poor baby

[alexa1]

sorry is this has already been posted.
how awful.
this

nothing has been said about her suffering any physical abuse although he did threaten to kill her and her ex partner (the boys father) if she left him.
apparantely he has a child from a previous relationship and used to be violent to the mother of his child.

It doesn't seem that she was actually in a relationship with Lloyd for that long (months at most). The more I read about it the less sympathy I have for her. Just wish the father had had more to do with Aaron and it might not have happened.

if she knew this man was violent she shouldn't have left her ds alone with him BUT i don't think she should be condemned for not leaving her partner. as i'm sure many women who have suffered at the hands of a violent partner it is NOT an easy thing to do.

also i am surprised that if neighbours noticed the baby's injuries that his own father didn't. if he had maybe he could have informed social services himself and he could have had the baby live with him instead. if i was her i would have asked him to take the baby so he didn't come to any more harm or even put him in care if she couldn't leave him.

i agree nappyadict but from i have read, she wouldn't let the father see the baby months prior to the baby's death. i'm guessing Lloyd told her not to.
it was revealed in court aswell that the father believed to be Aarons dad wasn't him and that he was the result of a one night stand. can u imagine how he felt hearing that he wasn't actually the father after all.
this story has really upset me as i am sure it has upset everyone that has read it. the baby is the same age as my DS and Just as cute. poor little mite, he never asked to be brought into this world did he.

wonder why the baby's dad didn't fight to see him .. i agree how horrible to feel all that grief and then find out he wasn't his son. it's not like the grief just goes away cos all of a sudden you are not the biological father.

there has been no mention of whether this woman was a victim of domestic abuse herself.personally i dont care,i just hope she rots in jail.

i agree diva - i have no sympathy whatsoever, even if she was a victim of domestic violence (which we don;t know if she was). she should of got the hell out of there sharpish. no one puts their baby at risk to a violent thug.

Being threatened with death is domestic abuse, emotional abuse is at least as devastaring as any other form

fair point ,peachy.

but i still think she should have left.i know i would lay down my life for my baby.

I hope to goodness I would have left and can't imagine allowing my kids to come to harm

But I have seen so many women I thought would never allow that to happen either get into such a mess- hard to know.

i'm really stunned at the harshness of feeling here...
i'm quite sure any mother would say they'd lay down their life for their child... it's a pretty meaningless statement until it is tested. i'd bet my house that this woman has said it herself.
i'd lay down my life for my child, of course, and i'd never stay with a man who beat me or touched my child. clever old me.
of course i've never been in that situation before so technically i am guessing that these are the things i'd do, but i'm surprised that everyone else can be so black and white about it.
if you are lucky enough not to be in an abusive relationship, count yourself lucky. not better. if you are lucky enough to have had the strength of character or the support to exit an abusive relationship, count yourself lucky and brave, but not better.
she endangered the life of her child by leaving him with an animal... she must be either terribly compromised as a human being or downright evil. how come everyone but me and a very few others knows for certain she's evil?

What a desperately sad story.

What's worse is that MY local paper also carried a story this week of a mum leaving her child in the care of a boyfriend who beat or kicked him to death.

The child's injuries were described as 'if accidental, would be similar to those seen in a high speed car crash or fall from a great height'.

The family had warned SS that the child was tearful in the company of the boyfriend.

Aitch, I have to take exception to your last post. Rebecca Lewis may or may not be deserving of our sympathy and is undoubtedly unlucky to a certain degree. But we all make our own fate and we can all change our own destiny so no, I am not 'lucky enough not to be in an abusive relationship'. It isn't random chance who we end up with and Rebecca Lewis put her relationship before her son despite knowing that he was violent to her own child. She could have left, she had family around her but she chose to stay with a man who made her child shake with fright.

Sorry, that should read: "Rebecca Lewis put her relationship before her son despite knowing that Lloyd was violent to her own child."

