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Hello all.
I am after whatever advice I can get.
My wife left me in July of last year. She moved out of my property leaving our children in my care. I was obviously happy to maintain the care of the children.
She quickly began a new relationship within a week or two of leaving the family home and had very little contact with the children.
Eventually she started to see the children little by little and we worked back up to a 50/50 split.
My ex varied from loving and wanting to recommence a relationship with me to being extremely hostile. During this time she would continually state that she needed the children to be declared as living with her so that she can claim housing and benefits. My response was always that the children should not be used in any way and we should maintain a healthy fair split between us.
After around 6 months of separation I met a woman and began dating. When my ex found out about this she made false allegations to the police and children’s school about me. She removed our children from their school early so that I could not pick them up and she ran away with them severing all contact. After 2 weeks of not taking the children to school she enrolled the children in a new school, again without my permission. Due to the fact that I was cut off from my children I was forced to apply for a child arrangement order. In response to this my ex managed to obtain an emergent ex parte non molestation order against me all based off of extremely revolting false allegations.
I responded to appeal the non molestation order with an enormous amount of evidence to prove the allegations were false. However I have never been given a return hearing to plead my case. This is an obvious failing of the court process.
on top of this I found out that when I applied for the child arrangements order the same judge heard the NMO right before seeing me.
I have jumped through every hoop and done everything by the book. I have fully engaged with CAFCASS. However my ex has done none of this. She has ignored solicitors and CAFCASS.
We had a hearing this week after 10 weeks of not having any contact with my children.
The judge seemed to be pandering to my ex and favouring her. None of my evidence for the non mol had been considered and all I got was a quick “sorry that hasn’t been dealt with”.
The judge did state that my ex’s actions were wrong for the fact that she took them from me and their school and ran away was wrong, but that was all.
Now whilst we are now waiting for a fact finding hearing my ex is being allowed to maintain control of our children and heavily dictate what I can and can not do even though CAFCASS have raised safeguarding concerns against her and my evidence raises concerns.
i feel as though I have been let down by the system and she has been allowed to do what ever she wants when ever she wants just because she is a mother.
what can I do? My legal team are playing by the books as I would expect, but I am not being given fair opportunity to be a loving father.
Please help.
hi,
would have been great to avoid a fact find hearing. but as it's on now, can concentrate on that, and hopefully it goes in your favour. are Cafcass doing a section 7 report also?
@bill337 thank you for your reply. Yes CAFCASS will be doing a full report now.
It baffles me that she did not engage with them the first time round and CAFCASS raised their own concerns from her medical history, yet she is still allowed to dictate and be favoured by the courts. I have been given no opportunity for fairness by the court.
It's clear from what you've shared that your ex's actions have been manipulative and unjust, and it's especially disheartening to hear that the judge's rulings seem to be favoring her unfairly. It's not right that she's able to dictate your relationship with your kids while disregarding legal processes and concerns raised by CAFCASS. I wish I had a magic solution for you, but all I can offer is my sympathy and solidarity. Keep leaning on your legal team, keep pushing for fair treatment, and don't lose hope. And if you haven't already, maybe consider reaching out to a divorce lawyer Oceanside for some additional support and guidance through this difficult time. You deserve every chance to be the loving father you want to be, and I hope things start looking up for you soon.
An update to the current situation.
After all of the stress and jumping through every hoop with CAFCASS, I was lead to believe that CAFCASS were fully on my side. They themselves raised concerns over my ex and highlighted how the childrens actions in my care did not reflect what has been alleged against me. Dispite all of what was observed CAFCASS could not make a decision on furture arrangements due to the sevarity of the allegations against me and recommended a fact-finding hearing.
A DRA hearing was attended in September, where the circuit judge clearly saw through the situation and appeared to not believe the allegations due to the level of evidence i have provided. She therefore decided to dismiss the allegations made against me and no need for a fact-finding hearing. (Small win)
The judge pleaded with my ex and myself to take a quick break and think about what's best for the children and negotiate further progression and a way forward for the future.
Myself and my barrister discussed multiple options and solutions to move contact forward and do what was best for the children.
After five minutes of the barresters talking to each other i am informed that my ex is refusing to negociate. When the judge found out about this she looked extremely disappointed.
In preparation for an interim hearing alot of reports were requested by the court for further evidence. Upon reading the information a lot of very worrying information has come to light about the childrens safety in my ex's care. Including injury, suicidal thoughts, being exposed to an abusive new partner and MARF referals being made.
I have submitted a statement to the court highlighting all of this information.
I was hoping to be in court this month to deal with an interim hearing as per the DRA order. However i have been informed this week that the next court listing won't be until March 2025 (6 months after the DRA) Even though this new information has been brought to the courts attention about the childrens safety they are still willing to drag this out for another 5 months.
Because of this unrealistic delay and the geniune concerns that i have for my children i have had to submit a C2 application for an urgent hearing. I am now hoping the court will see the risk and list an urgent hearing but there is no guarantee that this will happen.
I am now nearly £70K in debt dealing with this and my ex is more than happy to sit back and delay proceedings as it's costing her nothing.
I know that many other fathers are in the exact same boat as i am where we are simply let down and mistreated by an extremely broken system.
I am hopeful though that when this is finally heard by the court, they will not be able to ignore the information in front of them. Unfortunately though this is not the experiance i've had so far.
I wish all the best and good luck to all of the other fathers out there that are going through this. No person should be made to endure what we have to just so that we can be loving fathers.
@scuttler87 Hi, it's good that your case is getting closer to finish line, but 70k costs is outrageous! there are times when barristers can behave in unscrupulous manner, and collude with other sides barrister, to drag out the case to make more money. have you considered self representing?
@dadmod2 thank you for your reply.
it really is outrageous that costs can escalate so much. Unfortunately due to my ex wife’s actions I am having to deal with solicitors constantly.
i am so close now, and fear that I won’t be able to afford the final push.
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