Locked Up and Set Free

Episode Six: Locked Up and Set Free

He went to prison. She was still not free.

Clive is in prison. The welfare officer arrives with letters from him for the children. Charlotte tears hers into pieces without reading it.

Episode Six follows Vanessa as she changes her solicitor, begins divorce proceedings, and finds a new home and a new job — all while the system continues to reach in.

Four voices this episode:

The story of a house on Kings Lane, a job worth having, and a life beginning again.

The law on welfare officers, the court welfare service, and parental alienation syndrome.

Vanessa's reflection on what home really means — and why she spent thirty years working in housing.

The stage — building, and the discovery that professional help works best when you direct it.

Home is not where you keep your things. It is where your nervous system stops bracing for impact.

#ImplacablyHostile #DomesticAbuse #SurvivorStories #CoerciveControl #FamilyCourt #ContactOrders #MothersRights #YouAreNotAlone #DomesticViolence #WomensPodcast #HealingJourney #NewBeginnings #TrueCrime #Podcast

Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:25

Hi, so I just wanted to say quickly, thank you very much for listening so far. I've had a lot more people listening than I expected, and I really appreciate that. Um particular hello to people in America. I have no idea who you are, but thank you for listening to me. And we're just about to start um the next chapter, chapter six. But I also wanted to disclose that actually the person that you're listening to in the music intro and outro is Clyde. Um, that is his music. Um, and I don't think he's really going to argue whether I use it or not. Um, time will tell. Um, but it was copyright free to everybody else, but I felt that I deserved to be able to use it.

