Case Study: Malicious Ex Makes False Allegation of Assault
You know that feeling you get when you know someone is lying and you just can’t find the words to make people around you realise it’s a lie? Or maybe you remember that feeling from when you were a child at school and untrue stories were going around the playground?
But what about when you’re an adult? When you’re a grown man, a person in a respectable and responsible job and the allegations against you are being made maliciously try to and cause you harm?
That’s what happened to my client James recently.
He was a teacher, a professor in fact. He had split with his long term partner and was trying to move forward in a mature way – in this case there was an infant to be considered. He knew the relationship hadn’t been working for a while – they’d separated and reconciled a few times before the pregnancy and he had tried to make it work for the sake of the baby but he’d finally taken the decision that his life, and that of his child and his partner, would be better if they moved forwards and tried to be friends rather than in a relationship.
His Ex did not agree. She blocked his access to his son. She tried a number of things to ‘get even’ with him for ending the relationship.
In the end she accused him of assaulting both her and their son.
The police investigated, social services became involved, he was lost in a minefield of experts and professionals – none of whom seemed to want to actually listen to him and his protestations that:
She was making it up
He understood that they needed to check but surely the lack of physical evidence was enough? I mean she’s accused him of bruising their son – so where were the bruises? She’d accusing him of hitting their son in a manner which was impossible given the circumstances. Why was no-one listening to him?!?!?!
So he was now under arrest and on bail, with a court date and blocked from seeing his infant son. He had sought legal advice but had been told it was hopeless – it was her word against his and the courts were likely to believe her – I mean what reason did she have to lie?
Then he called Forrest Williams – and we did listen. We heard the desperation in his voice, we heard what he was saying, and we knew we could help. There were 2 areas – the first, and the priority, was the criminal investigation and charges – as desperate as he was to see his son we knew that there was little that could be done regarding access whilst the charges were against him. We liaised with the police who had determined that there was no evidence to support the allegation of assault on his son but were continuing with the assault on his Ex charge as there was now a supposed witness to the alleged attack. We arranged for him to be represented by one of our team of expert Barristers, who quickly and effectively during cross examination made it clear to the bench that the stories were fabricated – he even managed to get the witness to admit that the complainant had told her what she needed to say! He was found Not Guilty and the court ordered that he should be able to apply for a portion of his legal fees returned to him.
A wonderful result you may think, and it was, but in many ways the damage had been done as for our client it had been 9 long months in which he had not seen his son, he had not been allowed to be present for all those magical ‘1sts’, he had missed his son’s 1st birthday etc. It was a win, but it was still tinged with sadness that it had been allowed to get to that stage.
The police take allegations of Domestic Assault very seriously, as they should, but it is a sad fact that not every allegation is truthful, and in the meantime lives can be destroyed. We know this and we know that if you are accused of a crime you did not commit you need to know that the people you are trusting with your future believe in you and will fight for you. Forrest Williams is that firm, we do not advise clients to fight cases if they tell us they are guilty of an offence but equally we will never tell you to plead guilty if you tell us it didn’t happen – we act on your instructions. If you are accused of an offence and want to talk to a team who will listen to you before they give you advice then give Forrest Williams a call on 01623 397200 and we’d be happy to help.
