Rebecca Minnock - on the run with child after court battle

[BreakingDad77]

Is this one of those cases we wont get to the bottom of as to whether she is someone with MH problems or scheming father driving her to them?

In an open letter, the seven residents criticised the ‘unfair’ custody battle which left Miss Minnock with no right to see her son

And with that line, they have destroyed any credibility they may have had. There has never been a suggestion that Ethan was going to be prevented from seeing his mum.

Who wrote the letter for them to sign?

Supposing her allegations are true. None of us know. The courts do make mistakes.

If i'd had kids with my abusive ex and a court ruled our kid should live with him, Damn right i'd go on the run rather than hand them over.

I'm delighted to see this woman isn't getting the public support she was hoping for. She comes across as being a vile and manipulative lady. I'm in no doubt she loves the young child and wants the best for him, but unfortunately she probably also wants to use him as pawn to fight her battles.

All her stunt has achieved is confirming to the judges they made the right decision. Well done judges!

The comments on Mail article - as usual - quite depressing.

Along the lines of 'we haven't got the full facts' 'why would the court do this!'

Reminds me of someone with an elephant standing on their foot saying 'my foot is hurting. I demand to know why my foot is hurting'

This actually raises a serious question mark for me over the work of the Transparency Project. Releasing judgments seems to have little impact as people either don't read them or refuse to accept what they have read. So the same circus just continues.

Twelve years ago I went through a huge court battle with my ex. Despite me being clearly the resident parent with my kids seeing my ex alternate weekends (all at her request), the chances of me winning the court battle was low. CAFCASS ignored everything I said and just kept repeating "The kids need to see their mother". Even when I said "But she hasn't actually told me when she wants to see them more than the alternate weekends she's asked for!", they just kept repeating the same mantra.

So when I saw this case my first instincts were that there has to be more than the media was reporting and later the stories that professionals had deemed her to be a risk to her son started to make more sense.

A family court rarely awards residency to the father if mum is opposed. In my case I only 'won' when it was clear my ex was going to win. Faced with the prospect of having to actually provide for our two kids and raise them she folded and demanded less contact than I originally offered. That court casae cost me £5k to learn the lesson that actually what she wanted wasn't to win. What she wanted was to be the martyr. To say she'd been to court, fought me and lost.

I suspect it's the same here.

As for prison. I think she should be sent down for a nice long stretch at her majesty's pleasure. I don't say that out of any malice for her. I do feel sorry for her. However a clear message needs to be sent to others in the family court system that the will of the courts must be respected. Other's cannot be allowed to think that adhering to judgements are optional. Already too many mum's get away with ignoring contact orders with impunity because judges are too frightened to jail mum's due to the affect it will have on the children.

She lies about the father

She puts her feelings before that of her son's right to be with his dad.

She now sounds like she is trying to bully the courts into looking again at the case but saying public opinion is behind her. There no reason to re look. Nothing has changed other than she has acted like a very silly girl.

wigglylines - but wouldn't you turn up to the court hearing where decisions were being made about your child? Wouldn't you try appealing a judgment you thought was wrong?

Would you just go on the run the moment the case didn't seem to be going your way?

There are 1000s of disputes every year between parents. Thank god they don't all do this. The police would be in meltdown. I would like to know how many hundreds of thousands of pounds of public money RM has costs us.

She felt she wasn't getting a fair hearing

My guess is public money was wasted due to a snowball of professionals errors or agendas.

Again; when Ched Evans was convicted of rape there weren't cries of 'we don't know the facts, there are two sides to every story ' etc.

Why do people say it when it's a woman who has been proven (as far as a family court can 'prove') with evidence given by experienced professionals tasked with acting to protect and safeguard children to have lied and be emotionally abusing her child?.

But why does her 'feeling' entitle her to do what she did?

She had lawyers. Dr Berelowitz is one of the most well respected experts in this field and from what I am seen of him he is compassionate and humane.

She had YEARS to make her case. Years of dragging everyone back to court to make her arguments which never stood up to any kind of test.

Excuse me if I don't give much attention to her 'feelings'. I feel very strongly how unfair it is that I am not married to George Clooney, poor me.

What on earth does anyone's 'feelings' have to do with anything? Unless you are 3 years old, not much I would respectfully suggest.

WHAT 'professional agenda' ??? That a child has a right to relationship with his father?

Naughty professionals! bad professionals! how dare you work to apply the law.

Some of these comments are simply barking.