Yes she had family around her, she had about 4 sisters who all lived close by. Apparantley though as soon as she got together with Lloyd, she stopped all contact with her family and Aarons dad. I don't know why Aarons dad didn't take matters further but I read he was petrified of him as he threatened to kill him several times (all the more reason to take action for baby Aaron I think).
Despite what Aitchtwoho thinks, I have no sympathy for rebecca lewis at all.
In court, when it was revealed that Gareth Gilbert was not the real father off Aaron, she just looked at him and smirked. She left the court grinning and laughing, I mean who would be smiling in a situation like that.
She was just as bad as Lloyd, maybe not as evil and violent but the fact is she didn't care and even her own sisters said the same. The cousin of Lewis said the baby was always smelling of urine and soiled and looking generally unkept.

Actually, the way the family are all being nasty about Rebecca Lewis says to me that they are all feeling hugely guilty that they didn't do something to prevent Aaron's death. I would take most 'baby smelling of urine' comments with a pinch of salt tbh.

true. they are bound to feel guilty, anyone would. We can all say, why didn't we do this or that or what if we did this, it's a terrible situation for them.

This little boy lived about 10 minutes away from me

welshboris - did u know the family??

Nope

Heard about it when it happened, because my mum works in the hospital

So so sad

how sad.
I cannot begin to imagine the kind of life that little one has had to endure or how far the ripple effect of this must be hurting and upsetting so many family and friends. This sort of thing is always so much bigger and awful than the immediate people involved (which is unbelievably awful) - think of the little boy?s grandparents, aunts, uncles, next door neighbours, all those who had links and yet were unable/not in a position to prevent it. I bet this tragedy will haunt many poor people for a long time if not the rest of their lives.

Don?t htink it is our right to pass judgement on any of them with so few facts. I am so glad that responsibility doesn?t fall to me. Too easy to see it in black and white when reality is that we all live in colour.

I read your link and found myself bewildering DD2 by cuddling her and kissing her with tears running down my face . She looked concerned at my tears, kissed me, took her dummy out of her mouth and told me I could have it for a little bit! Bless her, what a cutie.

I think anyone who says "I don't care if she was suffering domestic violence, she should have got out" shows that they know very very little about the dynamics of domestic violence, tbh., or the puzzling and inexplicable level of control an abuser is capable of exerting over his victim.

Callisto, you're right that it's not all random, we all "choose" our own destiny in that sense, but if you have already been damaged by DV as a child, you may already be emotionally and psychologically "hardwired" to "choose" another violent relationship. I'm not sayng it's inevitable - many people grow up in abusive households and manage to make better choices, but simple statistics will tell us that children who grow up in violent households, will be more likely to go on to re-form violent households in their adulthood, than those who do not. (Hence the absolute importance of ensuring that children are protected from DV imo.) I agree with you re the comments from the family btw.

I am in agreement wit Caligula here - but would add that it isn't necessarily abused women who 'choose' abusive men - but that abusive men can spot an abused - and abusable - woman a mile off, and choose her. If her self-esteem has been destroyed, or never allowed to grow, she may well be grateful for any attention. It isn't a pro-active chpoice to find a man who will beat you and your child.
Of course from the pov of any of us, it is unthinkable to leave a child with a man who has hurt our baby - but this woman was terrified of him and seems to have had no social adequacy at all.
It doesn't make what she did al right, not by a long chalk, but It does have to be taken into accuont.

Also, i am very unhappy with the idea that 'real justice' is meted out inside prisons by prisoners who will treat child-abusers badly - as if they have some moral right. They don't: they may well be people who killed the father of a small child...or committed crimes which otherwise destroyed the lives of children and their parents.

Caligula - I do agree with you re DV and its long term effects but there is no evidence this is the case with Lewis. Both of her sisters seem to be very family-orientated and her family seems to be close knit and I would imagine that this isn't a normal profile for a family brought up with DV.

I also think that taking all responsibiliy away from a woman because she has suffered DV is unhelpful. Being a victim is also a choice, a mindset if you will. I may have been raped but I am not a victim IYSWIM. People need to take responsibility for their actions and their inactions. After all if I were to stand by and watch a child murdered by an abusive parent I would be responsible for that murder too.