How deprived do you have to be to move in a man into your home a day of ‘knowing’ him on Facebook? *[Content warning: concerns child abuse]

The mother's actions allowed it to happen. She's as guilty as him, the child had 101 injuries on her body, don't tell me the mother was unaware of what was happening.

@housemaus and @Oysterbabe make some interesting points. While no one is excusing the mother, it is so hard for many of us to even imagine not putting your child first.
I know with any shocking crime It's easier to label the perpetrators as "mad" or "evil", because it's so hard to get your head around and their background and/or upbringing is no excuse, I sometimes wonder if more research was done into this perhaps these atrocities could be prevented.

I’m absolutely sick to the stomach of it. It’s case after case of babies and children suffering at the hands of the mother’s boyfriend. I can remember a case where it was the step mother but that is much rarer. So many women leading chaotic lives introducing one crappy partner after another, failing to put their children first. Men who are not the biological father being left to look after children when the mother doesn’t have any clue what sort of person they are, if they can be trusted.

Low self esteem weak boundaries , feeling they need to be in a relationship no matter the background of the person. Thinking it's the worst thing in the world to be single.

She's not "as guilty as him" of murder because she didn't commit murder.

I appreciate it's a horrible crime but you're not going to stop it happening again by saying things that are inaccurate.

It’s a bit of a reach to say it could be either, Basic reading comprehension makes it quite clear OP meant depraved. There was no clarification required. Eg. “The fog/dog made it hard for me to see the cars in front of me on the way to work today’. Obviously dog changes the meaning but I think it’s fairly bloody obvious the word they’d have meant was fog. I mean, it’s not difficult. Why make it difficult unless it’s to shame the OP.

Hers’ may have been a different crime but it was equally morally abhorrent. She was the poor girl’s MOTHER, ffs.

I hope the knowledge of what she has done tortures her for the rest of her days, but I doubt it will.

This.

I would add to that the reason there are more divorces now than in the past is because most women are now working so they are in a better position to leave when things do not work out. Before you just had to get on with it.

I think it needs to be MUCH easier to give up your children. There are so many children living with parents who, when realising what parenting
actually involves, do not want to do it, are not able to do it and are not willing to put their children’s needs before their own. Yet the children are stuck there, in squalid homes while their useless parents prioritise shitty relationships over them.

Sadly I don’t think a lot of these women would even see themselves as bad parents. I’m sure they’re the ones with Full Time Mother as a status on Facebook who constantly post about their kids being their world. So many kids are being dragged up in neglectful borderline abusive or downright abusive homes. I’m sorry if this sounds judgemental but the kids are a source of extra benefits and I can’t see this type of parent giving a child up of their own volition and losing the Child Benefit and Tax Credits that go along with them.

I massively disagree. People who stand by and watch are the WORST that's a poor excuse I didn't do it "I just watched" ffs.

@Fifi1010 absolutely.

This story is shocking but I’m not surprised. This will keep happening as long as women think they need a man. I would vote for forced contraception / sterilisation in cases like this.
The man is abhorrent but the mum’s actions allowed him into their home. Why are we standing by and letting women like this have children? The buck stops with her.

@Nigvor she allowed this to happen, she stood by while he assaulted her child time and time again. How can she not be seen as guilty ?

@1Week @Merryoldgoat and @PortmeirionTiles , thank you. I'm one of the lucky ones in that DH and I met as teenagers at school, and we've been together ever since. We're both 60 now. He is absolutely wonderful, the sweetest, gentlest guy. We don't have children but we have numerous rescued pets and he has so much love and patience in his heart for all of us. I have a really peaceful, happy life and I know how lucky I am.

Also don't fathers have a role to play, keeping regular contact with their children might also reduce such incidents
I wonder how involved the biological father was with poor little Lola. And would he have been supported if he had tried to gain full custody?
Additionally the maternal grandmother is quoted, was she not concerned enough to report?
Are reports ignored/seen as malicious?

☹️
So so so sad.
Oh how I wish I could of helped you Lola 💔

i do wish it washarder to become a parent-this little girl stood no chance

hope they get a good welcome in prison

I saw a documentary a year or so about a young couple who's baby had died in questionable circumstances. As it all unfolded it became clear that the boyfriend was not the father, and that he was brutally abusive to the mother. They were both early twenties.

Throughout the entire process the woman's only reaction at all was rage against anyone who suggested her boyfriend had done anything wrong. She threatened a concerned neighbour, and screamed abuse at the police when they turned up to yet another terrifying row.

The police finally confronted her with incontrovertible evidence that her boyfriend had killed her child. Her immediate reaction was fury that the DNA testing involved would lead him to find out he wasn't the baby's father.

It was jaw dropping. Neither of them expressed any sadness or loss at all, their only feelings were for themselves and the 'injustice' of others noticing how violent the man was. They were both apoplectic with righteous anger.

I still think about it.

I agree. I don't understand all the stuff around low IQ, SEND etc - we can have high expectations for everyone and it's a pretty low bar to expect you to protect your defenceless kid.

Then maybe you don’t get to have a baby. It’s not a right.

Kids would be much better off if parents took the time to think about what is better for the hypothetical child rather than what they want.

But the point is in these cases women are solely responsible for the safety of their children. They are single parents, and it is their choices that lead to the abuse/death, in the same way as letting them play on train tracks would lead to tragedy.

It goes without saying that the male perpetrators of these crimes are responsible. What people are trying to do is prevent it from happening. And that starts by ensuring mothers prioritise and protect their children.

My read of the article is that James was extremely damaged and probably has a low IQ. The fact that authorities had had to tell her not to move adults into her home says a lot. I’m not absolving her at all though.

I also fail to understand the friend not making a police report and social services making a “multi-agency” referral but nothing happening?

The “partner” is an absolute monster. His mother must be so ashamed. She should also have called the police and ambulance 30 minutes before she did.

There are a huge amount of people in this world, male and female, who are mind blowingly selfish. They don't give a flying fuck who gets hurt in the process, as long as they get what they want.

When those people are parents, the results are often horrendous.

I have two children in my care who are horrifically damaged following their mothers selfish actions, after she let a sex offender into her life. She allowed them to be abused by him, because she enjoyed the subsequent attention from him. That was genuinely her defence in court.

There's no logic to these people. The only thing that we can hope for is that they are either self aware enough to realise that they're not the right sort of person to have children in the first place, or that social services step up their game if shit starts to go wrong.

Neither option seems likely, sadly.

@CarrieMoonbeams

I’m really really glad to hear how well you have lived your life.

They both need to rot. She didn’t protect her baby. There is no way she didn’t know what was going on. I wish forced sterilization was a thing for proven child abusers. This woman KNEW. She is no mother at all.