Care Proceedings & Fact Finding Hearing - Please Help

Post Reply
HH_Dad
Posts: 20
Joined: Thu Jan 10, 2019 6:05 pm

Care Proceedings & Fact Finding Hearing - Please Help

Post by HH_Dad » Fri Jan 18, 2019 11:45 am

I originally posted this in the 'General' section but now realise I should have probably posted it here. Any help/advice would be greatly received. Thank you...

I am a newbie and would love to hear from anyone re advice/experiences etc. I shall not mention names or location as I need to be careful as I am in Care Proceedings currently and do not want to jeopardise anything. It's a long story, but here goes...

My wife and I have two children; an almost-four-year-old girl and 15-month old boy. Our boy (I'll refer to as 'D') is not walking yet. A couple of months ago my wife and I noticed he'd lost interest in trying to stand. However, we put this down to the fact he'd only just had his last lot of vaccinations (MMR) and he was crawling around perfectly happily thus we were not concerned. But a few weeks ago D began holding his left-foot a bit, although he was not in pain or discomfort. We made a doctor's appointment but they could not get him in for several days. Therefore we phoned the Health Visitor, the 111 non-emergency number and then, finally, we decided to take him to our nearest hospital's A&E department to get him looked at.

They x-rayed his foot and said he had a very small "toddler fracture" which - we were told - are quite common, usually go unnoticed and heal by themselves. They are common for babies learning to walk. The hospital asked if they could do more x-rays as they suspected he may have an irritable hip. They came back telling us he had something similar on his right leg and what they *think* could be cracks to two of his ribs. My wife and I were shocked as D had been happy, crawling as usual and displayed no signs of pain or discomfort and we had seen no sign of bruises or swelling either.

Hospital asked if D had had any falls. He had - he fell down our stairs in October. They asked me what happened and then my wife before coming to the conclusion that our accounts had "inconsistencies". They then asked us to bring our daughter in to be examined too which we agreed - she was found to be fine.

Next thing we know is the hospital had contacted Social Services and the Police. We were both arrested for Child Neglect. Neither of us have ever been arrested or in trouble with the law before, we both have good, respectable jobs and we were the ones who had brought him in to be looked at. We were interviewed separately and released - not on bail - but pending further enquiries. The Police searched our home and took our mobile phones and laptops.

We explained about D's fall down the stairs and informed them that he goes to two different childminders for a total of three days every week. He is the smallest baby at both of these and the only non-walker.

As things stand now, we are in Care Proceedings and Social Services waded in heavy-handed suggesting foster care for our children. This caused us a terrific amount of distress and upset. In the end it was decided our children could stay with family in the same town whilst the Care Proceedings are carried out. We have a Fact Finding Hearing due for a couple of months time.

There are four of us in the 'pool or perpetrators'; my wife and I and the two childminders. The Police have only just interviewed the childminders - seven weeks after this saga began.

No one has seen any signs of injuries in D - he has been perfectly happy, not crying like he was hurt and there's been no external signs of injuries. We take him to loads of play groups, soft play, role play events etc and several leaders of them have written us character references to back up what we have said - i.e. we had no way of knowing about injuries.

We are only allowed to see our children currently under supervision. All of the supervisors have commented on how happy our children are and that they clearly love us. Our little girl is asking every time if she can come home and our boy cries every time we hand him back to the Social Worker.

We feel that we are being treated disgracefully by SS and the hospital. We asked the hospital for names of two paediatricians who stated that they felt D's injuries were not suspicious but the main consultant refused point blank to give us their names. We have asked our solicitors to obtain these details but so far they have failed too. And SS have displayed an astonishing amount of incompetence throughout by getting details wrong constantly and one serious breach of data protection.

The hospital have provided us with various reports and documents and have got his date of birth wrong on most of them and put the wrong date down for the x-rays. We are seriously wondering what else they have got wrong and how serious the injuries can have been, especially as we have seen no sign of any problems. They did not put him in casts and treated him with just Calpol.

Has anyone ever heard of anything like this before? We are utterly at our wit's end. I would love to hear of anyone who has been through anything like this. Thank you.

Starting again
Posts: 2
Joined: Tue Feb 19, 2019 12:08 am

Re: Care Proceedings & Fact Finding Hearing - Please Help

Post by Starting again » Tue Feb 19, 2019 7:05 pm

I have been there your story hit me sadly as I have had the same story. You need be truthful at all times be strong stronger than you ever been. Stick together keep a diary as well of everything said done on a day to day basis. Stay really strong. No matter the outcome stay strong and don't stop fighting for what you want.

Starting again
Posts: 2
Joined: Tue Feb 19, 2019 12:08 am

Re: Care Proceedings & Fact Finding Hearing - Please Help

Post by Starting again » Tue Feb 19, 2019 10:29 pm

Meant to say should point out not the same but very similar. Make sure if you have a solicitor have one out of the local authority, out the area. Best advice I was given. I can give you names to help if you need. Fight on.

Moonlight
Posts: 22
Joined: Thu Jan 10, 2019 3:12 pm

Re: Care Proceedings & Fact Finding Hearing - Please Help

Post by Moonlight » Wed Feb 20, 2019 10:03 am

Regarding information on the Doctor's request your medical records as they will be on there....
Google how to do it so not requestting from the hospital

HH_Dad
Posts: 20
Joined: Thu Jan 10, 2019 6:05 pm

Re: Care Proceedings & Fact Finding Hearing - Please Help

Post by HH_Dad » Mon Jun 17, 2019 11:11 am

I wanted to post an update on how my situation ended for anyone who is interested. It ended well, thankfully, but my wife and I were put through unimaginable hell. I cannot name names etc due to the final Court Order.

