Is emotional/domestic abuse a criminal offence?

[poshsinglemum]

If not, should it be? I think so although emotional abuse mabe difficult to proove.

Wasn't this proposed in France earlier this year?

iirc physical abuse would come under normal gbh type prosecution, but "abuse" isn't a criminal offence.

I agree that it should be but emotional / financial abuse would be extrememly hard to prove in a court of law. I guess it'd come down to character witnesses for the defence saying how much they'd changed and things like that.

I would be a bit worried aobut the idea of 'emotional abuse' becoming a criminal offence because it can be so incredibly subjective and there are people who are self-obsessed whinyarses who think that not getting their own way all the time means they are being 'abused'.
Certainly physical domestic abuse should be subject to the same prosecution as any assault on anyone else - an assault is an assault whether or not you live in the same house.

Psychological abuse/assault within marriage has recently been made an offence in France. I think it's a good idea but on a practical level would be very hard to prove. But it sends the message that this type of 'hidden' abuse exists and is just as damaging as physical abuse.

Some elements of EA are already crimes - harassment, false imprisonment, common assault, threatening behaviour, criminal damage, threatening to cause criminal damage, threatening violence, blackmail, malicious communications, actual bodily harm (which includes psychological injury).

The CPS document is here.

Grace: Yes, I have no problem with that - I think (again) it's stuff that would be a crime whether or not you live with/know the person. But I would be concerend if it was sort of understaood in law that if you and a partner are rowing and one of you calls the other a silly sod, then you can ring the police and go 'Waaaah I'm being emotionally abused'.

Yes, it's a difficult area to legislate. Mental torture is a crime, and so are human rights abuses (as long as we remain signatory). I wish the info in that document were more widely known - people so often put up with abuse, in all kinds of situations including domestic. If they knew that what's happening is a CRIME, they might be more aware of what's happening & what it means.

Common assault and harassment aren't likely to result in a custodial sentence. My point is that, if an abused partner can look at that list and report it as a crime, she's a sight less likely to feel she ought to put up with it.

There is a working party trying to hammer out definitions of abuses like gaslighting and bullying in general ... at least, there was this morning! Don't know if it's been axed in the new budget

Isn't it possible too that any law could be used against abused partners by particularly manipulative emotional abusers. Often emotional abusers do turn situations within the marriage/partnership round claiming the abused are actually being the abusers. It could be used as a tool to regain control when an abused partner is leaving say?

Or perhaps I am being too simplistic and emotional abusers aren't likely to want to raise attention to their own manipulations to people outside the marriage circle.

Agree with SGB. Whinyarses. Love it.

rowingcah, yes, that's why you would have to prove psychological injury under present law, rather than 'emotional abuse' being an illegal behaviour. My divorce papers say I emotionally abused XH#2, because that's the only way I could get him to sign. If EA were a broadly-defined crime, he could then have prosecuted.

The law looks for effects of the abuse. Many of the posters in this topic would certainly be found to be suffering 'actual bodily harm' if they were to take it to law - whereas the abuser wouldn't.

I've not read up on the French approach, but this thread's made me interested!

I, for one, wish it was a criminal offence. I have often thought that what my exh did was a crime. Spousal abandonment, Child abandonment and therefore Neglect. No maintenance paid, ignored court order that he pays all costs of divorce, major theft of our savings and overdraft totalling 20k, and severe psychological trauma and torture of ME in the process.

In fact though, he did nothing 'criminal'. He just ran away to fuck whores and scuba dive in thailand, stealing our money and leaving me with a 6 month old. Oh, and he lied on his CV to get a good teaching job there, when he has in fact been struck off the teaching register here, for Gross Misconduct.

If I left our son in his cot and flew to the Maldives to shag young men I would be behinmd bar4s - if they bothered to come and find me of course. No 'authority' (police, debt collectors, whoever) are the slightest interested in finding him.

