help?

[ineedanswers]

im trying to fins some answers, im a girl 16 years old and i am a victim of physical nd sexual abuse, my ex boyfriend did it to me, beat me up a couple of times knocked me out, and sexual abused me once. i need some help i want to no what type of question's they will be asking me during court? can any body help?

I didnt want to leave your post unanswered, i am going to report your thread to mumsnet so that it gets moved to the place on the forum where you will get the best answers.

I just wanted to say that you are very brave and i hope that you get the support that you need and deserve. Just remember - THIS IS NOT YOUR FAULT, YOU HAVE DONE NOTHING WRONG. you hold your head up high sweetheart xxx

thank you, ahahaa i needed to hear that :) i now no its not my fault, trying to move on with life but courts taking forever 2 more months :\ but yeah thank you :) xx

Hi there ineedanswers and welcome.
I'm so sorry to read this and hope you are okay.
We have moved this thread to our legal matters section as you say it's the court questions that you want help with.
BUT I also want to point out that (sadly) there are lots of folk on our relationships board who have experience of this kind of thing and you may want to post there too
Really hope that you can get some support to help you through this
Best
MNHQ

hello my darling, so sorry you've been through this. well done for taking it to court. Have you been in touch with women's aid? they are usually really helpful with this kind of stuff.

www.womensaid.org.uk/

I'm sure people will be on here with lots of advice soon.

no i dont no any like website's i just saw this page made a acountt didnt even realise it was for parents lol but thanks everyone, yeah im taking it court hopefully he will be in jail for a long time! :)

don't worry, you will still get support here, i think the suggestion to get in touch with women's aid is definately a good one. There are plenty of women who post on this website who aren't parents yet. You will be one day im sure :) Do keep posting on here and post your original post in relationships as that is were you will find the most people so you will get more responses. Do you have support in real life? your parents? And yes, may his toes rot and drop off in jail seriously, i agree with you, he needs to be in prison (bastard)

Have you been put in touch with victim support as the are very helpful from what I've heard. www.victimsupport.org
If you need someone to talk to that has some experience of this you can pm me. PM by clicking on message poster beside my name.

i was offered it but i never called the person :( i still missed him i was silly & now i dont have any help. i cant speak to my mum because its difficult to talk about, in courts going to kill me :( but yeaah thank you guys.. so much help :)

where abouts do i post "im trying to find some answers, im a girl 16 years old and i am a victim of physical nd sexual abuse, my ex boyfriend did it to me, beat me up a couple of times knocked me out, and sexual abused me once. i need some help i want to no what type of question's they will be asking me during court? can any body help?" this on relationships part, not sure how to use these ?

Have you contacted Women's Aid?

Sorry, xpost. Will shut up now.

no, i wanted a website that i could like email or somthing, i dont want to like, talk on the phone? :(

You can still call victim support. You don't have to go for the counselling side but they can also take you through the court process and help you know what's coming.
This page also looks very good and seems to have some good links on it www.direct.gov.uk/en/CrimeJusticeAndTheLaw/VictimsOfCrime/DG_070444

ineedanswers i'll post a thread in relationships linking to this one, that should get you some more traffic x

Sorry can't help with the court details, but wondering if you could talk to one of your friends mothers? They could also be with you while you made some of the phone calls the others have suggested.

Hi. I was in court only about a month ago due to my husband hitting me. He was accused of assaault by beating.

Ask me anything you want about the experience.

I would recommend that you do actually talk about it with someone as it will make it easier to talk about it on the day. I personally did not find Victim Support very good in my area but the Witness Care people were great. They will invite you to go the court before the day - I went about a month before. You can ask them lots of questions then. They want to support you as much as possible so you do turn up at court on the day and given your evidence.

I found the police officer who originally dealt with my case brilliant too. Have you asked for help from your contact in the police?

I responded to your post on the Relationships board last night - see here: www.mumsnet.com/Talk/relationships/1529767-help

Victim Support operate a dedicated service for young people who are in your position. Please make contact with them and let them help you through the possibiity that you may be required to give evidence in Court if he maintains his not guilty plea.

But please note that the fact that he has maintained a plea of not guilty to date doesn't mean that he will plead not guilty on the day of the hearing in the Youth Court.

