A Mother's Story by Rosie Batty

Author:Rosie Batty
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Published: 2015-09-20T16:00:00+00:00

A note from Luke to me, written in November 2011

Greg was served with an interim IVO in which Luke and I were listed as protected persons. Under the terms of the order, he was not allowed to commit family violence against us or damage my property, and he was told he needed to seek counselling from the Men’s Referral Service.

As for the assault charges, they were to be heard at a later date, and this would keep happening. The assault took place on 16 May 2012, but it wouldn’t be until 8 January 2013 that the matter was to be heard in court.

The next day, I received a phone call from the family violence service. I told them I wished to change the access Greg had to Luke but was worried that it would only provoke him to further violence. They recommended I seek a change to the access arrangements with the Family Court, which would mean engaging a lawyer and going through the time-consuming and expensive process all over again. In the meantime, they suggested, it would be best if Greg’s access visits to Luke were ‘supervised’.

Some days later, Child Protection contacted me to say they had assessed me and deemed me to be a responsible parent and therefore the best placed adult in Luke’s life to provide that supervision. I did point out that I was also the person that Greg had threatened to kill. But they explained that their remit was simply to protect the child. The courts, they informed me, had the responsibility to protect me and they had done that with the issue of the IVO.

I pointed out that, in their wisdom and despite a serious assault charge, the courts had also let Greg walk free from the court on bail, and that previous experience had taught me Greg didn’t much care a jot about orders written down on pieces of paper. They told me to call the police in the event he breached the IVO.

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