I told her I wanted to find a lawyer and fight to stay in America with my son, where at least there would be different Court experts who I hoped would listen to M – would hear us. I wanted to at least try – refusing to release our dream of a life without fear. She made some calls to a few local law firms, but without success. So we entered the Court and she told the Judge, a very severe looking woman in her sixties, with a white face, scraped back blonde hair, expressionless and looking bored, that I was going to seek counsel and she sought an adjournment to allow me to do this. The Court gave me exactly two days to appoint someone and another hearing was scheduled for the Friday of that week.
We left the Court and went straight home and began to ringing through the book again – leaving messages on answer phones, speaking to secretaries of every law firm in the area.
By Thursday night we had still not secured any legal representation. It seemed likely we would be sent back to the Island the following day. I was in total despair as I feared for M being given to R and what that might do to him. I hated him being in Foster Care, but I believed that most foster carers were kind people and he was safer in care than returned to the Island and given to R which would otherwise be the likely outcome. It was hopeless – we had run out of time.
At six O clock the phone rang – a very polite gentleman said, “I’ve picked up your message and I can represent you. Come and see me after the hearing tomorrow and I’ll ring the duty counsel and tell them to seek a further adjournment as I have another case in the morning.” I was overwhelmed with relief and gratitude – there was something in this man’s voice that spoke of assuredness, determination and integrity. It was a commanding voice – which I later learned came from a military background – but that was perfect. Dan turned out to be a man of honesty, principles and military precision. But most importantly when we eventually met him – he took one look at my son’s evidence and the few papers I had with me and said “One thing is clear – you have never had a voice and neither has your son.” And for the first time, I felt we were about to have one.
Dan was a one man band lawyer. He was old school – a large man with a gentle sense of humour, very polite, called me "Maam" and my father "Sir" and held an air of confidence and authority that could only command total respect. I liked him immensely from the moment we shook hands and sat down in his small unpretentious office. He was from another era, had no internet access, sometimes causing problems especially when we were trying to get information from the Island sent out quickly - and had one elderly secretary. He charged fairly, was clearly principled and after reading M’s evidence he said “We must make sure you stay in America. Get yourself as established as possible and plan to stay.”
He looked at my jeans and T shirt with a critical eye – “And one more thing, get yourself some smart clothes and wear them at your contacts with M and in Court – I want you to present as the respectable woman you are.” I nodded. Of course back home I had suits, skirts, jackets and smart clothes, but I had never expected to need them when we packed to run. I did as suggested and went straight to the shops and bought some smart trousers and a jacket.
We went into Court again the following morning. Louise had spoken to Dan and was under instruction to tell the Court we were now legally represented and seek another adjournment for him to come into Court where she explained a date would be set for the “Show Cause Hearing." This meant that the CAS would have to demonstrate why they had removed my son. I had little knowledge then of the paperwork that had been sent to the CAS lawyer, a short, stocky, native American Indian woman with straight black hair, piercing black eyes and a hard cold expression. She stared at me with open contempt and I wondered what lies had crossed the ocean – that she could show such open hostility towards me.
The Judge sounded faintly annoyed to hear I now had a lawyer, but she had no choice but to set a date for a Directions Hearing for the following week, when she would then give a date for the Show Cause Hearing.
When we came out of Court, Louise told me that two people had arrived from the Island and were in a side room at the Court, expecting to collect and return M. I later discovered it was the Social Worker who had never met M or seen us together and had only met me once briefly before making the application take him from me – accusing me of emotional abuse and coaching- and the psychologist who had most recently been involved in the case. He had originally been sympathetic to both M and I. He had told me he was "a down to earth Lancashire man" and could not be swayed. He said that forcing M to see his father was wrong and that if necessary we should take this all the way to the European Court of Human Rights. At the time we had felt that he was a Godsend, he even suggested I should make a formal complaint against the educational psychologist who was anything but impartial and had supported M’s father to the hilt – bringing him to and from contact in her car and giving him lifts to the airport. He had been appalled at her lack of professionalism, especially as she was claiming payment from the Government whilst doing private work for the Court.
As much as this solid Lancashire man had supported and listened to us, he suddenly swung the other way. One could only assume it was because he was in the pay of the Department and pressure had been put on him in some way. It was a mystery but now he was here too. The Government were clearly determined to get us back and were prepared to use taxpayers' money to send two people out, but on this occasion we managed to thwart them and they neither appeared in Court or managed to take M. I later discovered that they had gone to see him, but I didn’t find out what had been said to M until months later. M was silenced and too afraid to tell me anything at our contact sessions, clearly having been warned that he would not see his mummy if he gave her any information about what was happening to him.
