling you this happened to me. I’m sure you wouldn’t be so hard on anyone else as you are being to yourself.

I think you would get a totally different response from the police now. I won’t give my age but I can imagine the attitude when I was a preteen and it was pretty much the same as what you describe despite the actual laws.

They might be interested. As it was reported at the time they should still have that, which gives contemporary evidence to support what you are saying. At the very least it might be relevant to any inquiry into this poor woman's death and what risk assessments were done

I mean I have seen some stuff on Mumsnet but have some bloody compassion and humanity.

You know nothing about the woman or her life other than she was murdered. None of us know how or why she got to the point she did but she didn’t murder herself.

Oh I have compassion and humanity in spades, thanks.
But that doesn’t mean that what I said isn’t true.

I think I have read about this case. Am I right in thinking he committed lesser offences or was arrested and each time was released back to live with her (within the time period they were together)? I think her family have tried to raise the fact that this shouldn’t have happened or she should have been made aware of his convictions. Apologies if I’m thinking of a different situation.