Mum and Maddie,
This letter is for you to understand why I’ve had to do what I’ve done. It’s for you to show to the police and the court to explain myself. This is the only thing I could do for Olly to have any semblance of a childhood with his mum. I’m really sorry to leave you all but we have no other choice and I promise we will be ok! I will never let any harm come to Olly. My solicitor has told me repeatedly that because of how Patrick is portraying me in court that the Judge believes we are causing Olly emotional harm. It’s impossible for me to show them and prove to them the extent and amount of emotional abuse I have endured and still am being subjected to. I’ve been told that there is a strong possibility that Olly will be appointed a guardian by the court, something Patrick requested at the last hearing. I have also been told that this outcome goes hand in hand with Olly being placed into Foster Care! I cannot believe any parent who has even an ounce of love for their child would ever consider asking for this! I can’t let his hatred for me and need to control and destroy my life be the reason that my boy ends up in care! I love my son endlessly and will not allow it! He does not love his son or care about his well-being. Since our breakup I was the one who encouraged and suggested in court every weekend contact for Olly with his father. This custody battle is not because he loves his son. Why would he not have been happy to give Olly a steady normal life with this mum and his dad in it! Why does he want to take him from me when I’ve done nothing but adhere to his demands even when I did not feel they were in Olly’s best interests. What have I done, other than leave an abusive relationship and still allow him extensive contact with Olly? My son clings to me sobbing and shouting that he doesn’t want to go to daddie’s. He comes home and clings to my side not allowing me to leave the room without him! Why is my son’s voice not being heard by the court? The court system is so wrapped up and concerned with “Father’s Rights” that they overlook the children’s happiness and well being. There is something wrong with the environment there for Olly not to want to go so badly! I begged Social Services to investigate the situation with this dad when Olly was telling me he was being hit there. This was the one and only time I broke the court order, Olly was distraught and hysterical but the court, police and father didn’t care and demanded my son went back to visits with him, threatening me with prison if I didn’t force him to go! My son deserves happiness and watching him be dragged away from me every week is disgusting and is the only thing on my end that is causing Olly emotional harm! I had to bring my son home 3 days early from a family holiday to Florida at Patrick’s insistence and the courts disgusting decision. It cost my mum hundreds for new flights and missed days, What father that loves his child would want their child to miss family holidays! Leaving him was the hardest thing I have ever done until now. It was terrifying and I only done it because of Olly! I want to protect him from having to recover from his childhood. I used to be intensely scared of going to bed every night, to the point where I would purposely go to bed at 6/7 pm at night in the slight hope that he would feel remotely guilty about forcing me awake for sex! I think I got roughly 2 hours of uninterrupted sleep every night if I was lucky, my body and mind felt constantly exhausted from being in a permanent state of tension. I would clinch and go rigid when I heard him coming up the stairs as I would pretend to be asleep. If I refused or protested too much, the level of hostility the next day would cause me to have extreme anxiety and panic attacks. This sort of behavior intensified and became an every night occurrence around September/October 2015 after I’d had Olly. I was pressured into sex only 3 weeks after Olly was born and he only waited that long because of the bleeding. It was extremely painful due to the birth I had, he didn’t care or react other than forcefully to my obvious pain or objections. I had to go straight to my doctors and ask for the Morning After Pill as he had refused to use any contraception as he didn’t like it. I couldn’t refuse as he liked to point out I was financially controlled by him and he could get me out of the house whenever he wanted to and he “knew people.” I was embarrassed about my situation and scared that if I told the truth about his behavior that they would alert social services as I was a young first time mother...turns out I was right that no one could help me! I told my GP Dr. Murphy at Hassengate doctors that a condom had split!... not long after I went to the doctors and was prescribed 20mg Citalopram for what I described as severe anxiety caused by my relationship. I don’t remember giving too many details as again I didn’t want Social Services alerted. I intentionally hid my prescription from him for months until he searched my bag and goggled the name of them. He began to publically refer to me as a crazy and my 100 mg pills and mock me to my family and friends. He would constantly refer to me as “mental” and “weak.” I was too embarrassed to ask for help and ashamed and worried that because I had tried to leave before and had to come back because of his threats that nobody would believe or even be willing to help me. Everyone seemed to not like him and his behavior but no one seemed to confront him or help me. I don’t resent anyone or want them to feel bad as it was my fault for not asking for help or telling anyone the extent of the problem. I know this and blame only myself. The controlling nature became worse to the point where I wasn’t allowed to move or even choose items of furniture etc...The worst part of the relationship was when I would care for his other children while they were