Circumstances

 To whomever will listen

My wonderful little 62 year old mum, my beautiful sister who suffers greatly with her health and my gorgeous and caring younger brother and I have been through a lifetime of hell.

The pain has nearly ripped us all apart, both as individuals, but also as our own family unit.

My father has sexually, psychological, financially and physically been abusing my mum her entire adult life.

As children, this became normal to us - screaming and objects being thrown in their bedroom at 2am would send me and my baby brother running into my sister's room where we would huddle under her duvet. My sister thought my mum was being raped, I thought she was being murdered. We were regularly terrified.

Objects around our house would be destroyed - televisions and vacuum cleaners were his favourites. But he would also smash up anything of any value to any of us if he wanted to.

As a 9 year old, the oldest boy, I would tell my father to stop and tell him he was bad. I would step in-between him and my mother - to protect her against his as pathetically as I could. I would be attacked, humiliated and isolated as punishment. 

After one particularly horrific attack, with sexual assault and homophobic elements against me, we finally called the police to help us.

Unfortunately, the police came and were incredibly aggressive towards us, who they KNEW were the victims as we placed the call. The police told me to leave the house and threatened me with arrest as my dad had made allegations saying that I had punched him. I have never touched him as I knew it would be the end of my life.

I left the house and didn't return.

Years of therapy that I struggled to afford, helped me understand that none of this is right or normal. My father is a monster and the shame for what he's done to us belongs with him.

So last year I decided to take the step of involving the police. My mum wouldn't have anything to do with them, as they "only make things worse" but I reported all my childhood abuse to them.

To my shock, the police didn't understand the definition of sexual assault. This is basic stuff... I had to fight with several police officers and essentially teach them the legal definition of sexual assault. After finally getting them to understand that, I then had to explain homophobic sexual assault to them. 

This meant getting them to imagine a father doing and saying what he did to me, to a daughter. The explaination made sense to them and they finally accepted all my allegations - but I can't see how they'll be able to explain it to CPS or their superiors. Is that what heteronormative policing looks like? A gay man's perspective is so alien to them that they dismiss it outright.

My mother was then on borrowed time to leave my dad or accept that she would have to support him against me. I can't tell you how hard it was for me to go to the police because I knew this choice would have to be made. 

I made the decision that going to the police could result in my mum being killed. It tears me up still that I had to take that risk, but he needed be held accountable and to be stopped - what else could I have done when mum refused to leave him.

My father must have felt the tension between him and my mum as he became more aggressive and violent towards her. This culminated in him breaking her finger on Christmas Eve 2023. 

On Boxing Day, my brave little mummy got up early, snuck out the house and dragged everything she could, a ten minute walk away to my sister's house. She darent use the car incase it woke him.

My family rallied around her to protect her, to try to heal her. My fantastic cousin paid for her to have psychotherapy twice a week and my sister and husband housed her. She cut off all communication with my father.

Thanks to the therapy she has been mostly deprogrammed from his manipulation but I can't imagine how deep her scars are. She is so fragile but so strong. I just want to cuddle her and keep her safe.

Several weeks after she left, my dad told her that he was going to put her dog to sleep if she didn't come back to look after it. My mum didn't reply and the dog was killed a week later, which we found out when calling the vet to check. There's nothing we could do about it.

My father lied to the vet and said the dog had become incontinent - they vet put the dog to sleep. As my dad was an owner of the dog, it's his right and we can't disprove what he said.

We were devastated, but rationalised that it was my dad's fault and not ours.. but it's still painful and we all feel responsible in our own messed up way.

We've managed to get back into my mum's matrimonial home several times to try to retrieve what we can, as she's got nothing. Other than her clothes, all her inherited pictures and jewellery from her mum have been hidden. My dad claims he had to sell them to afford to pay his bills, but we know it's not true, it's another bartering token to be used.

This has all been found out via my mum's divorce lawyer, as we have zero communication with him.

After more breakthroughs with her therapy, my mum felt ready to return her shame to its source - by reporting everything to the police. I was in shock, I couldn't believe she was actually doing it! It showed us that she would never ever go back to him and that we had our mummy safe with us now, forever.

The police took it very seriously and invited him in for an initial chat and they are still gathering more info - having yet to fully interview my mum months later.

He was released with bail conditions which he breached the next day by threatening my brother in law, footage available from the chemist. The police wouldn't do anything.

The following week, he saw my mum in a pub and hurled abuse at her, with a third party having to intervene as they thought he was going to hit her. The police have done nothing - they haven't even spoken with the third party. "Lack of evidence" they say.

My father is refusing to cooperate with my mum's divorce lawyer, failing to declare property and valuing his highly successful business, which was entirely funded from my mum's inheritance and supported by mum working for him for free, at zero. No doubt he will claim some sort of health issue that he doesn't have is the reason, to drag it out even longer.

We have tried to negotiate going back to the house and he unlawfully changed the locks. 

We tried to ask the police to escort us into the house, they told us it wasn't their job but "if it kicks off, we'll come".

So, two nights ago when we knew he was out in London, we went back to the family home to collect the rest of mum's clothes, what pictures there are left of hers and our childhood Christmas decorations.

On us leaving the house, the police arrived. They were here to investigate an alleged burglary. We explained the situation and they were happy for us to have entered the house.

They then arrest my mum, saying my dad has made an allegation of stalking and harassment. 

They cite that she apparently called him twice in August from an unknown number and "stalked him" because she walks my sister's dog from her house to the park and my dad saw her.. Mum walks the dog to pay back my sister for staying there and because it clears her head, she can't help that he lives down the road!

Despite us pleading and begging, the police decided that these two phone calls and walking the dog require immediate action, for a 60 year old woman to be brought into police custody overnight, on a Friday, for questioning. DESPITE knowing that SHE is the victim of all that horrific abuse, she is taken away to be held in a cell. My father was INVITED in for an interview!! INIVITED FOR SEXUAL ABUSE

The police tried to tell me that I had to leave her car at his house because "an allegation of theft had been made about the contents of the car". They wanted me to leave her car, within his lockable gates, on his driveway.

Thank god for my legal background because I found myself having to explain the legal definition of theft and why this, a woman putting her clothing from her house into her car, fell outside the definition of theft. After a bit of back and forth, the officer understood and allowed us to remove the car. It's literally filled with shoes and clothes.. it makes me want to cry at the injustice of it.

Mum was released yesterday afternoon after 16 hours in police custody. They have said "no further action" is required and the sargeant at the station, who spent a long time talking to my mum, cried. She told her she shouldnt have been taken in like she was and that she too had been a victim of domestic abuse. On my mum's way out, the sargeant asked if she could give her a hug.

My beautiful brave little mummy came out of that station in her pyjamas and little jacket looking terrible. She slept on a rubber mattress, rubber pillow and in a cell with a toilet in it and a camera looking into the cell.

How is this what justice looks like? How is this right? 

My sister is having full blown seizures brought on by the stress of this, on top of her existing problems. When I think of the enormity of all of this, and that it's our currently reality, I could scream for days. 

Help us. Please. This isn't right. This can't be how the system treats survivors.. where is the justice? The fairness? The humanity?