Well, he's guilty of fraud and contempt of court at the very least. Not enough to extradite him though

Child Neglect/Child Cruelty/Child abandonment... he is guilty in my book of all three. One might argue that he left his son with me - his mother - and therefore techincally did not 'abandon' the baby. But he left me in the most tortuous circumstances, penniless and in the most hideous fashion, with no regard for how I might be able to cope with, or raise the baby.

Indeed, a month after exH abandoned us and went abroad, my son was removed from me for three days by police and social services, because I was not coping.

He has shown utter disregard for the welfare of his baby son. In fact he wrote to the German colluders saying that I was drunk every night and flew into terrible rages and he thought 'sod it' and decided to leave us.

So by his own admission and in print (it was a bloody lie of course) he left his baby son in the hands of a raving drunk.

He should be found, charged and banged up.

I feel very strongly about this. Because he is not the only man/father/horror of a human, to have got away with this so very easily.

He is not suffering at all as far as I am aware - and I am not talking about karma, I am talking legally and financially. He is enjoying a sex-filled, fun-filled, well-off existence.

He should be serving a sentence.

Don't know about England, but in Scotland, physical abuse is prosecuted with a domestic aggrivation, so the sheriff can deal with it appropriately, and see whether there is a pattern of behaviour. Some emotional abuse, ie where a breach of the peace is committed, or abusive texts, will also be given that aggrivation, so will be taken into account in sentencing.

Though I should add, he wrote to his brother that seeing as he left me with a good fridge, cooker and car, that more than made up for anything he stole or did.

He should be in prison, not free to go on and revisit his criminal intent and behaviour on some other woman/women. Or men for that matter.

I wish I had more time and money - I would pursue this issue, campaigning for some kind of law and register for these types of men - just as there is a sex offender register.

He is a danger to the poor young prostitutes he has engaged with too for that matter.

He was very cunning going to Thailand where he is beyond the short arm of UK law.

Unfortunately it would be too difficult to prove in most circumstances. Hearsay etc. Controlling behaviour in any sphere of life isn't illegal as far as I know. But perhaps some sort of compensation package would be a start.

My x managed to live for free for 4 years whilst I busted my gut to pay the rent etc etc and it would be nice to have that money back.

But then to be fair I should have told him to pack his bags a long time before he did. Actually he didn't even bother to do that. Till the very last I had to do that for him.

Just best to put these relationships behind us and learn the signs so as not to get involved with another person like that in the future.

Easier said than done though.

UA, your register idea might work. I have come across sites where you can post details about ex boyfriends, etc., some of which have been sued, but an official register of people like your exH who have done a bunk, abandoned spouses and children, cleaned out bank accounts, and all of the above can be proven, might be useful.

That is what I mean Math. It can all be proved. In Spades. And those who have covered for him and allowed him to continue unexposed, should also be given some kind of caution for allowing him to get away with it:

I am talking about the Tesol school in Thailand at which he trained - the organisers there know all about him because I warned them and they even had his conduct confirmed by his school in this country, yet still they decided to do nothing to stop him gaining a good teaching job and the German publishing executive who has kept him in clover with freelance work since he left us....he too knows exactly what h did and chose to believe h's tale of woe instead of looking at the bare facts - ie he is living in thailand and his baby son is in the UK. And he has a son of his own only a little older than my boy.

They have both aided and abetted a crime in my book.

I wonder what my son will make of them all - of his father, and of his colluders - when he is old enough to be told the truth and shown the stark evidence. He may well form a very poor regard for a legal system that allows a father to recklessly abandon a baby and wife, ignore court rulings, not repay large debts that the bank is chasing him for...

Have you had any therapy, UA? Sounds like you're finding it hard to move on.

UA: What your husband did was decide he didnt want to be in a relationship with you any more. That is something every human being has a right to do. I have seen a lot of your posts on the subject and while I agree that this man should have been prosecuted for theft (he cleaned out the bank account) and the bank manager who allowed this should have been disciplined for incompetence, other people and organisations, such as your XH's employers, are not obliged to listen to what may come across to them as the rantings of a deranged person - it is not their job to police what employees do outside working hours.

