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Original poster

am I the only one incredulous about what is going on in the Shannon Matthews trial?

63 replies

Tommy · 28/11/2008 13:36

DH can't understand why I am so interested in it (or "excited" as he puts it )

I just can't get my head around it - how on earth did they think they would get away with it? (big assumption on guilt here, I know, but the facts are that she was found in the home of a family member...)

OP posts:
fatjac · 04/12/2008 12:58

They have both been found guilty!

tiredemma · 04/12/2008 12:59

NO!! What a surprise!!

IllegallyBrunette · 04/12/2008 13:01

No surprise frome me either.

The only good thing to come out of this is that now hopefully all of her children will have much happier lives.

tiredemma · 04/12/2008 13:02

Karen Matthews disgusts me.

Blu · 04/12/2008 13:07

"she was too stupid to realise that they were never going to give reward money to family"

The plan was that the guy would 'find' her somewhere and he would collect the reward and then share it.

KM strategically left the uncle off a family tree that the police asked her and her partner to complete so that they could investigate the whole wider fmaily. So KM obvously chose to mislead the police about that - so that he wouldn't be investiugated / questioned, and so that he wouldn't be recognised as family when he 'found' Shannon. The uncle had changed his name too.

themildmanneredjanitor · 04/12/2008 13:16

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

spokette · 04/12/2008 13:16

I hope Karen Matthews starts eating some fruit and veg whilst she is locked up because her skin looks as if she has never partaken of such substances

Lulumama · 04/12/2008 13:20

i truly doubt the children would have benefited much, if at all from the £50 000 reward, if the parents were too stupid to foresee their plan was unworkable. £50 000 in those sort of hands would last weeks not years.

poor children, mother guilty of kidnapping, stepfather guilty of downloading child pornography

a sorry, sad mess for the children and Ms Matthews has alienated herself from teh entire community who rallied round to help

tiredemma · 04/12/2008 13:22

I remember watching that Documentary and thinking WTF??

Stupid woman.

matildax · 04/12/2008 13:31

i agree lulamama. its just so very sad.

the only good to come of this is, that her children will be now brought up in happy loving homes, with the possibility of bright futures.

she may be 'thick' as people on here have suggested, but how about adding cruel and greedy to the description of karen matthews. i sure as hell think she deserves it.

TwoIfBySea · 04/12/2008 13:32

The £50k would have gone within weeks and not one thing would have been there to show for it. Frittered away.

The problem lies when the working class became the welfare class. There are kids now whose parents never worked and not only that, who can't see the point in working. And they pass that on.

I'm on benefits at the moment and it is depressing to think I am automatically lumped in with these people. However I see my current situation as just that, current, I worked before and will work again and there is no way my dts would be allowed to lay about claiming benefits. They should be seen as a hand up not a handout. And therein lies the problem.

That mentality caused this daft woman to put her child in danger like that and may she get what she deserves now. Hopefully the children are now in a good foster home where they can flourish.

lyrasdaemon · 04/12/2008 13:37

It's Shannon that I feel sorry for. That poor child will have to spend the rest of her life knowing that her mother saw her as no more than a meal ticket. What that will do to her sense of self-worth, I cannot possibly imagine. Some women are just not fit to be parents, and Karen Matthews is one of them.

wannaBe · 04/12/2008 14:04

they are beneath contempt and I hope they go down for a long time. But.

Given the publicity/outpouring of money that has surrounded other cases, surely it was only a matter of time before someone did this.

Next time a child genuinely goes missing, people will think twice about helping/trusting that it's real.

wasabipeanut · 04/12/2008 14:11

The whole thing has been deeply disturbing and depressing. It highlights these godawful bloody estates and utterly hopeless existence of most of the occupants.

Agree that at least Shannon and her siblings might actually get some sort of love, stability and future now.

abraid · 04/12/2008 14:19

Yup. We've created an underclass that simply doesn't 'get' concepts like work, dignity, self-respect, restraint, family responsibility: all the traditional working-class values.