supposed to be in his care, he would intentionally demean me and encourage them to ignore me as any sort of authority and taught them to disrespect me. I loved those children as if they were my own and I stayed in the relationship as long as I did because I loved and cared for them so much. When he spitefully holds me after I’d left, he told them I didn’t want to see them anymore, he broke me more than anything he’d ever done before. It destroyed me! I watched how he treated their mother, even though he wanted her to move on and be decent to him he still refused to be decent to her. He stalked her emails, blanked her messages when he had her children (to the point where I would feel so guilty I would secretly message her via Facebook to let her know they were ok), he refused to allow her to have his contact number, she wasn’t allowed near the house, etc...He thrived on the fact he made her suffer, he audio recorded their court mediation and hearings so he could hear her cry again. He would laugh at these! He allowed her to move on by moving away as he had ended that relationship. He wanted her away so he could move on with myself. I was a naive little girl at 18 and he was 37! I feel awful for how he treated her and leaving her pregnant. Maybe how I’ve been treated is Karma...He allowed her to move on by moving away as he controlled that decision and situation. If the court had listened and realized why I wanted to move away and how I would have still abided by the order I wouldn’t have been forced to protect my son in this way! I am not allowed to be in our son’s life as Patrick did not make the decision to remove me from his life. It’s shocking and my son is now a child of the court thanks to his manipulation. I have endured harassment, stalking, being chased in my car, having my personal emails and social media privacy invaded and have had no help from the police! Patrick is a psychopath and he will not be satisfied or stop until he has completely removed me from Olly’s life, either by manipulation of the court as he has done or I truly believe he is capable of killing me. I love Olly more than anything and will never allow anyone to harm him in any way! I’m sorry for leaving but I am truly so beyond scared for my life and I will not allow him to destroy Olly’s life by taking mine. I love you, Maddie and Billy and really hope one day you’ll be able to be with us again. I truly believe this won’t be able to happen until he is proven to be what he is and the awful court system has been changed to protect my son and people like from him. Please ask the police to make sure you are all safe from him and his family, he has no boundaries and I’m scared he’ll try to hurt you’s. We love you’s and I’ll find a way to let you know that we are safe and happy. Sorry, I love you! Ellie xxxxx Please let Mandy and Ellie at Changing Pathways know I am ok and that I appreciate all the help they gave me. They are the only ones who believed me and will worry about me and Olly. xxx
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Yet another UK Family Court judge is using mainstream media to launch a nation-wide manhunt for a protective mother, and to spread lies about her so the public will help him catch her. As usual, mainstream media is doing Judge David William's bidding and covering only his lies and distortions, while completely omitting Ellie’s side of the story, which is in court documents and in a letter sent to her mother just before she fled into hiding. View Ellie’s heart-wrenching letter here: https://www.womenscoalitioninternational.org/news/letter-from-mom-in-hiding The Women’s Coalition is launching a counterattack to this public lynching of a wonderful mother, just like in the Samantha Baldwin and Rebecca Minnock cases [see link below]. Both cases engendered much public outrage about judges taking children away from loving mothers and giving them to controlling and abusive fathers. Help make this post go viral too! SHARE, comment on and like this post! COMMENT on media stories in support of Ellie. TELL family, neighbors, friends the truth. URGE the public not to turn Ellie in if they see her. THE TRUTH: Ellie is a great mother who has done everything right. She reported abuse by the father to the court and social services, and she made Olly visit his father as she did not want to be in violation of the custody order, even though he said his father abused him and it caused him great distress. The father, who claimed he “knew people” told Ellie he was going to get Olly placed in foster care to make her “ruin her life”. There was an upcoming hearing where she believed that was going to happen. Not surprisingly, Judge Williams made Olly a ward of the court after she fled. Judge Launches Mother Manhunt: Asks Public’s Help Mainstream Media Spreads Judge’s Lies to Help Catch Mom “I will never let any harm come to Olly.” - Ellie, Olly’s mother JUDICIAL LIES via MSM: 1) Judge Williams said he is “gravely concerned” for the boy’s safety. Truth: Williams knows the child is in no danger with Ellie and that she left to protect him from his father. He is just using that lie to get the public to want to turn her in. 2) Judge Williams says his level of concern for Olly is so high, he is making him a ward of the court, which means foster care. Truth: If the father was safe or wanted him, he would have given the father sole custody. Apparently, the father does not want Olly, just to ruin Ellie’s life, so Judge Williams is simply doing what the father wants. 3) Judge Williams says the mother “vanished” before a “critical” hearing. Truth: Williams gives the impression that Ellie vanished because an upcoming hearing may not go her way. But Williams neglects to mention that he was going to take Olly away from Ellie at that hearing and place him in foster care because that is what the father wants. 