Son assaulted - police instruct me to break contact order - who has more power?

[ilovemilton]

DS was assaulted by ex at weekend contact.

Long long case of no contact, supervised etc and many issues.

At the last hearing, an enforcement order was put in place that residency is transferred if I break the order "again". Even though I have never actually broken the order - this came from daughter running away whilst with him and kids not being happy etc.

Assault was reported to the police, who took it to MASH, who said suspend contact immediately. Today should have been contact after school.

If I do as they say, will I be breaking the order? Can action then be taken to remove the children? Are the police allowed to override an order?

Oh, wow, I don't know, but didn't want to read and run. Surely the police order would override a social services order?

Do you have a contact person/social worker you can ring and clarify the situation? Your poor son.

I only have the policewoman who instructed me to do this. They said SS would be in touch but contact is due in 4 hours so getting twitchy.

Who placed the contact order? I would assume safeguarding trumps a civil court ruling.

MASH are the multi agency safeguarding hub. If the contact order is via social services then they automatically over rule that ( are soc services people who give contact orders? I dunno!)

I know this is hard but if a safeguarding group give you an instruction, if you ignore it you are putting your child at risk. Can you call SS yourself?

Is the solicitor you have used in the past available to you on the phone?

Phone the policewoman for advice and/or social services.
Police should have automatically reported to them anyway as a safeguarding concern. If they haven't contacted you I'd assume that they are confident you'll protect ( ie no contact). I'd want their back up if I was in your situation.

Also worth speaking to a solicitor?

The court trumps others. If the police put it in writing send that to court, stop contact and ask for a hearing.

Is this a verbal or a written order from the police? I'd try to get it in writing or confirmed that it's on record somewhere and take heed

I agree with howto. The court order is enforceable in all cases, nothing can over rule it BUT - the court will decide if it is in the DCs best interests for you to be penalised for breaking it.
I suggest you apply for an emergency amendment to your child arrangement order today, to cease all contact until further SS investigation and safeguarding is carried out.

Call the policewoman and explain you need this in writing, even just text or email.

And create a papertrail from your side as well: "As we discussed by phone, there is an enforcement order BLAH BLAH. I will need something in writing from you to show that it's MASH who have instructed me to suspend contact."

If that fails, would it be possible to turn up in person at the SS offices and, come contact time, handover to them? Drastic, but will focus their minds on either sorting the paperwork or taking responsibility for failing to follow the MASH instruction.

x-posted with better advice from PrettyBright.

I don't have a solicitor, can't afford one. He has a kick ass legal aid one :/
The court made the order, as well as the enforcement order.
Police say court can request copies of their report if needed.
Social services say they have allocated someone and they will contact me.
But I'm going to be in a situation in four hours where we both turn up to school to collect the children and I don't have anything formal to stop him.

Don't distress your ds playing daft games handing out to ss as previous post. Just stop contact, tell the court, give them the paperwork and ask for a hearing. You are untouchable if you do as I suggest and your child safest.

You need an emergency amendment. Don't just stop contact, you'll breach the order and whilst you may have good grounds, it sounds like it appears that you have a history of breaching orders, so that's a risk you don't want to take.

I self represented op, listen to me.

The child arrangement order is still ongoing so I can't apply to amend it yet.

The police can piss off, they can write a report they are fobbing you off.

I don't actually have a history of breaching orders. I have a history of reporting to social services each time they come back injured and ex doesn't like it so got and enforcement order.

You can apply with police evidence to have a hearing.

Who arrests, police, who said no contact police, get it in writing, don't move from cop shop till they play ball.

Try to contact the court that made the order and ask the judge to give you advice or make an amendment to the order

Would it be worth calling the school and explaining the situation?

I would have thought that the more communication to the authorities you make the better.
Your poor ds and poor you

I've rang the court and explained. They said if the child is at risk you're within your rights to not send them and have added a note to the judge.

There is physical evidence for this assault. Which there hasn't been on previous occasions - where he has claimed I'm being malicious and gone down the route of parental alienation.