THe idea of a 'register' is a crappy one as so many people become vindictive and nasty when dumped, even though the partner doing the dumping has not acted with curelty or dishonesty, just exercised his/her right to end a relationship that isn't happy and isnt working.

As I said, I have seen a lot of your posts on the subject and there is something I think you ought to consider, which is that you may have played some part in what happened to you. I am getting the impression that you were, for whatever reason, absolutely desperate and determined to hold on to a relationship with a man who was never that keen in the first place. He seems to have treated you with cruelty and indifference for some time before his departure: I don;t know what damage might have been done to you by others to put you in the mindset that a crap relationship should be held on to at all costs, but a lot of people would have said 'good riddance' to the man long ago.

I think you are also in danger of damaging your son by your bitterness about your ex. I'd say the less you tell him about his dad the better tbh.

Although UA may come across as bitter, I think essentially she is right, it is very easy for men to bugger off, leave their families and avoid paying anything towards the upkeep of their children, and no one is that obthered, in fact, if his skills are required in wirk then his entire conduct is overlooked, and thus society colludes to disadvantage the weak against the strong.

There is also the flip side which a friend of mine has where he has effectively been barred from ever seeing his daughter again by his wife, who really is deranged...she made him always arrange to go over, then is ALWAYS out when he goes, and if he writes to his daughter the letter is returned annotated with her comments.

So the door does swing both ways BUT most of the sufferers are women.

I do think that if Amnest International define something as abuse/crime when it happens to prisoners then it should be a crime when practised on a spouse by a spouse.

But Miggsie, prisoners can't walk away from their abusers.

Well in Ireland it's recognised as constituting domestic violence and qualifies the sufferer to apply for the remedies and barring orders available under the DV act for their protection. They would not be able to constitute a prison sentence but they do affect constitutional rights so are pretty far reaching in legal terms but this has also drawn criticisms.

Solid I quite agree with you - that he had every right to end the marriage if he did not want to be in it anymore. He did not have the right to behave as he did in ending the marriage.

A lot of people bang on on MN about how children have a right to a father and a right to have a relationship with their father. Well my son's father has denied him that basic right in that case.

You have seen a lot of posts about this because i consider it to be a serious issue. It is nothing to do with me hanging onto a man at all costs - you are very very wrong. But of course you don't know me so it's not a problem that you should make such an assumption.

I am truly happy as a single parent, I enjoy my freedom and I love being a mother. I am competent, socially skilled, good with money, have a lovely home, am very organised and work hard cleaning. I do not need or want a relationship and have no idea or interest in whether that might one day change.

I am not bitter. Ask imblet. I don't think she would say that I am 'bitter'. I struggled terribly to get over what he did and to get back on my feet, true. I still struggle at times and I post on here when things are bad. But essentially I have survived his terrible treatment of us both and two years on have created a loving and happy life for my boy.

I do not feel the need to defend myself anyway as this is not the point..It is simply a discussion about whether fathers/men (or women for that matter) do specifically this - lie, steal, run away abandoning a baby, then deceive their way into a third world country to sleep with its prostitutes and gain a good job on the back of a concocted CV, not to mention has escaped huge debts that banks and other creditors are chasing him for, should actually be able to do this. There is no system for bringing them to book. There is no reciprocal agreement between here and Thailand re maintenance, there is no way banks will actually take money from his Co-Op account to retrieve the money he owes them.

And fwiw, I most certainly shall tell my son the truth about his father - god knows when he will be old enough to know, perhaps in his teens/twenties or 30s? I have no idea. It would be very wrong I think, if I, as his mother, also colluded in creating a thin veil of deceit or obfuscation when it comes to the man who made him.

Just my thoughts.

Going to have a pimms and lemonade now. Enjoying the glorious sunshine, my son is having a nap and I bought him some crocs this morning. I am, in fact, so blessed.