In a nutshell; our situation began in November 2018 when we took our 13-month-old boy to A&E to get his foot looked at as he was holding it a lot. The hospital in question alleged that our son had “multiple fractures”; fractures in both legs - apparently - and fractures to two ribs and even suggested he had a broken arm. They quickly decided they had got it wrong regarding his arm but due to everything else they reported my wife and I to Social Services and had us arrested by the Police. Six Policemen arrived – along with security – to drag us out of the hospital and throw us in cells.

We had informed everyone from the beginning that our son had had a tumble down the stairs in October but the main doctor for Safeguarding decided she did not believe us. As Proceedings began, my wife and I arranged for an independent Consultant in Trauma and Orthopaedics (someone who was a Fellow at Great Ormond Street Hospital) to examine our son’s x-rays. They reported back that they could not see any fractures whatsoever. The report was given to our solicitors but the Court insisted on waiting for the two Court-appointed experts to report.

They were not due to do so until late March but, thankfully, the first one reported in early February and confirmed there never was a fracture of our son’s right leg, there was an ever-so-minor ‘toddler fracture’ to his left leg which was not suggestive of non-accidental injury (as the hospital stated) and it tallied with his tumble down the stairs and he was unsure regarding our son’s ribs, but said if he had had fractures he would have had difficulty breathing which my wife and I know he didn’t. He stated in his report that he was unequivocal there was no suggestion of child abuse.

Following his report the second expert was dismissed by the Judge and the Local Authority withdrew. Although my wife and I are relieved it is over, we are effectively gagged by the Court Order which states we cannot have ours or our children’s names made public. The doctor in question who I would love to name here but cannot, made a series of mistakes and was wrong with her accusations. She also twisted almost everything we told her when we took our son to hospital. Our Social Worker informed us as we left court for the final time that our case was the “5th or 6th case to have ended early in the past few month’s due to the hospital getting things wrong”.

My wife and I were the ones who brought our son in to get looked at yet we were wrongly accused, arrested, spoken to like we were the scum of the earth, humiliated in front of our friends and family and now that we are complaining to all and sundry everyone is either ignoring us or fobbing us off. Neither of us were known to Social Services at the time and neither of us had ever been in trouble with the law before. It is scandalous. We have spoken to another family who were also wrongly accused by the same doctor and we are wondering what needs to be done for an investigation into her conduct to take place. We have complained to the Police, the NHS, the General Medical Council and our Local Authority which, incidentally, has just been graded ‘INADEQUATE’ in all of its Children’s Services.

We are left wondering about whatever happened to the legal presumption of innocent until proven guilty? I appreciate medical professionals have to be incredibly cautious these days but when they get it wrong there seems to be no comeback on them. We lost a Christmas and 16-weeks with our children – time we will never get back.

QuestionMark
Posts: 145
Joined: Sun Jul 22, 2018 5:10 pm

Re: Care Proceedings & Fact Finding Hearing - Please Help

Post by QuestionMark » Mon Jun 17, 2019 4:30 pm

This is horrendous. There really needs to be case-studies done on what is happening here - is this something Family Rights Group do, Suzie?

HH_Dad
Posts: 20
Joined: Thu Jan 10, 2019 6:05 pm

Re: Care Proceedings & Fact Finding Hearing - Please Help

Post by HH_Dad » Tue Jun 18, 2019 9:01 am

It is horrendous and this is only half the story. If I tried explaining every mistake they made it would take me all day. Between the hospital, NHS and Local Authority they got our son’s name wrong, his date of birth wrong (several times – and various different dates), his x-ray dates wrong and the LA even named the wrong hospital altogether and sent us documents relating to another family which included the name, address, phone number and GP details of another parent. Right at the beginning of this due to the fact they got so many of our son’s details wrong we genuinely had to ask them whether they had x-rayed the right baby (that much they had got right).

It is scary that these people that have so much power and can remove children are classified as ‘inadequate’.

HH_Dad
Posts: 20
Joined: Thu Jan 10, 2019 6:05 pm

Re: Care Proceedings & Fact Finding Hearing - Please Help

Post by HH_Dad » Thu Jan 23, 2020 4:52 pm

Sorry to 'bump' this thread but I wondered how things turned out for @Starting_again and whether @QuestionMark or anyone else had any other updates? I would be keen to know if anyone has gone through anything similar, especially if in the same area (xxxx and xxxxx).

My wife and I - through speaking to people/friends etc - have met two other families in xxxxx who have recently been through something similar to us. I cannot believe how they (medical professionals and Social Services) can treat innocent people the way they do. They seem to assume the worst from the beginning and work back from there. And when they are found to be wrong they shrug their shoulders and say 'we were just doing our jobs...'
Last edited by Suzie, FRG Adviser on Mon Jan 27, 2020 10:08 am, edited 1 time in total.
Reason: post moderated to promote anonymity

Post Reply

Who is online

In total there are 4 users online :: 0 registered, 0 hidden and 4 guests (based on users active over the past 5 minutes)
Most users ever online was 318 on Fri May 28, 2021 9:04 pm