Meanwhile, the CAS offered me two one hour contact slots with M at the Children’s Aid Society building and they offered my father one. We both took these gratefully but also fearing each time what state M would be in when we saw him and longing to sweep him up and take him home, whilst being powerless to do so.
The CAS said the foster carers had agreed to a phone call that Saturday morning. M rang me and we had a ten minute chat. He seemed happier with these people, since he had moved from the first foster home, from where I later discovered he had twice tried to pack his little Thomas the Tank rucksack and run away. How could this be in the best interests of a seven year old? Yet still we could do nothing except comply with the strict regime.
The Foster Mother, whose name was Candy – asked for M’s Club Penguin membership details so that he could go on the internet and play. At least this was something familiar to him and something he had done at home. I gave her the password and username and thanked her for looking after M. “It’s a pleasure.” She said. “He's a lovely boy.” I was reassured that whilst he could not be with me, he was with someone who was kind and there were other children there with whom he quickly made friends, being a sociable boy.
M took comfort in the other children, especially one little girl who was adopted and a couple of years older than him. He had long since learned that adults could not be trusted, did not listen and did not believe him, other than his Mummy and Grandad, but as children often do in these terrible situations, he looked to his peers for support.
After the success of the phone contact which was reported as positive by the CAS, future calls were then suddenly stopped on orders from Social Services back home. It was another cruelly bitter blow for M and for me. We had done nothing wrong, yet the omnipotent Department punished us further. It was almost as if they were getting revenge for us daring to run and for managing to do it.
The tabloids had picked up our story and had run three articles. This clearly was not good publicity for the Island as they wrote candidly and as we were outside the Island’s jurisdiction there was nothing to prevent them running the articles legally, but it was inflammatory as far as those back home were concerned.
We had run in the face of an order whe
n the police were on port, alert and in broad daylight right under their noses. It hardly made the authorities look competent and at that moment they saw us a threat to their carefully protected image of the sanitary safe community that was advertised as a safe haven. The reality was very different. Drugs were rife, and it was known that several paedophile rings were in existence on the Island. One could only wonder whether somewhere in all of this tragic mess that was now our life, we had accidently stumbled on someone who was a part of this underworld. There were many theories but how did you expose it? Was it the first social worker I had reported the abuse to? Was he protecting others like R? Was that why they took no action? Was it the police? Or worse still was it the Judge? One could only surmise, but conspiracy theories – even if justifiable – were not going to be possible to prove and we were stuck with the only tool we had – the Law.
Dan brought us fresh hope. He seemed to understand the corruption that lay behind the fact that we had, in effect, whistle blown on abuse and believed that this was a cover-up by the authorities. We didn't know why. What was the connection that R had with the Court and establishment? How could we even find it?
Dan’s advice was that whilst he believed that we were right to think that something more sinister may be behind this, I must focus only on the fact that I was a good mother and not try to persuade the American Courts that the Courts back home were in some way lacking. One Court tends to believe that another Court is fit for purpose, especially when it is a Westernised country – I was starting to think we should have gone somewhere outside the Hague Convention. However, when you are running under the gun you haven’t time to shop around for the right place and I really had believed we would not be found, at least until we were well- established when it would have been so much harder to bring us back. Dan said if only I had managed to get M into school before they took him, we might have had a better chance, but nonetheless he was going to do his best. The important thing was that he did not doubt the abuse had happened and at last someone was actually listening to us.
It was a mixed blessing having Dad with me. I was grieving so hard and was in so much emotional pain that my moods swung from sheer anger at the injustice and cruelty, to despair that I may never get M back – this coupled with the fear that he would be sent to his father. Sometimes I howled and sometimes I shouted but it all boiled down to the same thing, I needed and wanted my son back so badly and I had no idea where or how he really was. I directed my pain at Dad for giving us up, because I had to direct it somewhere, but then I would feel worse for doing that when deep down I loved him. After a couple of weeks he decided to go home and return closer to the hearing which was now due to take place in September.
The two one hour sessions I had with M did nothing to reassure me and whilst the people he was with seemed to be kind, he turned up looking unkempt, often grubby and seemed anxious and wound up all the time, constantly questioning me as to when he could come home. He was also hanging onto the hope that he would start school in Florida. He still wanted to come back to our American home and we both clung onto our dream as hard as we could.
He would be tearful when we parted and would cling to me. I would stem my own tears until he'd left the room – led out by the cold emotionless social workers – who after all, were “just acting on orders.” I neither felt they had sympathy for me or particularly judged me. I think they were slightly bemused as I was not their usual client, being well-spoken and educated and I made sure I always turned up looking smart. I wondered if they questioned what they had done – and I longed to know what they had been given as a reason. We would find out soon enough.
