DP accused of abuse

[Whatnow2017]

My DH was accused of abusing his sister when they were both kids, we found this out from his mum and she 100% believes her.

His mum is volatile and has genuine memory issues- the type you should chat with a dr, not the I can't remember where my keys are.

We're not close to his family as they never liked me at all so I'm not inclined to believe anything they say.

But what the hell now?! We have a kid together and there's no real issues to speak of, but what am I supposed to think and do?

I'm an anxious mess right now so I apologise if the message is a bit muddled, so is my head at this point.

Before anyone asks, DH never showed any inappropriate behaviour so I find it very hard to believe any of this.

It's OK, SewMeARiver I get it, women don't lie about rape/ abuse nearly as often as the aggressor gets away with it.

I'm not going to assume he's guilty without some more proof really and I'll get some advice and act on that.

I wouldn't advise either of you to contact this sister or his mother.
If I was your DH and was absolutely sure that there is no truth in her accusations I would go to the police myself and tell them that I'd been accused of Sexual abuse. I would also let SS know and tell them that the police are investigating these claims.

My perspective on this via my post was that some assumptions are red herrings, such as babysitting etc, and even mental health. You can't use those things to discredit an accusation and actually, the intention is to explore it rather than discredit it, does that make sense? which it does sound like you are trying to do.

Gaining an actual history of events via the appropriate channel will be able to give you a clearer picture - whether this was something that has been interpreted in a certain way, such a a blurry childhood memory, or a confusing event for the sister - the possibilities are endless at the current time and faced with a real lack of information, you cannot make a judgement or a decision without more information.

I for one am not judging him or you, I just don't think it's a good position To start from 'this cannot possibly have happened' should look like 'ok, let's get to the bottom of this'
I feel for you because this must be very hard. Please don't feel you can't post or anything. I know it's an emotive subject but you are entirely innocent and deserve to be able to discuss it

If they were both "tweenagers", two years apart, does that mean as one pp said, pre-teen? And does pre-teen mean up till age 12?
Would that mean it would be legally classified as sibling sexual abuse?

That would be still have been extremely harmful to her, and very likely to have been kept secret for years by her, but it does mean your husband would have been a child at the time too.

Perhaps bad things happened to your partner too and he was acting it out.

Adults need to protect children from doing this sort of thing to their siblings.
A lot of so called 'messing around' is incestuous abuse.

Perhaps too, as someone else said, this happened to her, but it was someone else who did it. The family sounds as though it has many difficulties.

I think it may be worthwhile you and DH getting some legal advice with a view to self reporting this to the police and getting both ahead of the allegations and professional advice on how to deal with this and your children (e.g. signs of abuse).

At this stage, until you have evidence otherwise, please remember that your husband is innocent. Accusations of abuse are really bad when the person is innocent. People here will no doubt say that doesn't matter as there are children involved but this could put a lifelong barrier between your children and their father for no reason. He has to be open to being investigated but if there is no evidence that has to be accepted by everyone involved.

but if there is no evidence that has to be accepted by everyone involved.>Would that mean it would be legally classified as sibling sexual abuse?

How could there be evidence? Unless someone witnessed it then there can be no evidence. The mother believing it is the red flag here.

Sorry. I may have misunderstood a lot of the subcontext of many posters here. The OP and her DH have a child so therefore the issue is that because of the accusation, he is liable to have abused his own child. Hence I was going in that direction.

Bluntness

Would that mean it would be legally classified as sibling sexual abuse?

Whatnow I think you will both need to talk to someone confidentially. If someone accused my husband, my instinct would be to trust him. I don't know whether some women of guilty men have doubts about their husbands and try to ignore them. Innocent men are wrongly accused. Whatever the outcome, the larger family sounds toxic. Hope you get some resolution soon,

I have tried looking up the age at which someone can be charged with a crime and found that the age of criminal responsibility in England and Wales is 10 years old. www.gov.uk/age-of-criminal-responsibility
I do think twelve is still a child though in so many ways.

