Possible child welfare case, need advice re his ex partner

[Namechanged1234567]

Sorry this is long and complicated but quite serious.

DP and his ex wife have a 3 year old child. They separated when their child was newborn. Ex wife has mental health issues which she is medicated for and a history of violence and drug abuse, which she also left behind her years ago. By all accounts she is a good mother to their child.

DP's child spends every weekend with us. I have DC from a previous marriage and we have a baby of our own.

A couple of years ago ex wife got a new partner. DP wanted to meet him if he was going to be spending time around his child but ex wife refused. I came on mums for advice and was told that it was none of DP's business and he was controlling for wanting to meet this new man. He never met him.

So yesterday DP received an email from ex wife partner. He said that ex is selling herself for cocaine, had a threesome which was filmed and her child walked in during it, that his child was taken to hospital for swallowing cocaine and a few more horror stories.

DP immediately went to fetch his child without telling the mother what it was about. Ex wife partner asked to meet DP to talk through what had been going on. Ex wife then gets wind of what's happening and her, her family and friends all barrage DP with calls saying that the partner is psychotic. They said he's been beating ex wife, that the police are involved and that he has a history of violence against women, robbery and burglary and has been to prison......

So we now have his child safe and are not sure the next steps to take. Either he is lying or she is, but either was she has allowed this man into her child's life. He was in prison for a spell while they were together for drink driving too.

I am so angry and upset that this shitstorm has been brought into all of our lives and desperately worried about DP's child. The mother now wants to take their child 200 miles away to live, it's just insanity.

You really don't need to call out of hours children's services but you can if you feel you want to have a record of what you have done.
He needs to apply for residence and negotiate contact throughout the proceedings through mediation. Just because the starting point is residence doesn't mean they need to end up with that arrangement.

Do you feel it would be morally right to apply for residency under these circumstances?

All you have are allegations from an ex partner whose only reason for contacting you is to cause problems for the mother. You need to find out if there is any truth in the allegations before all the residency stuff. Tbh if the child had been taken to hospital for swallowing drugs social services would already be involved and the childs father would know about it. I think you need to calm down and encourage your partner to not over react. If this turns out to be malicious the mother will be very angry with you both and this will affect the future contact arrangements.

Do you feel it would be morally right to apply for residency under these circumstances?

Based on the information you currently have, yes. If things change, your DH can withdraw or change what he is asking the courts to order.

Are you reading any of my posts?
Sorry but I do know about this area!
The bottom line is that she can't stay there at the moment, you have various allegations some of which are likely to be true. Your choices are to return her and ask social services to assess the situation or to keep her and ask the courts to do so. Courts have far more power than social services and in this case they are the appropriate body to apply to.
As I say, it doesn't have to be permanent, and it may not even result in you having residence but it will safeguard the child in the meantime.

Thank you Gallavich, I think we're going to apply on Monday. Do you know exactly what it is we should be applying for? Would a PSO not just stop her from leaving but mean she stil had residency?

As I said before, you need a Child Arrangements order to deal with where she lives and stays, and a prohibited steps to predvent relocation and exposure to the man.

I'm a family solicitor. That's what I'd tell you to fo if you came to see me Tuesday. ehich is when the courts reopen.

As the ex wife doesn't have a court order in place then she no more has residence than you do.
You would be applying for a child arrangements order, you can download the form and fill it in then take it to the court on Tuesday and pay the fee to file it.
It's not a prohibited steps order that you need (I don't think) as you are applying to vary her living arrangements, not to prevent the ex wife doing a specific thing.
Remember that judges can and do grant interim orders while they order assessments to go ahead so you could get an interim order until more is known, then through mediation negotiate a suitable contact/care arrangement that means she spends enough time with her mum but is also kept safe.

Follow bert's advice where it varies from mine as she is a solicitor.
Bert - wouldn't the child arrangements order deal with the risk of her taking dd or exposing her to the boyfriend? Why the need for a second order? Just curious.

