Mummy Where Are You? (Revised Edition, new) (20 page)

              It was, indeed a frightening thought that babies could be earmarked to be taken at birth from a parent, because there was something in their family background that was considered a flaw.  This could be as tenuous as someone having a Grandmother who had suffered depression or a distant cousin who had taken drugs.   Virtually anything in a family’s history could be used as an indication that the child would have some kind of genetic flaw and the whole idea of this bill was reminiscent of a move towards some kind of Aryan Race – was this Neo Nazism in action?  One could only wonder, but it certainly felt that way.  As I listened to the views of those speaking out against the bill being actioned on the Island, I felt increasingly compelled to speak.  I was a victim of the way that children can be suddenly and unfairly stolen from a loving home and I needed to warn people to register their opposition to such a bill to avoid suffering the same fate.

              Standing right next to the Minister for Social Services, whose face turned purple as I told the audience of some two hundred people what I had experienced, I described the harrowing events of what had happened to us.  I was careful not to give out my name or the names of anyone involved so that I couldn't be accused of Contempt of Court, but several people knew me or my family and in a place that small, there could be no hiding one’s identity. I finished my tale of horror, then quickly left.

              It had taken me courage to stand up and speak and I now felt drained.  As I left the room, several people patted me on the back and congratulated me for speaking out and it was then that I met two people who would have important roles in my life from then on – one was a non-practising psychologist who offered me her support and one was a man with political aspirations who, as soon as he was elected made contact with me and had his own concerns about the Department.  The lady, Sheila, offered me friendship and emotional support but I was not sure whether to even trust her.  I was battered and suspicious now of people’s motives and had had my fingers burned so many times in placing my trust in people who turned out to be false friends, that I didn't ring her until some weeks after the meeting.  I agonised for quite a while before I finally met her, but she turned out, at least on the surface, to be genuine and very supportive.

              Speaking of false friends – I digress here back to America for a moment and the realtor Miriam who had befriended M and I, but had seemingly jumped ship when she attempted to negotiate with his father.  Consequently, a number of things happened. For one my car which had been put into her safekeeping disappeared without trace.  She had volunteered to sell this for me when I left but two years later, I still had not received any money and attempts to find out where it was, failed completely. Secondly she found a tenant on a private basis for the house and I was delighted to have some income, but nervous when she said this woman was a friend and that she had taken no deposit or references from her before giving her the keys – knowing I was far away and could not check things out – I had a bad feeling about this from the start.

              I knew that Miriam considered anyone who walked into her office seeking to buy a house, a friend and that most likely she knew nothing about this woman at all. Miriam was persuasive and told me that the lady in question was going through a terrible divorce and had a son the same age as mine.  She very much played on my sympathy and convinced me that I was as good as saving these poor soul's lives by offering them refuge.  I still remained unconvinced deep down and had a feeling of impending doom about the outcome of this arrangement – which sadly turned out to be right. 

              The woman paid one month’s rent before defaulting.  They trashed the house causing thousands of dollars worth of damage and left it full of cat urine, garbage in the garage and rotting food in the fridge.  Miriam did ask them to leave eventually but I then sent her money to get the house cleaned which she pocketed.  By the time I had found a reputable Property Manager to take the house on, it was in such a bad way that it took a year’s rent from the new tenants to fix all the damage.  It was heartbreak – I still considered the little house our home and to have it so violated was very upsetting indeed, not to mention the financial consequences which were hard to bear.  It seemed that everything we had built, was being torn down around us.

              At this time, I had also made a complaint regarding the UK police force in R's county.  I had begun this before I had gone to America, when they had failed to investigate the allegations that M had made in regards to staying with his father in England.  They refused to do so, saying that the local police had already investigated and they were not going to do this again.  I'd then passed the matter to the
Independent Police Complaints Commission
-
IPCC
, who upheld my appeal against this decision, just before we ran and I decided to attempt to reopen this which I managed to do successfully.  When again the UK police failed to agree to carry out any investigation of their own, Tom wanted to take the matter to Judicial review.  He wrote one of the strongest letters we had in the case and he described in it what he had witnessed on viewing M’s DVD evidence which he had previously done  along with Brian and Brian’s assistant Julie who had come over with him to take notes. 

              All three had come back from watching the DVD with the same reaction “M was definitely abused by his father.”  Tom went further in saying that he believed that in the UK,  M’s father would have been charged on far less than what M had disclosed to the police. 

              The  part of the interview which had struck me most was that M had begged the police officer who interviewed him to “please make it stop,” in regards to the abuse. Her response had been, “we can’t do anything and we can’t make it stop.”  This was what they called Child Protection.  They protected themselves, each other and the perpetrator but not the child.

              Regrettably Tom came off the case before we had an opportunity to follow the line of action he was then recommending.  I believe not doing so was a grave mistake, but the person who replaced him wanted to focus on my Criminal Trial and felt this was a side issue. 

              Tom's demise came when the Judge decided to press on with M’s father’s application to have me committed for contempt by breaching the Prohibited Steps Order.  A Directions Hearing took place to set a date for the Contempt Application to be heard in the Family Court.  Tom took the decision, without my instruction or consent, to make an admission of guilt on my behalf.  I had been given five minutes to leave Court for him to supposedly take instruction.  He fired statements at me very quickly; “It's true that you went to Florida, isn't it?" "It's true that you breached this Order, is it not?”  Of course, both of these things were fact, but when I tried to argue that I had done this for good reason, and that any admission of guilt would contradict my defence of necessity in the Criminal Court, he just said, well “those are the facts and you can’t argue with them.”  He then returned to Court and made a plea of guilt, which placed me in the position of facing possible sentencing, prior to trial, potentially weakening our stance in the Criminal Court.

