Can father be prosecuted for hitting child if the mark has faded

[Peanut2525]

Child hit by father but mark has faded and she didn’t take a photo.
can he be prosecuted
there were witnesses

So, have the police been told about the pinning down incident or one of the hitting ones?

Have you contacted your local authority children's services for advice?
Stopping contact without valid evidence can make things more difficult (you're always advised to make sure you evidence ant difficulties like this) Social Services will say that it's a civil matter , but you need their back up if you're withholding contact because he can take you back to court for breaching the court order.

The police advised to stop contact

Then they will look to interview him as I've outlined above.

I will contact them Monday. Good idea.

Thanks

Without evidence, CPS will say that it’ll be a waste of money as there is no proof.

What on earth occurred to be pinned down? Has the 11yo been assaulted? Are they boy or girl?

Do you have this in writing?

No

There is a lot missing from this story.

What are you talking about “You’re always advised to have evidence”?!I’ve been through over a decade of proceedings and never heard this. The family court doesn’t actually require evidence and often it’s not available, decisions are made on the balance of probability. The standard advice is if you are concerned about contact then cease and make an application to the court.
op, if your daughter refuses to go to contact following this incident then Court should understand that you can’t make her. You may be in for a bumpy ride but ultimately if this actually happened, I don’t think they are going to try to make her go back.

I worked with a parent who hit their child and left a mark which was there for several days.Social services got involved and police but police did not follow it up and social services pulled out after maybe a couple of months.
It was deemed to be a 'one off' and the parent showed high levels of remorse and worked with social services to make changes, hence why it didn't go further.

Ok. This father has been hitting for years and my daughter told the police that

This is the first time a big mark but she just didn’t think to take a photo

She never wants to go again

She told the school who have sent in a marf form

@Driftingawaynow everyone's experience of family court proceedings can be very different . I was advised to keep a log of any issues (so probably evidence is the wrong word to use)

You might want to make an application to the court to request a variation of the order. I don’t think other children’s evidence will be required, if your daughter reports in her own words and not influenced by you that she was pinned down and marks were left on her arms then the family court will be realistic for ultimately there’s fuck all they can do to force her to go. They may see this as an abusive assault or simply poor parenting and Mayalso request a section 7 report into the well-being of your younger child. Your ex sounds like a Cunt, I hope you get a good judge who sees this.
it’s standard for police to give the sort of evidence you’ve been given and they won’t back it up in writing, and even if they did the judge will tell you it’s their court and not the polices.
don’t let the court catch you being adversarial with your ex, stay calm and don’t be emotional in there.
It’s straightforward, he hurt her, she now doesn’t want to go and you can’t make her.
At the end of the day 14 is pretty grown-up firstly in terms of their autonomy over contact and secondly in terms of things getting physical with them.
hang in there and give them both lots of hugs x

You have the right as a parent to exercise your PR and refuse contact if you have reasonable cause that your child could be at risk. If this was reported to police as you say then they would have referred on to children’s social care so expect a call from them.

Absolutely would not amount to an ABH. At best a common assault or you could down the child cruelty route for a more specific offence.

if the only witness is the child and said child has provided an ABE (don’t take statements from children) then there are admissible grounds for him to be charged. It will obviously depend how credible an reliable said child’s evidence is. If the mother is supportive will also count. Is the victim old enough?

doesn’t matter if the red mark has faded, no need to prove an injury for a low level offence.

Tell the police and children’s social care. They may want a child protection medical, but as there won’t be a mark to comment on this may be of limited use. However, children’s healthcare professionals will always raise the voice of the child. There doesn’t need to be a mark to prove there is an issue if the child has a clear history.

Yep not credible. Cps wouldn’t take that any further because there’s inconsistencies already regarding what the actual assault was. Op just a warning and I’m not suggesting at all that you are embellishing but police and cps do scrutinise the evidence. If matters are NFA’d or dropped a record is kept. Further if you ever were to be found to be embellishing it would do you no favours in fact would go against you for anything you report in the future.

So your children are being abused by their dad? You don’t need anyone on here to tell you what to do, this is a police matter.

Useful - thanks