SPEAKER_00 1:18

Chapter 6. Locked up and set free. While Clive is in prison. A sense of determination pushed Vanessa out of bed early. She had made up her mind. It was time to get her life back on track. The fire had taken nearly everything she owned, but it hadn't taken her spirit. She needed a job, something stable, something in HR where she could put her skills to use and support her daughters. She spent the entire morning poring over job listings in the paper, making phone calls, and drafting a CV. She was focused, driven, pausing only when the girls needed breakfast, or asked for help finding their favorite cartoons. Then the doorbell rang. Standing at the door was a woman with a somewhat uneasy smile. Mrs. Wilson, I'm Jenny Shaw, the welfare officer assigned to check on the children. Vanessa's stomach dropped. She told the girls to go play upstairs and invited the welfare officer inside. Jenny wasted no time. There's been some concern about the breakdown in mediation between you and your husband. The court has ordered regular contact, but you've not been complying. There's a reason for that, Ms. Shaw, Vanessa said firmly. Clive poured scalding hot beans over my eldest daughter's head during their last visit. My girls are terrified of him. Ms. Shaw nodded and made notes. She did not look up. I understand this is difficult, but the court's order remains. The law presumes contact with both parents is in the children's best interest. Not when that parent is abusive, Vanessa snapped. It is common for children to visit a parent in prison. The court considers maintaining a relationship with both parents vital to a child's development. That's insane. How can anyone believe that taking them to a prison to see him is in their best interest? The law is clear, Mrs. Wilson. The court's orders must be followed. If not, there could be serious consequences, including fines or imprisonment for noncompliance. Imprisonment? she repeated, incredulous. For protecting my children? Ms. Shaw rose. I'll be filing a report. I advise you to speak to your solicitor. Gail's guidance. After Ms. Shaw left, Vanessa sat with Gail over a cup of tea and poured out her frustrations. I just don't understand how the courts work. I thought I was done with Clive, with all of this. But now it's like I'm fighting a whole new enemy. Gail nodded. You're right. But you don't have to fight alone, and there are steps you can take. First, you need to make sure your solicitor is working for you. You're allowed to instruct your solicitor. They work for you, not the other way around. If Mrs. Perkins isn't fighting hard enough, you can change. I didn't know I could just change, Vanessa said, feeling a small sense of relief. You should also consider getting a forensic psychiatrist's report. It's an independent assessment of Clive's mental state and capacity for safe parenting. It provides expert evidence that can be invaluable in challenging the contact order. The suggestion did not come from a solicitor, it came from another woman. Looking back, that seems to have been the pattern throughout much of the case. The most useful information rarely came from official sources. It traveled between mothers, one conversation at a time. Gail had also mentioned, almost in passing, the possibility of a child psychologist, an independent professional who could speak directly with the girls and produce a report that the court would be required to take seriously. The idea gathered momentum slowly. Solicitors worried about cost. There were discussions, questions, delays. But a woman asked the right question Have you thought about getting a child psychologist? Divorce and a new solicitor. Vanessa left the meeting with Gail, feeling renewed. The next day she called a new solicitor and began the process of changing legal representation. Within days she had a new team, one that immediately started fighting for a forensic psychiatrist's report, a child psychologist's report, and began strategizing about how to challenge the contact order. And she decided to start divorce proceedings. It was time to sever the final legal tie to Clive, once and for all. She instructed her solicitor to file while Clive was still in prison. It didn't feel particularly brave, but she knew it was the safest option. A few weeks later, the papers were served. Clive received them in his prison cell. Vanessa imagined the moment, his anger, his shock. For so long he had controlled her life. Now she was the one making the moves. For the first time in what felt like years, Vanessa felt like she was truly free. Not just from Clive, but from the fear of him. She knew the battle with the courts was far from over, but she was no longer facing it alone. The welfare officer returns, letters from prison. A week later, there was the dreaded knock on her door. Ms. Shaw again, with more paperwork and what she called a routine visit. This time she came armed with letters from Clive, handwritten on thin prison paper, stamped with the official seal. These are from your daddy, Ms. Shaw said brightly to Charlotte and Molly. He's written to you both, and he'd love to hear back from you. Charlotte held the letter between her fingers. Her face darkened. She glanced at Vanessa, and then without a word, she tore the letter in half, then in quarters, until it was nothing but scattered pieces on the floor. I don't want it, she said firmly, her voice thick with emotion. Ms Shaw's eyes widened, then turned to Molly. The younger girl held her letter hesitantly, her eyes on the torn pieces of Charlotte's. Ms Shaw crouched beside her. Molly, wouldn't you like to read what your daddy has written? At the mention of Clive, Molly's lower lip trembled and tears began streaming down her face. She shook her head, clutching her stuffed pink, shiny elephant tighter. Vanessa's heart broke watching her daughter's pain unfold. She knelt beside Molly, pulling her into her arms, while Charlotte stood stoically beside them. This isn't right, Vanessa said quietly to Ms. Shaw. They don't want this. They don't want him in their lives. I'll include their reactions in my report, Ms. Shaw said briskly. But the court will still expect you to encourage contact. I'm not going to force them to do anything they don't want to do, and I won't have you pushing them into something that clearly hurts them. After she left, Vanessa collapsed onto the sofa, drained and furious. Clive, from his prison cell, still had a grip on their lives, and the very people who were supposed to protect her children were telling her to give him more access. But she was not going to give up. She had seen the pain in Charlotte's eyes, the fear in Molly's tears. She glanced at the torn letter on the floor, then at her girls. If they had each other, they would find a way through. Life in the lane. From these dark days, two dreams arrived within a week of each other. A job offer. HR manager for the Consumers Association in Milton Keynes. A real job in her field, the kind of work she had been good at before Clive had dismantled that version of herself. And a house in the village. Old Kathy Stapleton had decided to move north, and her council house on Kings Lane was coming available. Claire drove Vanessa down to Kings Lane, just five minutes' walk from where they had lived before the fire. Vanessa got out of the car and fell immediately, helplessly in love with the place. A pebble dash semi with a spacious garden, and best of all, back in the village, back in the small community she had loved so much. After three days of anxious waiting, the call came. Oh, Vanessa screamed. Pure joy, arriving like a wave. Only those who have known what it means to not have a home will understand what this felt like. She brought the girls to see it with blindfolds on. She ground the car to a halt at the top of King's Lane and reached back to take the blindfolds off. You see that house? Well, soon that's going to be our new forever home. Just watching their faces light up was enough. Charlotte said it was big. Vanessa said big enough for a bedroom each. The girls screeched with excitement. A couple of days later they moved in and that night ate Chinese food amidst a sea of cardboard boxes. Vanessa packed the girls off to bed early, then walked out into the back garden. The sun was setting behind the fields, and two ponies silhouetted against the dying light turned their heads to greet the stranger. Walking into the consumers' association on her first morning, she felt something she had almost forgotten, the quiet satisfaction of being valued for her competence, of being seen as the person she actually was, not the reduced, frightened version of herself that years with Clive had produced. Work gave her back a language she had nearly lost, the language of capability, of being able. She had crawled through the crap and been met with roses on the other side.

