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?

I think it's inflammatory and unjustified to suggest that this father will enjoy the fact that the mother has supervised contact. After all, if she had simply made a normal arrangement from the outset which allowed her son to have regular contact with his father, the issue of supervision would not have arisen at all. And he is hardly likely to enjoy the fact that he has had to spend an awful lot of money to reach this point.

Isn't there far too much generalisation on both sides in some parts of this thread and elsewhere? The fact is that there are undoubtedly both deadbeat mothers and fathers out there; there are also excellent, caring, sensible parents who do not use their children as weapons or seek to exercise inordinate control. Each case has to be looked at entirely on its own merits.

Ici,

My comment was in response to hiddenhome stating that "Men do like their own way regardless. I wonder if he's going to enjoy seeing her being reduced to supervised visits.

The poster was insinuating that the mother's behaviour was due to the father possibly being a manipulative bully, which is clearly not the case.

She was insinuating that the father may be getting a twisted satisfaction from the mother only having supervised visits.

I was stating that in this situation, the father would enjoy any action that would prevent the child from facing further abuse, rather than the poster implying the he would get some twisted enjoyment from seeing the mother suffer.

The only person to cause any suffering in this case is the mother.

Don't take my comments out of context.

each case has to be looked on entirely on its own merits

And the debate over this case has revealed that there are fewer people than you might think who believe that.

There are a significant minority of society commenting on FB, media sites and forums who believe that "merit" or "evidence" is secondary to the mother/child bond.

and in this case, which we have the rare privilege of being able to openly discuss the fact that the mother is a controlling, manipulative liar that has been using her child as a weapon.

We are discussing this case on it's own merits.

and the reaction of a significant minority that blindly support a mother against all the evidence simply because she is a mother.

There is also a significant minority, even on this thread, even when faced with facts are trying to imply that the father is likely a manipulative bully.

I wonder how far one would get trying to imply that when a mother has been abused by her ex, 'well she must have done something to deserve for him to have done it.'

I don't feel sorry for her in the slightest. I am in a similar yet albeit less extreme situation myself. I feel very sorry for the boy, for the life he is going to have because of this woman's inability to put him first.

Yes, I would also like to know what is the evidence for the claim that men are more likely to be abusive and neglectful parents.

Because that is not remotely my experience. Its a pretty even split between mothers and fathers in a race to the bottom in my cases.

And also most excellent point - if so many men ARE selfish, entitled etc, etc then who on earth is raising them to be so?

Or is the argument that men qua men have these qualities? Which would be an interesting point and could equally be flipped to apply to women - and in fact did for centuries, we couldn't vote/work/own property because we were too 'hysterical' owing to possession of a uterus.

Are we really back to making those kind of arguments about genetic determinism?

The sad fact is that there are many people out there believing nonsense like that Spero.

To me, reading the reaction to this case and from some of the parallels to my own, there seems to be 3 types of reaction.

Those that have experience of this and/or have read the publicly available facts of this case and can see the mothers behaviour for what it really is.

Those that think both parents are failing their child and just need to work together. As in their opinion, when a mother behaves badly it must be the father contributing too.

And those that blindly defend her disgusting actions, fall for her 'poor little victim' story and blame the father for the mothers deplorable actions because, no woman could ever abuse her children and their father. If they do concede that 'some' women do this then they will say it is insignificant as it is mostly men that abuse women and children.

"Yet albeit", oh dear, I need more sleep.

I have three sons and I certainly don't bring them up to be selfish and entitled. I hope this woman goes to prison and I would be saying the same if it was a man. What she has done is cruel and was unnecessary- a god complex in which she is the only person that is good enough to raise her child. Well she will now get her 'parenting' whilst being watched in a contact centre. The architect of her own deluded misfortune....

It is certainly a very interesting question - if men ARE so awful why is that? Given that the majority of primary carers and single parents are women....

Do you think she will realistically go to prison?
I still can't make my mind up about her. But I'm not sure prison is right for her.

chaise Unless they overturn her mum and mums partners sentences, how can they not send her to prison?

If her defence against contept of court is, as she said to the DM, that her decision to flee was spur-of-the-moment, then the facts on which the judge sentenced her mum/mums partner are unsound. They admitted in court that they plotted with Rebecca the night before she fled.

Realistically, what defence is there for fleeing and remaining hidden for so long? She admitted to the DM that she knew that she should hand herself in. Yet she remained hidden, forcing the case to be publicised. She was missing for two weeks PRIOR to the case going public.

If her mother and mums partner are serving custodial sentences for failing to share information about her whereabouts, how can the court not imprison her for not coming forward for so long?

sonnyson, I think you are assuming that my post about the issue of whether the father "enjoys" the need for the mother to have supervised access was directed at you, whereas it was in fact directed at the poster who originally suggested that that would be the case. I apologise if my poor wording makes it look that way. The person you responded to suggested that he would enjoy it in a malicious manner, whereas you were, I think, rightly pointing out that he would be pleased that access was supervised simply so that he can have some peace of mind. And I totally agree with you in that respect.

The other difficulty in relation to sentencing is that she is repeatedly publicly proclaiming that she thinks she was in the right and she would do the same again. I suspect the judge is going to have to make it very clear to her and any other parents who might be inspired by her example that the court is not to be ignored. The trouble is that if she is imprisoned she is going to have an absolutely wonderful time playing the martyr and her supporters will go ape. Sigh.

I wonder if she stayed hidden for so long in order to ensure there was publicity, with an eye to "My weeks in hell hiding from UK Court" type of publicity with the handout that goes with it.

I'm being horrible.

Icimoi,

My mistake, no need to apologise.

Jux,

There lies the problem. You are worried that you will be perceived as being horrible for stating what is more than likely based on her previous and current behaviour. You are not being horrible by being accurate.

Chaise,

I think the Judge has little option after jailing the mother and her boyfriend.

She hasn't showed one genuine flicker of remorse and is stating she would do it again and again.

If she is not punished then it will only encourage parents that are inclined to repeatedly flout court orders thinking they will not be punished to do so.

Why is prison not right for her? Because she is a mother?

Out of interest, I don't think I've read anything that mentions RM's own father. I don't want to speculate but it would be interesting to know what relationship she has/had with her own father.

I feel sorry for her.

I feel sorry for her,

Could you possibly expand on why you would feel sorry for her.

She wants you to feel sorry for her, that's the point.

A fresh investigation is what is needed.it's not just RM that has lost faith in the court system and imperfect humans dealing in opinions/information.

I find the misogyny on this thread a disgrace, why pit Women against Men and label Mothers as some have on here. I am quite shocked at the posters who have posted such opinion.

I also find the poster speaking about themsekves and a Judge's opinion on control over a child quite a scary and says a lot about those two individuals.

Who says she has lost faith in the court system?

Not liking what the court says is not the same thing as having lost faith in the system as a whole.

It would be a shocking waste of resources to drag up all her old lies to be re investigated again.

A fresh investigation is what is needed.it's just RM that has lost faith in the court system and imperfect humans dealing in opinions/information.

Are you suggesting that the courts should order fresh investigations into every case where one party has "lost faith in the court system"? Or, only when the mother has lost faith? Or only when the mother flees with the child?

I don't know if you've widely read posts on Mn, but there are mums posting every day saying that they have no faith in the system. And on other forums, there are dads saying the same thing.

When Ethan was a baby, his dad applied for contact. And the court ordered that it must be supervised. Do you think he lost faith in the court system as a result? Do you think that he should have fled with his son, in order to ensure that his case was freshly examined?