Basically to be frank it seems you know enough details to even know what to think let alone post it on an internet forum.

Personally id do 2 things. 1 seek professional advise. 2 ask HQ to delete this thread.

In terms of memories of these things. I think someone messed around with me when I was about 4/5 years old. I have a strange memory that keeps coming back but no clarity as to who did it. It might never have happened but I do think I blocked it out as a child. Huge chunks of my childhood memories are missing. I don't know what that means. I don't expect I'll ever get answers. But just saying your sil could be telling the truth that something happened to her, she may have got the wrong person she may not. It does need investigating though as you will have some pretty legitimate questions regarding your own children's safety. I wish you all the best op, this is an awful thing for you to face. I hope your dh didn't do this. I hope your dc are safe.

Innocent till proven guilty...it is the basis of our law and justice...so tread carefully.

I think you're doing the right thing, contacting a lawyer, as this is a very difficult and potentially explosive situation. And NCPCC too without giving names.

I really don't think contacting social services as a first line of action is a good idea. Social
Services work to a different standard of probabilities and guilt than the main legal system. This means they can say you must protect your children from perceived risk, and it could get very serious, very quickly, even if there's not enough evidence to bring a conviction.

I'm not bashing SS, but I do wonder why people think they are the general arbitrator of all social and personal problems. They don't really have that role in daily life. And they are not here to make everyone happy, they are here to protect children at all costs.

You'd be inviting such a powerful force into your lives that may not act in the way that you'd find helpful. They won't be looking to keep families together at all costs, and they won't be too concerned at the effects their actions and investigations have upon the family. They'd see it as a necessary way of getting to the truth and ensuring your dc are not at risk.

It may be that there is no basis for taking this further. Or it may be that someone thinks it could well be true and it could well mean your own children are at risk. In that situation they may not be happy with the family continuing as it is whilst an investigation is going on. The length & strain of an investigation like that may be very hard to bear.

More something to manage with good solid legal advice, than to try and use as a general advice service.

"It’s important to remember that false accusations can and have destroyed and devastated innocent lives".

You can still be president of the USA with merely unproven & likely true allegations, never mind false ones.

The destruction and devastation of innocence is overwhelmingly skewed towards the victims of these crimes, who rarely see justice.

False allegations of sexual assault are as rare as false allegations of physical violence. Suggesting there's a difference in the absence of facts is an example of misogyny rather than the misandry you cite.

If I was your husband and innocent, I would be speaking to the police in order to protect myself, my family and my good name.

If I was your husband and guilty, I would be trying to sweep this under the carpet, avoiding any type of third party involvement and hoping the problem evaporates.

I'm going to go against the grain a bit here and suggest you speak to SS.
You need professional help in this and the NSPCC is a good start but I really think the police and SS should be involved.

I'm not going to make a condemnation on what you have posted it may be true it may not and nobody is in a place to know for sure until the police start investigations.

Can you speak to a family member that can speak to the sister and act as a go between for you both so you can ask if she will meet you and that you are passing it to the police and SS?

Sorry you are going through this OP.

It may be an idea to contact police and ask them to investigate these allegations. They may also involve SS and your DH may be asked to leave the house until the investigation is over and a conclusion is reached.

Your DH, if found not guilty (or there is no evidence to suggest that he did anything), should be allowed to go back to the house and resume family life, although during the investigations, SS may have the requirement that he is not left alone with your DC and can only have supervised access to them until this has been cleared up.

If he is found guilty, there's the problem with telling your DC about what happened (in an age appropriate way), and answering their questions as well as trying to move on from it. Like you say yourself OP, it's a mess, but going to the authorities first and asking them to investigate will get the ball rolling.

Lucy Faithfull Foundation may be helpful

I know it’s been a few years but I’m hoping the original poster sees this and could possibly send me a message?