This actually raises a serious question mark for me over the work of the Transparency Project. Releasing judgments seems to have little impact as people either don't read them or refuse to accept what they have read. So the same circus just continues.

Was always thus, spero - in most cases, people don't want to be informed, they want reassurance that the world works the way they believe it should.

This case, and the Transparancy Project, has createed fear because they undermine established beliefs and understanding. It's human nature to ignore, minimise and avoid anything that causes us fear.

that's really depressing Peruvian but probably spot on. The law of unintended consequences again.

or my favourite quote - the truth will set you free. But first, it will piss you off.

I think she should go to jail. As other have pointed out she has already had lots of chances to engage in the system and prove her point but after lots of professionals looking at her arguments they have come to a decision which she thinks is wrong and has went on to take things into her own hands.

I think any parent who doesn't engage and makes up allegations should be jailed - they seem to think they know best and want things their way. Fact is they don't know best and are being selfish and manipulative.

Glad to see thee are still a few diehards who just won't believe the court judgement nor the doctors nor the lawyers nor the father. I guess all these people were men and can't possibly be right...

peggy I think what is significant is how many diehards there actually are....

If a father had done this people would be calling for him to be jailed - I think all parents in this situation need to learn they can't just do what they want. She has come across as immature and controlling and has actually shown the professions in this to be totally correct in the judgements.

Also interesting that she has her own script, her stepfather and mother , who are now serving time and has a criminal records thanks to all this, said it was planned and she says spur of the moment. Again she shown to be lying.

"but wouldn't you turn up to the court hearing where decisions were being made about your child? Wouldn't you try appealing a judgment you thought was wrong?"

I depends on the situation, and whether I had any faith in the court system. If I had made true allegations which I had been unable to prove about an abusive man, and the court and press were vilifying me for making those allegations and they were about to me hand over my child to an abusive man, yes I'd go on the run if I felt it was the only way I could protect my child from an abusive man.

I'm not saying that's what's happened here, but that I can imagine a scenario where I would feel cornered into going on the run.

My point is we don't know what the actual truth is - do we? Just because the courts has seen all available evidence doesn't mean they know the actual truth either or that justice has necessarily been done.

Yes it's possible that she did lie and has been moumentally stupid. But we're looking at this through the lens of the press, who we know twist things to fit their news agenda.

I am disappointed by how quick people are to judge when we don't know all the facts.

What did she accuse him of, is that known?

Does anyone else think that this woman has genuinely deluded herself into thinking that her actions will have a positive effect on reversing the judge's decision? She seems very self-assured and (dare I say) rather smug when giving her interview.

Surely all that would happen now is that if a judge revised the decision to even 50/50 contact split (I know that won't happen, just asking the question) then children's services would deem her a significant risk now and potentially be looking at Ethan going on a child protection plan? That could also be the case if unsupervised contact was awarded due to the risk of continuing emotional harm and her absconding with him again. Why any parent would want that for their child is beyond me. Having social workers involved, doing random checks, meetings, potentially more court proceedings etc.

I feel very sorry for RM but from what I've read I feel much more sorry for Ethan and his father. I do think RM should face serious consequences for her actions.

The problem is though that consequences for her are also consequences for Ethan. Not good for him to have his mum, who he's spent much of his life with till now (I accept that more recently his time has been split between both parents) taken away from him and in prison. I hope the police meant what they said in their appeal to her and that contact can be maintained, even if it has to be supervised.

But surely you can't use that argument for all crimes?

If you do something illegal (not to mention damaging to Ethan - that's another argument) then you have to accept there will be be consequences.

If a burglar gets caught and sentenced to prison, should they not go because they have children at home?

It's awful that the consequences for RM also mean Ethan missing out on time with his mum, but that's a risk RM knowingly took when choosing to do what she did.

To add - I do have some personal experience of a case similar so I'm prepared to admit I may be biased.

What has been reported is that she accused the father of 'abusing' Ethan - both sexually and because he was a drug addict. None of her allegations have been accepted after many court hearings.

If the court was sufficiently worried about her to order supervised contact BEFORE she went on the run, I cannot imagine the index of concern is now lessened.

(awaits correction by the more expert posters)

I looked for sentencing guidelines for child abduction by parent. There does not seem to be anything quantified, rather references to previous judgments.

I think that, yes, there does need to be a penalty for breaching a court order. The court needs to be compassionate, but it cannot let orders be flouted.

Sounds no, I totally see that. It's just one of the reasons why this case makes me feel particularly bad for the child. No easy answers.

Did the court order her contact with him previously to be supervised? I haven't read that so far.