It's because we're so materialistic. In the past the unions, the Methodists, whatever, would have provided some answers that didn't just lie in making lots of money. That's gone now. People just want to be famous and rich. They will do anything to achieve this: even kidnap their own children.

Lulumama · 04/12/2008 15:38

abraid, i think that is quite a simplistic way of looking at things. children were neglected, pushed into working for their families at the expense of education, treated horribly etc etc since time immemorial.

i thikn this is an isolated incident of one family; going totally off the rails to the extent of faking a kidnapping for financial gain

i don;t think the way they live, in poverty, no work and no work ethic, no family cohesion etc is isolated, but i do think that the karen matthews kidnap debacle is a one off

ScottishMummy · 04/12/2008 15:47

saddest of all is how to try support shannon coping with knowledege mum planned that act

i find that really harrowing
the fracturing of trust and family bonds
the very person who should love ,protect you is a greedy,scheming woman

dingdongmerrilyonpie · 04/12/2008 15:58

Abraid I agree completely, I've just tried to say the exact same thing on the Chat thread but you have said it so much better than me.

FunnyLittleFrog · 04/12/2008 16:28

What I find so unnerving is that despite the stupidity of the plot Matthews managed to pull the wool over the eyes of the police, the national media and the local community, not to mention members of her immediate family, for 24 days.

Everyone believed that Shanon was genuinely missing and that Matthews was completely distraught. Even when Shannon was found much of the media coverage focused on the planned 'reunion' of mother and daughter.

Scary that everyone was taken in by this woman.

LIZS · 04/12/2008 16:34

but surely the police could well have had their suspicions from early on but could not take the risk of being wrong and had to follow through with a full scale search operation. Imagine if they hadn't and it had turned out to be a paedophile, the outcry of institutional discrimination against working classes etc etc. A child was still missing whether her mum was culpable or not, it was fortunate she was found "safe".

beforesunrise · 04/12/2008 16:36

(not read whole thread sorry)

I too am weirdly fascinated by the whole thing, in a grim way... you know what though, much as i am incredulous about how a mother could possibly do this to her child, every time i see a picture of Karen Mathews i think... gosh she's my age and she looks like my grandmother... she must have had a shitty shitty life. no justification, it just makes me to think how atrociously some people live.

TheCrackFox · 04/12/2008 17:02

They both disgust me and I feel very sorry for Shannon and her brothers and sisters. How on Earth the pair of them thought that this plan could work is beyond me.

Hope they get decent jail sentences.

donnie · 04/12/2008 18:16

I agree with previous posters - for me the saddest aspect of this is that Shannon Matthews will spend the rest of her life knowing her own mother was prepared to kidnap, drug and imprison her, all for cash. How would you ever be able to come to terms with such a thing?

I veer between finding the mother a revolting, lazy selfish oaf and feeling a bit sorry for her( as she is such a dimwitted loser). Can't decide, but whichever one it is she is vile.

We3kingsoforientRaahh · 04/12/2008 20:23

for me the tragedy is that Shannon and her siblings may never be a family again, they may lose touch. i find that tragic, and the mother is to blame for destroying a whole family unit. They will doubtless be better off without their mother (though i'm sure, as children do they will miss her, and wonder where she is now).

snigger · 04/12/2008 20:33

Something is certainly lacking in someone who could knowingly be apart from her child for that length of time, allowing them to be kept under such conditions, and using inappropriate medication to guarantee docility. Grim.

Without being flippant or disrespectful of the distress caused by this situation though, I did stifle a giggle during the news this evening when they screened local reactions to Shannon Matthews discovery -

"It's all round Asda, it must be true".

Giggles aside, I feel for the people who must have felt terrible let down after being duped so deliberately - the public response must have been counted upon, and encouraged, to make the pay-off more valuable.