By pleading not guilty on the various Court appearances he will have made for his bail to be extended until the date for hearing was set, he's been able to remain at liberty.

However, he will be advised that if he pleads not guilty on the day and is found guilty by the Court, it's probable that he will receive a more severe sentence than if he pleads guilty.

In addition, if he has previous conviction his offending history will be taken into account if he's found guilty of offences against you and this, together with other factors, will determine his sentence. If he's offended before, it's probable he will receive a custodial sentence.

Nevertheless, you need to be prepared for whatever may happen on the day and Victim Support's Witness Service is best placed to support and advise you and also your mum who, presumably, will be accompanying you to Court.

I know you've said you find it difficult to talk to your mum but she may be finding it equally difficult to talk to you, especially if she thinks that you are still entertaining fond feelings for this violent and abusive young man.

It's not easy being in the grip of powerful emotions in respect of romantic relationships at any age, but it's especially difficult during early teenage years when it's not unusual to believe that you're an adult who is fully capable of determining your own life but you're unfairly being treated like a child by parents/teachers etc.

Please keep posting on your thread on Relationships (see above link) - the majority of the responders on this site are mums but you won't be judged for having done what so many thousands of women/young girls have done before which was to get in over your head with a male who failed to show you the respect you deserve.

izzyizin- thanks for all that infomation really helped, yeah when he was taking in for questioning about my case they kinda of cort him for 24 house robberys aswell, hes only 16 :\ so he did 6 months in jail on just out on bail till my case

Springhasarrived- what type of questions did they ask you, thats all i really want to no :( i just want to be prepared, i get really nervus and i start mixing myself up, if only there was a scriped i could follow, soo much easier :(

You don't need a script, honey. I've answered your question via the Relationships board (see link above) and you should bear in mind that, although many people have been the victim of attacks and assault such as the ones you sustained and have been required to give evidence in Court, all cases are different and each case is tried on its merits.

Ineedanswers the questions will be based very strongly on the statement you made to the police. That statement would have been the basis on which the charges were made. In my case, and I imagine this is quite common, I made a statement which involved 2 incidents. He was only charged with one so that was the only one that was discussed or indeed was allowed to be discussed.

When you get to the court on the day you will be given your statement to read. You will be in a private room and very quiet. They ask you to read and more or less memorise it so that your memory is refreshed. Not pleasant I know but necessary. The prosecuting lawyer (your side) will come and talk to you in private and explain to you how to answer questions. Someone from the witness service will look after you and reassure you as much as possible, get you a drink etc.

When you go into court your lawyer will ask you brief questions about what happened which will be very easy and then the defence lawyer will stand up and ask you more questions. These will be much harder questions and will go on for longer but dont worry, just stick to the facts and do not agree to anything that is not true. For example in my case i was shown photographs of the rooms where the assault happened and they tried to get me to say where exactly I was standing when i was grabbed first. I didnt know so despite her going on and on, I did as I had been told and kept repeating that I didnt know.

A good tip when you are being asked these hard questions is not to look at his lawyer when you are answering them but direct them towards the judge. This particularly helps if you are starting to feel angry by being asked the same questions over and over which will happen.

Try to remember that everyone in the court bar his lawyer are on your side. You would not be there unless the police believe there is a strong possibility of conviction. Bear that in mind all the time.

Everything that is said in court is written down. This means the questions are each quite short, just a lot of them!

You will be allowed to have screens. This means that you wont have to see your attacker but the rest of the court will see you. Basically they cover where he sits.

You were very brave in going to the police. Think of this as one last effort in being brave. You can do it.

Hope that helps x

Sorry, should have said you do have a script - it is your statement.

The OP will be giving evidence by video link in a Youth Court Spring

Youth Courts are markedly different to the (adult) Magistrate's Court you gave evidence in - please see the advice I've given on the OP's concurrent thread in Relationships (click the link above in my post yesterday at 18.41)

The OP will not be asked to memorise her statement and it's highly unlikely that she will be left alone at any time.

Even though criminal Courts of Justice are, in themselves,adversarial this young OP will not be subjected to any 3rd-degree style questioning by the defence.

I'll shut up then.

Springhasarrived- no you dont need to shutup, you have helped so much thank you! im in childs court & i think im like in another room via video link :(