I hung onto the hire car that my father had rented and as we had gone to the Travel Lodge to use their fax machine to get Court papers sent from my previous advocate, we filled the staff in on what had happened. They had got to know M and I when we stayed there for over a month and they were all devastated for us and very sympathetic.
My father and I would often go there for dinner – neither of us felt much like cooking or eating, but we had to keep body and soul together and stay strong to fight this. There was still hope if we could convince the American Courts that M would be in danger, as we fully believed he would be, if we were sent back. But we only had a few weeks to accumulate papers and Dan said the seventy testimonials to my good parenting that had been written to the Department by family and friends were of no use, unless they were in sworn affidavit form. We were under pressure to get things done quickly and people who had been supportive, were now less so. Friends were turning their backs on us, as is often the case when your life hits a wall and smashes you to bits. The car crash we were in, had another element – it was almost although we were now infected with the disease of having a child removed. People seemed nervous – afraid they might catch it. One by one good friends turned their back – but at least my closest friend Sarah was still in touch. We spoke for hours on the phone – often through the night when I could not sleep. I wished she could be with me – I felt so desperately alone.
In the evenings I would go up to the Travel Lodge and eat a solitary bowl of French Onion Soup, and drink a half carafe of wine – sometimes I would stay at the bar chatting to the waitresses as they came back and forth or whoever was seated at the bar. There were rarely any customers, other than perhaps the odd travelling salesman, but that suited me. Whilst I was totally isolated and overwhelmingly lonely, it was not a pain that could be shared with anyone else. I didn't want to talk about why I was in Florida – now that our hopes had been dashed – I didn't want to tell people my child had gone into foster care – I felt I would be judged even though I was innocent of any crime other than wanting to protect him. There were too many awkward questions should I hold a conversation, so I stayed in my bubble of pain, drifting through each day as best I could and spending most of my time searching for the best things to take M on our contacts.
I had come up with the idea of us both working on a scrapbook between our sessions. I would fill one for him and he for me and then we would share them at contact. It seemed to work well and helped us feel closer. I put photographs of myself, M and my mother that I had brought with me, in the one for M. I printed off what I could from my laptop of our holidays and other happy times and I found a wonderful Arts and Crafts shop called Michaels, which was packed with all kinds of stickers, painting materials, glitters and scrapbooking items. I spent a fortune on things to bring for a our scrapbooks, but it was worthwhile as M would wait excitedly to see what new decorative item I had found and we would sometimes work on these both when together and apart. They were much treasured by both of us.
M seemed to have got used to the family he was now with. I knew very little about them and was not at liberty to ask too many questions with our supervisors sitting behind the two-way mirror. I knew there were other children and that M was sharing a room with another boy. I also knew that there was an older girl and M liked her best. They played together on their DS Lites and swapped games. I was glad that he had someone to help him through this, but it angered me terribly that he was even in foster care. It was wickedly cruel and unnecessary. He needed to be with his mum.
M told me he was praying to his Nanny to help him get home to me. He had been very close to my mother and we had spent a lot of time with her even though she had lived across the water in the UK. We went to see her most school holidays and we went abroad with her at least once a year. We had some wonderful memories of times together. I so much wished I could talk to her. There is something special about a mother/daughter relationship that is not possible to substitute. The comfort provided by that, is irreplaceable and I still felt the loss very deeply.
I could not believe that the Courts had only allowed us two days to go to her memorial service in England and see family and friends, before ordering us back to the Island for forced contact with his father - a contact where M would shake, wet himself and sob for an hour. How could any father put his own flesh and blood thr
ough that? He appeared totally unaffected by it. Whilst I had empathised with M and longed to protect him from his pain, it was nothing to the pain we were enduring now. We had almost found our pot of gold – our Rainbow’s end, only to end up in the middle of a thunderous storm. Our tears were endless torrential rain, our wounds and scars deepening and engraved forever on our hearts.
They moved our contact slots to lunchtimes and asked me to bring food to share with M. I felt it was rather unfair to do this when it encroached on our precious time together and neither of us wanted to waste it eating. Also there was a limit to what we could eat – given that there were no cooking facilities. I felt, however, that there would be some kind of black mark placed on me if I did not do this, so I tried to come up with healthy tasty meals in Tupperware boxes once more - cold pasta dishes in Mayo, trays of Sushi, fruits of every kind and different kinds of salads. Sometimes we ate and sometimes neither of us could get past our pain enough to swallow it, but I came prepared each time nonetheless. I was under scrutiny for my every move, word and thought. They recorded everything I said and did and interpreted it in any way they saw fit. But when I saw the reports – which I did weekly – they were all positive.
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