4) Judge Williams says Olly will suffer long-term emotional consequences from being “abducted”. Truth: Williams knows that Olly will suffer far greater emotional damage from being taken away from his loving mother and placed with an abusive father or in foster care. He doesn’t care. He is doing what the father wants. 5) The media posts terrible pictures of protective mothers so the public will be less likely to empathize or sympathize with them and more likely to turn them in. This is proof the media is deliberately skewing the story, which is entirely unethical. This case is just one in the epidemic of judges disregarding unfitness and abuse by fathers, while making false, negative findings about mothers who are simply trying to keep or protect their children after divorce or separation. This new mother manhunt is also another example of how the power elite perpetuates patriarchal control in the family through courts, social services, law enforcement and the media. Hopefully it will help raise awareness with women about how they still do not have the power to keep or protect their children after divorce. Women must unite and demand a new system free of discrimination. *The Women’s Coalition and all its 21,000 followers stand with Ellie and hope she and Olly remain safe in hiding for a very long time! NOTE: A High Court Justice, James Holman, is harassing Ellie’s mother and sister. There was a hearing on Wednesday where he berated them, calling them liars and threatening them with jail if they do not say where Ellie is. He lied and said Olly would not be taken away from Ellie if she returns so they would help get her back. TWC will be making another post about that part of this case. Samantha Baldwin’s case: https://www.facebook.com/TheWomensCoalition/photos/a.1464723457135309/1896844423923208/ NOTE: TWC is not linking to any of the mainstream media false accounts but you can google "Ellie Yarrows" to see them. [Pictured: Ellie and Olly; Judge David Williams] Dear Mr. Zucker, The Women’s Coalition is submitting this complaint regarding a recent episode of “This Is Life” entitled “Divorce and Child Custody: Men Cry Foul”. In this segment, Lisa Ling supports the false assertion that men are being discriminated against in Family Court, not women. She disseminates other fathers’ rights propaganda and promotes their agenda. Ms. Ling justifies her one-sided portrayal by saying in the beginning of the piece that it is about fathers’ problems in Family Court. But it is not just a human interest story; it is a political piece, serving to disseminate fathers’ rights propaganda and promote their agenda of mandatory equal parenting. As such, Ms. Ling was ethically obligated to ensure the public was given information that is accurate, fair and thorough, but she did not. She is supposed to act independently, but instead did fathers’ rights activists’ bidding. She is supposed to seek the truth, but disregarded valid research supporting that it is women who are being discriminated against, not men. She is supposed to minimize harm, but she has done great damage to women and children with her negligent, biased and inaccurate journalism. We are disappointed in CNN for broadcasting this segment and are requesting you compensate for airing this harmful episode by providing The Women’s Coalition with funding for a short film documentary, which will get the truth to the public. With this documentary, you will not only be helping CNN’s reputation for good journalism, you will become a hero to millions of women and children around the world. Thank you, Cindy Dumas, M.A. Executive Director Damon Dumas Communications Director WomensCoalitionInternational.org [email protected] To sign onto this complaint, send your name to: [email protected].
In a recent episode of “This Is Life” entitled “Divorce and Child Custody: Men Cry Foul”, Lisa Ling pushes propaganda straight out of the fathers’ rights playbook and promotes their agenda of mandatory equal parenting, which is extremely harmful to women and children. This segment depicts the Custody Crisis as Family Court judges routinely discriminating against MEN, believing women’s lies about abuse, unjustly granting primary custody to vindictive women and restricting or eliminating visitation with their children, and allowing women to alienate their children from them. Mandatory equal parenting time, in which children are automatically split in half after divorce regardless of circumstances, which reduces or eliminates child support, is claimed to be in children’s best interests. THE TRUTH The true Custody Crisis is that judges are routinely discriminating against WOMEN, falsely deeming them liars and alienators, unjustly granting sole or joint custody to self-serving or violent men, eliminating contact or restricting visitation with their children, and allowing men to alienate children from them. Forcing equal parenting time on warring parents is not in children’s best interests and children do better living with primarily with their primary attachment figure. These laws also make it harder than it already is for women to protect children, since judges often disregard abuse by fathers. And it’s not like Ling was unaware of this opposition. The Women’s Coalition and many of its followers contacted her during filming in March, alerting her to the research and countless horrific case studies, many involving children forced to live with their rapists. We asked her for a voice. But she ignored us. NOT JUST A HUMAN INTEREST PIECE Ling tries to justify broadcasting this one-sided piece by deceptively presenting it as merely a human interest story in which she is “just trying to understand what a messy divorce looks like for dads”. However, it serves essentially as a political argument claiming men are the ones discriminated against in Family Court, not women, while spreading fathers’ rights fictional narratives. Worse, it promotes a special interest