What's to be done about this recurring situation where a woman using state services can be treated in such demeaning ways for doing so? In some cases the police, AVO's, use of assistance services are all being used against women - as if they are all in some type of collusion to stop good dads having free, unfettered access to their children - and all of then taken in by those wikkid, lying women.
Such cases are particularly problematic, but not limited to, ones where because money is unavailable and Legal Aid limited, women are self-representing. ( More likely after financial abuse and outcomes of DV). Women are being eaten alive. Not so men self representing from my observance. They are usually being treated with every assistance possible.
One case the husband PUNCHED the solicitor in court, then sacked him, and took over. Judge though he was a just bit stirred up! Imagine that!
Other examples:
1. A man's sworn affidavit to the court states that his ex wife's claims of having suffered cancer are untrue. She produces clinical records that show her condition. The Judge has no idea what the medical terms mean. Much 'play' takes place challenging her truth. He asks a psychologist 'You're the closest thing to a doctor here - what's this about?' Shortly after, the judge places together his thumb and forefinger, making a circle, and asks 'Well, how big was it? This big?' The point that it was obviously big enough for the woman to undergo major surgery was lost, the concept the husband had deliberately lied in a sworn statement was lost. But her humiliation was nowhere nearly over.
2. The woman claimed the ex had been repeatedly violent in the marriage. The police took out two Domestic Violence Intervention Orders on her behalf, and the husband breached and was fined. The judge remarked 'The husband says 'oh he just let them go and didn't oppose orders against him'. That's the end of any judicial concerns about the husband's violence.
However, the mother had a relationship with another man who was ultimately convicted of serious Domestic Violence against her. The judge allowed opposing counsel to berate the woman about her unsuitability as a mother because she repeatedly chose unsuitable men, including insisting she repeatedly show the court how he had threatened her with an weapon to her head. The entire event was trivialised, made fun of and the mother reduced to tears. The judge did not intervene. Then she was criticised by the judge for 'her behaviour' on the stand with him concluding she was a pathological liar.
The woman had sought support from Government and Non-government agencies and practitioners - psychologists and social workers, all of whom work in the specialized field of assisting women escaping violence.
The judge refers to such agencies as 'fringe services' remarked about her trotting off to all and sundry looking for a favorable report. He said affidavits from such services were not relevant because they show only one side of the matter, they do not interview the man'.
What's the point of women saying no to Domestic violence at the state level, using state government responses, if doing so allows them to be re-victimsed, trivialised and harmed in the Family Court.
The legal system is mimicking Domestic Violence Abuse. By our very strategies we are setting up women to be abused. There's no point in changes to AVO's if the women leave the violence and lose their children to the abuser.
3. The Family Court called for reports from 'an experienced Family Report Writer. The children all were able to give accounts of behaviour by the father (including slapping, stopping the car so that they would be thrown about because the kids were misbehaving, holding a child up to a fan and over water, threatening the chop off their head or drown them) the Family Report Writer challenged the father in front of the child with the allegations, - absolutely breaching any confidentiality the child might have expected and exposing them to later ramifications or payback. The FRW decided the events were just overly boisterous behaviour of the father. FRW reports are secret. The mother cannot let anyone see them, ask anyone for help.
Secrecy is the language of tyranny. The mother says the FRW wrote a great deal of inaccurate information but it can't be proved and no one asks the children as to accuracy.
The Judge remarked as to the eldest boy's ancestry - he is the mother's natural child but not the step-father's. The judge got the nationality wrong and took that line of musing as to whether the court should direct the child to some type of Buddhist studies since that was the dominant religion of that country. Wrong country! Wrong religion! Not sought by anyone! He later awarded residency to the step-father, although the boy's real father wrote an affidavit as to the step-father's actual violence towards him, and that he wanted the child to live with the mother.
The boy, aged 15, repeatedly runs away from the step father citing cruelty. The school seeks permission to get him help as he is suicidal. The Child's representative refuses permission. The school counsels the child anyway. The mother is accused of orchestrating the runaway and is now banned from any access to the other children 'because she might encourage them to run too'. The father's cruelty is missing from the equation. She is ordered NOT to seek help without permission from the Child Rep who has refused permission for her self-harming, suicidal son to get some help.
This type of treatment from the Family Court, in one case, shows just how this court responds to the message 'Violence against Women, Australia Says No!'
It does not seem to understand:
* Past behaviour is the best predictor of future behaviour
* Domestic Violence perpetrators continue to harm their ex's via the children
* Violence Against Women is illegal
I read the published judgment where the Court (Family) has ordered a woman not to get any assistance, not to attend any help agency, not to attend a doctor, the police or other, without permission of the court. We take her kids, give them to an abuser then don't let her get help. Oh and Mental Health issues are on the rise. What a surprise!!