SPEAKER_02 12:16

Author reflection. The title is deliberately uncomfortable. Somebody can be released from prison, and yet the woman he terrorized is not released at all. She remains on alert, listening for engines, watching roads, reading every sighting as a threat. That is what I wanted this chapter to hold, the mismatch between the legal event and the bodily reality. The welfare officer bringing the children their father's prison letters is one of the most disturbing moments in the whole narrative, and it happened exactly as I have written it. The system was doing what it was designed to do, facilitate contact, maintain the relationship, follow the order, but those were my children. Charlotte tore the letter without hesitation. Five years old, and she already knew. I have thought many times about what it means that a six-year-old's knowledge of danger was not admissible evidence, while a bureaucrat's checklist was. I have worked for housing associations since precisely because I understand with my whole body what a home means. Not a property, not an address, but the thing that allows you to close a door and feel safe on the other side of it. That's not obvious to everyone. It was obvious to me. Home is not where you keep your things. Home is where your nervous system finally stops bracing for impact. Going back to work was its own kind of healing. The first morning I walked into the Consumers Association, I was a professional again, not a victim, not a mother in proceedings, not a woman who needed protecting, a person with expertise and value. That distinction mattered enormously, even if I couldn't have articulated it at the time.

SPEAKER_01 14:13

The legal landscape, family court in 1990s, Britain. The welfare officer and the Court Welfare Service. In the 1990s, the Court Welfare Service played a central role in family proceedings involving children. Welfare officers were responsible for interviewing parents, sometimes children, and producing reports to assist judges in making decisions about contact and residence. The service operated within the probation service until 2001, when CAFCAS, the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service, was created to take over its functions. In the period covered by this book, welfare officers had considerable discretionary power, and the quality and fairness of their reports varied significantly. The practice of delivering letters from an imprisoned parent to young children was framed as being in the children's best interests to maintain the relationship. The children's own responses to those letters, their terror, their refusal, their tears, could be noted in a welfare report, but were typically weighed against the officer's assessment of whether those responses were genuine or had been encouraged by the resident parent. The suspicion that a mother might be coaching children to reject their father, sometimes called parental alienation syndrome, a contested and scientifically dubious concept that nevertheless had real purchase in the courts of this period, was a constant hazard for women like Vanessa. To show the children's fear was to risk being accused of manufacturing it.

SPEAKER_02 15:47

What stage was I at? Stage building, what I believed, a new solicitor could change things, the right evidence could protect the girls. A home and a job were the foundations of a real life. What I was learning, the system could reach into even the safer spaces. A prison sentence did not end the legal battle. Professional help worked best when I directed it, not the other way round.

SPEAKER_04 16:15

Questions women ask at this stage. How did you cope with starting again financially?

SPEAKER_02 16:21

Community, Jackie, the church collection, and work as soon as I could get it.

SPEAKER_04 16:28

Did the children understand what was happening?

SPEAKER_02 16:30

They understood more than I sometimes wanted them to. Children always do. But no, not really. It went on for many years, about three in total, so that's a long, long time in a child's life.

SPEAKER_04 16:43

Was changing solicitors the right decision?

SPEAKER_02 16:46

Without question, you are entitled to a solicitor who fights for you. The moment you understand that, everything changes.