group’s controversial legislative agenda which benefits one gender and harms the other. As such, Ling did a huge disservice to women and children and violated journalistic ethics. Therefore, The Women’s Coalition is submitting a complaint to the president of CNN, Jeff Zucker, asking him to take down the offending episode and fund a Women’s Coalition documentary on the truth about the custody crisis to compensate for the damage this piece caused to women and children. THE EPISODE It is such rich irony that Ling begins the episode with clips of her protesting at the Women’s March, stating women are demanding their voices be heard, while she precludes women from having a voice in that very segment. Ling contends that while women still have to fight for rights outside the home, we “may have the upper hand at home”, insinuating, of course, that we do. But that is false, like so much else in her piece. In fact, the one place women still have almost no power is keeping or protecting their children after divorce. Ling’s first highlights men’s rights activists who “bash” women, in a transparent effort to make the men she subsequently interviews look good, since they supposedly don’t overtly bash women. However, calling women liars and alienators on international TV is arguably a worse form of bashing. MISLEADING STATS Ling declares first thing that 80% of mothers have custody, misleading the public into thinking women are winning 80% of custody battles, which is false. The reason women have primary custody 80% of the time is because most fathers agree to it—no need for a judge. In cases where fathers fight for it, they win sole or joint custody most of the time regardless of past parenting involvement. Approximately 75% of custody cases involve domestic violence and/or child abuse, but fathers win in over 75% of those cases. When sexual abuse is reported, fathers get custody 85 - 90% of the time, even a small fraction are false reports. That means an awful lot of children are being forced to live with abusers and rapists. FATHERS #1, 2 & 3 The first father she interviews had a Protective Order issued against him, with detailed incidents of domestic violence and child abuse. However, Ling minimizes the abuse and discredits the ex-wife, without ever asking the father if he perpetrated the reported incidents or speaking with his ex. Ling leads the public to feel sorry for this father not having his children half-time, but that is apparently because he works and lives far away, not because of a biased judge. Perhaps the most damaging part of the interview with father #1 is that Ling suggests the restraining order was wrongly issued since the evidence of his abuse did not meet the criminal burden of “beyond a reasonable doubt”. The criminal burden is high because the accused faces prison, so it is not applicable to protecting children in civil court. It has always been the societal consensus that the civil “preponderance of evidence” burden is appropriate in Family Court cases. For Ling to support that fathers’ rights ideology endangers children. The second father Ling interviewed complained about how he was so depressed he attempted suicide, but admitted that was caused by the failure of his marriage, which was due to his affair, not by a biased judge barring him from his children. He said everything had gone great with his children for years after the divorce, until he was jailed for not paying child support. The third father, who was never married to the mother of his baby son, has regular visitation—every other Wednesday and weekend. There was no indication the baby was being harmed by this parenting arrangement as Ling portrayed. He didn’t like paying child support and was fighting for equal parenting time, which would have eliminated the child support. NONE BARRED FROM KIDS So, despite Ling’s portrayal of judges regularly barring children from good fathers, not one of the three men Ling interviewed are. And it would not have been unreasonable if the father with a DV restraining order had been restricted to supervised visitation, but he was free to visit with his children as long as he informed the mother in writing. However this was portrayed as a terrible thing. Although some of the men at the beer-guzzling get-together claimed the courts had taken their children and their exes had alienated them, there was no way to know for sure since Ling did not provide backstories or input from the exes. All three of the men were unhappy about the child support they had to pay and the loss of control in their family. The fathers’ rights core agenda is to enact mandatory/forced equal parenting legislation, which they euphemistically call “shared” parenting. This legislation not only gets men out of child support, it gives them more control over their children and over their women after divorce. So it comes down to men trying to keep power and control over women, while women are trying to do what is best for their children. The truth is that judges are routinely empowering men and disempowering women. The family is the last great frontier of women’s empowerment, unlike what Ling claims as the mouthpiece for fathers’ rights activists. Shame on Lisa Ling for betraying & harming women and children.NOTE: The full episode is not yet available on CNN’s site, but can be viewed on a men’s rights youtube page: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ITN0ABmtck4&t=543s LINK to COMPLAINT
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AuthorCindy Dumas, M.A. has been researching, writing, and raising awareness about the Custody Crisis since 2003, when she was unable to protect her children from their abusive father. She fled into hiding when Family Court failed her and was tricked into returning home, when her children were given to their abusive father. Archives
January 2022
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