No, you can't assume the judge would order the child to live with dad, and clearly the child at the very least should spend time with mum. What is the minimum change needed to make the child safe? Forbidding mum to bring the child into contact with the boyfriend. So, that's a fairly likely outcome. In which case you also need an order preventing relocation.

Even if the judge ordered the child to live with dad for the time being, whilst investigations are carried out, the child needs to see her mum, so protective orders (or an undertaking from the mum) would still be needed.

Thanks. We all live here in the South, including the boyfriend. The ex wife is now trying to relocate to the Scottish border to start a fresh...

The fact is she has been using drugs (we know this) and has had a violent man (we know they have attacked each other regularly) who has a string of convictions and been to prison during the relationship, around her child.

She refused to give the mans details to DP as she knew he would not want his child around this person.

The rest may or may not be true. Some of it is, other stuff maybe not. He motives are revenge, that much is obvious, although he has said he's worried about the child....

She has a history of violence and drug abuse herself as well as a string of violent drug busing boyfriends. If she moves away she will be away from her partner but will also be away from DP. He will not be able to monitor the situation.

As MrsB has said you need to apply for a prohibitive steps order to stop her moving away as well as sorting out residency/contact/child arrangements.

It's probably going to take some time to sort all this out and obviously he doesn't want his DD to move away to Scotland in the meantime hence the prohibitive steps order.

Never mind prohibitive steps. If I believed my child was living in a shitty situation I'd go for custody, it's a no brainer surely? And it'll be granted if there's truth to it.

And how come he had a child with an unstable drug user?

Sorry, missed the violent bit. Why is his child living in this environment? If he knows about it???

She used to use drugs and had a charge of gbh, this is before she met DP. He seemingly kept her grounded. She seemed to be a good mother, although depressed.

He only found out about the allegations yesterday and within an hour had collected his child.

If police have been called to the house where a child is present social work will be involved, they are automatically called by police.

I think acting to protect the child is the right thing. However, it prob wouldn't hurt to keep an open mind whilst doing so. The fact that she used to be addicted to drugs would seem to make it more likely that what the ex is saying is true now EXCEPT that if he is abusive than that is exactly what, knowing her history, he would say, just as if she had mental health issues he would suggest she was going of the rails, or if she had been abused as I child he would refer to that. Basically whatever was in her past would be used against her. So both scenarios could be true, or something in the middle.

There is no such thing as "custody" in English family law. The relevant order is a child arrangements order, which can specify with whom the child lives, with whom they spend time, and for what periods.

Your DP needs to deal with this in the main.

He needs to keep care of the child and ask SS to get involved in order to establish whether there are any risks.

That's all that needs to be done.

You and he do not need to be having futile conversations with his ex as TBH that will get you nowhere re any risks being assessed and the child's other parent being able to resume parenting responsibilities of whatever kind.

He has spoken to his ex. She says she is the victim here and the police have said the man is allowed nowhere near her. She says she's suffered enough without DP taking her child away too. She says she wants the child back.

I'm a social worker. In this situation I would be advising both parents that she should stay with dad at the moment (but it would be good for the child to see her mother if you can arrange that without difficulties)
Somebody needs to assess what has been going on in that house. Whether she is using drugs and exposing the child to sexual activity, or whether the partner was abusing the mother, or a combination of both; it's a mess and not suitable for a child.
Your husband shouldn't be trying to make any long term arrangements for her care now, but he shouldn't be returning her.

If that's what the police say, OP, then I'd be thinking this whole business is an attempt to further abuse your DSD's DM. They have confirmed the Ex isn't allowed near her, and have not told your DH about any concerns about his DD. Luckily for all of you it sounds like all these allegations are no more than malice.

So, who was at the house yesterday wen your DP collected his DC?

Presumably if the mother was innocent and a victim of the partner's violence she would have been at the house and they would have had this conversation yesterday?