Support for survivor of male violence - Fri Martin

[JusticeForFri]

Hi, I hope this is okay to share here? Fri Martin has her appeal coming up and we are trying to rally support. Fri is a young women from Liverpool, with two small children, who stabbed her abusive partner. He beat her, sexually assaulted her and dominated her with coercive and controlling behaviour. Justice for Women are collecting messages of support via social media or emails. It would be lovely if some mumsnetters could write some messages of support for Fri.

Here is some more info twitter.com/justice4women/status/1334821772785487873?s=21

Bumping, thanks op.

If anyone would like to send her a message please send to [email protected]
It would mean a lot to her to know that people care

Thanks, I'll do this later

Done

Bump

done

it's also finally made me get off my arse and set up a monthly donation to justice for women. it was really easy via their website, I can't believe it's taken me this long.

giving this a gentle bump

Fri's story which can be read in an article linked to from the tweets above is really tragic. the sentence she received does not feel like justice for her or her children.

an example of what excellent work justice for women do to fight the structural inequality that faces us because of our sex

@BernardBlackMissesLangCleg

giving this a gentle bump

Fri's story which can be read in an article linked to from the tweets above is really tragic. the sentence she received does not feel like justice for her or her children.

an example of what excellent work justice for women do to fight the structural inequality that faces us because of our sex

Thanks for your support! It’s really important that women like Fri know that others support her

Shameless bumping - the appeal is on Wednesday

crikey

thanks for bumping the thread and highlighting why we need organisations like justice for women

@Keithina123

men get abused to not just women. 85% of people who are accused of rape are found out to be not guilty. Don’t you think that is horrible that men get accused of something they didn’t do. It destroys there lives just because a women didn’t like them.

Nice bit of whataboutery there.

The rape conviction rates in the UK are appalling. Don't you think it is horrible that rapists go unpunished. Womens lives are destroyed because some man raped them and the criminal justice system lets them down.

men get abused to not just women.
85% of people who are accused of rape are found out to be not guilty.
Don’t you think that is horrible that men get accused of something they didn’t do. It destroys there lives just because a women didn’t like them.

Oh behave and bog off you prat. In comparison to women a very small number of men suffer abuse.
So you're saying 85% of rapes reported are just made up by women who don't like men.

Sounds likely.

You know what sounds even more likely? Women aren't taken seriously, their rapes are not investigated properly and rapists get away with it as it's not really seen as a major crime.

85% of people who are accused of rape are found out to be not guilty. even though most of them are guilty.

Fixed that for you.

The mental strain of living under coercive control and abuse is unbelievable. You don't know whether you are coming or going. You can't leave because you have no money and anyway he said he would kill you if you leave. You begin to believe everything he says even if you are sure you didn't say such and such but he told you he did do you must have. Years of living like this are just torture. I really hope this is understood in her trail. I'm ten years free and I am still undoing all the abuse. I also have an inflammatory condition brought on by years of stress. I'll be thinking of her x

Having read the story, yes she was physical and emotionally abused, there is no doubt about that, but his attempts at coercive control wasn't really working if she regularly went out drinking and meeting up with friends and the arguments were 'volatile' and both were physical with each other. She wasn't downtrodden and controlled, but clearly fighting to retain her freedom.

The fact she lied about the event and tried to cover up her crime would make me feel she was capable of just asking him to leave or going to a woman's shelter and not put up with this behaviour. She was intoxicated when she committed the act and I'm sorry, did it in anger in the heat of a violent argument. If it had been self defence, why didn't she say so immediately?

She had options to get out. Manslaughter for sure, but this isn't as clear cut as other cases of long standing abuse ending woman snapping. If the genders were reversed we wouldn't be having this debate.

The sentence of course is outrageous, but she should not walk away free because she had options to tell friends and family and the police, and walk away from the abuse. Someone's son/brother etc died, and that shouldn't be forgotten.

If the genders were reversed

gender, that prissy, mimsy, hyacinth bucket word

SEX

SEX SEX SEX SEX SEX

it is Fri's sex that meant she was a mother, that she was the primary carer, that she found herself in a situation she felt unable to escape, that she felt unable to talk to or be heard by her all male defence team, that the court viewed her in a less sympathetic light, not taking her PTSD into account

c'mon, unclench, you can say it:

SEX

Sex 😂😂😂😂😂

Thought I'd be politically correct.

@goldenharvest coercive and controlling behaviour is far more complex than that and there are so many reasons that women don’t leave their abusers. She did lie initially but that’s not strange when you consider traumatic amnesia and fear of what was going to happen to her two small children. Even Fri herself is not saying she shouldn’t have been prosecuted, just that it was manslaughter not murder. Her brother speaks about it here www.justiceforwomen.org.uk/news/2020/12/11/recording-of-the-public-meeting-held-10th-december-2020

I just can't believe that a jury can find Timothy Brehmer guilty of manslaughter, when it was obviously murder and find Fri guilty of murder when it was obviously manslaughter, how backwards are things in our judicial system.

@JusticeForFri. Totally agree it should be manslaughter. I was in an abusive coercive marriage for many years, so I know exactly what it does to you. I wouldn’t have been allowed out drinking with friends, and (for many years) I never argued back. Fri was not beaten down enough not to argue back and the fact she had been drinking heavily and arguing with the victim says to me she lost control and picked up a knife. To me that is manslaughter. I’m not convinced it was self defence but the police should have looked at that too.

To me people in domestically violent relationships cannot immediately use the defence of coercive controlling behaviour being the reason they killed someone, and their intention wasn’t to kill. It’s like saying a careless driver who kills someone shouldn’t be held responsible as there intention wasn’t to injure anyone. In the end someone is dead, and their life is also important. Sentences however should reflect all circumstances and take into account mitigating factors, like CC/violence.