              I was horrified, but sat there powerless to do anything about it.  Gabby was furious and I understand that afterwards she had a face to face heated argument with Tom for jeopardizing our position in the Criminal Trial. 

              I emailed Tom the night he'd thrown me to the wolves.  I asked him again if he believed in me and believed in our situation.  But despite his fine words in his letter to the IPCC, he again replied that “he didn’t need to believe me in order to represent me.”  On this, Brian was of the same opinion as me, Tom had to come off the case.

              It was a shame that someone who had had such good ideas and was so strong in cross examination, had so little faith in me.  He had even tried to persuade me to tell the Guardian Ad Litem that I had inadvertently influenced M and had become angry when I would not agree to.  I had not influenced M in any way and nor could he have been influenced.  Children of six cannot sustain a forty minute interview if they are not telling the truth.  I pointed this out to Tom.  I told him that M could barely remember what he had for lunch at school that day at that age and there was no way I could have scripted him for an interview.  What was more, I had no prior notice of the interview and thus no opportunity and certainly had no motive for doing so. 

              His father at that time, was only seeing him a couple of days a month and was paying good maintenance and private school fees, as well as contributing towards holidays for M, so what on earth could be my motive for wanting to risk losing all that?  Common sense dictated that M had to be telling the truth and I felt deeply let down that Tom did not seem to have the faith in us that we needed in someone who was going to represent us.  Whilst he was an aggressive lawyer, he achieved very little in the end.

              Despite the huge fortune we were paying our ever-expanding legal team, our average monthly bill now mounting to close to £50,000 between the family  and criminal cases, little progress was made and we didn't know how long we could go on.

              Brian headed to London the next day and texted me from the train to say that he was on his way to seek new Counsel.  I hadn't even got as far as asking him to do this, but he knew that I wouldn't accept anything less than someone who was totally committed to us, and most importantly at least was sure our innocence.  If there was even a shred of a doubt this may inadvertently reveal itself in Court. 

              It was a shame really as in many ways Tom was a better performer in Court than anyone we had had before.  He'd been very tenacious but without that relationship of trust, it was not going to work.  Later on I learned that Tom had just landed a much bigger case and Julie, Brian’s assistant told me that she believed he had lost interest in us in favour of the new case. 

              Phillip was the next person to join our team.  He was a QC rather than a barrister, so technically of higher rank.  Brian had gone to London to meet with several barristers but was seeing Phillip about another case and had told him our story.  Phillip had then offered to take it on.  Apparently our case had really captured his interest.  Brian contacted me that night to say he'd found the man for the job and our hopes were again raised.

              Meanwhile the Department were pushing harder towards their ultimate aim of giving residency to M’s father.  Having got M to now see him by dint of delivering the
Playstation
, he was due to visit M at the Foster Carers home.                Unlike myself, R didn't have to endure the humiliating and restraining conditions of the Contact Centre.  He had the opportunity to not only befriend the Foster Carers but to go out to the park with M where he would have only cursory supervision by them.  M, who was a well behaved child and clearly in awe of all the adults pressurising him, was conforming to their wishes.  It was also now three years since he had made his first disclosure to me and between them working on his brain to distort and dilute his memories and the various grand gestures made by his father by way of lavish gifts, he began to cooperate, having resisted resolutely for the first five months since his return. 

              To this day I do not know what was said to M, but I suspect a great deal of manipulation was used.  I have no doubt in my mind that M was coerced and I do know he feared staying in foster care or possibly being adopted.  He had seen that happen to another child who was with the same family.  I guess in situations such as these children will do what is necessary to survive – even if that includes forgiving their abusers.  It was clear to M that he was not going to be given back to me from the very fact that he knew that Mummy was in a great deal of trouble for taking him to America and also that compared to the fast increasing contact with his father, mine had only increased by half an hour and the conditions surrounding it had tightened even harder.

              M had little or no life with the Foster Carers compared to the life he had led before, so being allowed to go out anywhere was a huge relief from the oppressive conditions he was forced to endure.  His father naturally placed all sorts of temptations in his way.  He took him Go-Karting, swimming, played football and did all the things that I had done with M before, but the difference was that he was seen to be doing these things and he played everyone with his practised charm, ensuring his status as victim whilst he pursued his mission to take my little boy away from his mother.

              M, with the innocence and naivety of childhood, knew nothing of the danger he was in and began placing his trust in someone who did not have his best interests at heart - a man who saw him as a tool by which to persecute me  and seek his revenge for my daring to go to Social Services when M had disclosed the abuse and was now determined to torment and destroy me for the rest of my days.

              I first got wind of the fact that direct contact had been achieved and that M was about to spend unsupervised contact with his father at his father’s cottage in the south of the Island, one Friday in February.  This had sent me into a state of total panic.  I was so worried about his safety and anxious following another upsetting time with M when he had seemed particularly nervous and clingy with me, that my father had decided to take me out for dinner to distract me. 

              At this time the police appeared to be watching our homes with vigilance and following us everywhere.  Dad had twice been stopped on the pretext of driving too slowly.  I had been stopped for “being, about to speed.”  It was ludicrous.