FD24P00235 - [2025] EWHC 952 (Fam)

The mother alleges that the domestic abuse that the father perpetrated against her in Miami culminated in an incident on 26 April 2017. She alleges that on or around that date the father threatened to beat her with a belt if she refused to take part in a sexual act with another woman at a party at the family home. When she refused, the mother alleges the father raped her as a punishment whilst high on drink and drugs. The mother further alleges that the following morning the father attacked her by slapping her in the face, calling her names and choking her to the extent that she passed out. The mother alleges that the father also threatened her and the children with a gun.

On 26 April 2017, the mother made no allegation in respect of the sexual abuse of P or Q. In proceedings under the 1980 Hague Convention however, the mother introduced an allegation that the father had attempted to anally rape Q on that date. Further, and over seven years after the event, P wrote a letter for the Children’s Guardian the subject matter of which concerned the father’s alleged treatment of her, her mother and her brother. In the letter, P alleged that her father had sexually abused both her and Q, including engaging in the sexual abuse of P in the presence of or with another women, with whom the father had been engaging in sexual activity, and forcing her to “smell some white powder”. In her oral evidence, the mother alleged that the father made P consume cocaine, after which P fell asleep. The mother was not able to assist the court with why P fell asleep immediately having been allegedly given such a powerful stimulant narcotic.

As with her other evidence, the mother’s various accounts of the alleged incident on 26 May 2017 vary greatly, are replete with inconsistencies and appear to escalate in severity each time her account is given:

As I have noted, it is only within the proceedings under the 1980 Hague Convention that the mother began to allege that the father attempted to rape Q on 26 April 2017 (in oral evidence, the mother claimed this was because a lawyer had told her she too would be charged if she made allegations of sexual abuse). In her statement dated 19 October 2023 the mother alleges that the father assaulted Q and put a gun to her and the children’s heads. When speaking to the Children’s Guardian on 8 November 2023, the mother alleged that when Q was 2 years old, she and P caught the father trying to have anal sex with him.

During cross-examination by Ms Guha, the mother claimed that her changes of account as summarised above were consequent upon the Court Clerk in Miami informing her that she was only allowed to include three allegations in her filing for a civil injunction. When further pressed by Ms Guha as to why she only began raising allegations of sexual abuse against the children in the proceedings under the 1980 Hague Convention, the mother ascribed this to threats from the father and his associates, notwithstanding that she had previously raised allegations of rape and serious violence against the father.

In her statement of 19 October 2023, the mother further alleges that following the incident on 26 April 2017, the mother and the children were taken to hospital. The mother asserts that her eyes were all swollen and bruised as was her jaw from where the father had hit and beaten her. The mother has produced no hospital records from that alleged visit. The court does have some of the police records pertaining to the examination of the mother on 26 April 2017. That evidence in respect of the mother’s alleged injuries is difficult for a number of reasons.

First, and as I have noted, the Miami Dade police Domestic Violence Supplemental Report contradicts the mother’s account of a long history of domestic abuse from 2012 to 2017 in that in answer to the question “Is there a history of domestic violence” the report records the answer “No”. Second, the mother alleges that the father used a gun during the incident and that police retrieved two firearms from the property on 26 April 2017. However, in answer to the question “Type of weapon used in the incident” the answer is entered “none”. Again the question dealing with any weapons impounded the office has entered “N/A”. A separate ‘Offence-Incident’ report records that there were no weapons. Third, the report states that the mother was not transported to hospital, contrary to her evidence in these proceedings. Finally, whilst the mother is described in the police documents as exhibiting “Bruise(s)”, in two photographs of the mother taken by police and set out in the Offence-Incident Report it is difficult to identify any injuries on either photograph. Whilst the mother has a dark area under each eye, I note that a medical report following the alleged incident in June 2020 the mother’s eyes are said to “have dark circles and appear to be sunken”, which the pictures associated with that later medical report depict.

As a result of the alleged incident on 26 April 2017, the father was arrested and placed in custody. He was charged with assault and entered a not guilty plea. A ‘stay-away order’ was granted by the Miami court on 27 April 2017.

Within the foregoing context, the mother seeks the following findings of fact with respect to the alleged incident on 26 April 2017:

The father denies the allegations made by the mother relating to 26 April 2017. He asserts that it was the mother who was being verbally abusive towards the father and the children on 26 April 2017, threatening the father that she could destroy him. I pause to note that evidence of the paternal grandmother is that the mother was volatile, often losing her temper “with anything”, such as the father taking the children to visit the paternal grandmother. The father alleges that the mother threw the children’s breakfast away on 26 April 2017, which made the children scared. He further states that caused him to cook breakfast again. Before doing so he turned on the video camera on his phone, which recorded an interaction between the parents at 10.05am, in which the father asks the mother what is wrong in response to her appearing unhappy with the father and she responds with “fuck you”. The mother accepted in cross-examination that she swore at the father and was angry on that morning.

The father asserts that on 26 April 2017 he thereafter left the property with the children to get some milk to give the mother “time to relax and settle”. When he returned, he states that the police were there, the mother having called them at 10.31am and reported a physical altercation. The paternal grandmother stated in her oral evidence that the father told her that he had left the property to buy milk and returned to find the police present. It was clear from the evidence of the paternal grandmother that the father had told his mother about the mother’s allegations on 26 April 2017, namely that the mother had alleged the father had hit her with his hand. During her evidence the paternal grandmother stated that the father was never aggressive with the children, did not have a violent temper, and was not controlling in the household. As I have noted, during his oral evidence the father freely admitted that he owned firearms and that they were kept at the family home. The father stated that this was in the exercise of his rights under the Second Amendment to the US Constitution and as a result of him formerly having worked as a security guard. In this context, I note that the 2013 tax return contained in the bundle indicates that the father had a security business called “Black Knight Protection Inc”.

The mother thereafter applied on 16 June and 10 October 2017 to dismiss the civil injunction on grounds that she was endeavouring to engage in marriage counselling and no longer felt in any danger. That motion was initially denied by the court on the basis that the case involved serious allegations of domestic abuse. The injunction was ultimately dismissed on 30 November 2017. On 27 September 2017, she signed a non-prosecution affidavit stating it was her desire to have the charges against the father dropped. The mother signed a declaration on the affidavit that she was not put under any pressure to withdraw the criminal charges. The mother now contends that she was pressured by the paternal grandmother into withdrawing her criminal complaint. The mother asserts that the paternal grandmother both offered not to trouble the mother after she moved to a different state if she dropped the prosecution and that the paternal grandmother had told her she was “crazy, filing orders against [the father] because she knows how dangerous he is and what he can do.” The paternal grandmother denied having said any words to this effect when cross-examined. By way of explanation, the paternal grandmother stated that:

“I am not on anyone side, I always protect women, but a few days later she said the children wanted to stay at home, and she was regretting it and it had got out of hand and she wanted to speak to the authorities.”

I am not satisfied that the mother has proved her allegations in respect of 26 April 2017 on the balance of probabilities. The mother has given multiple different accounts of the incident in question, which accounts are both internally inconsistent and inconstant as between accounts. The mother’s accounts are so replete with inconsistencies such that it is impossible for the court to rely on them absent corroborating evidence. Beyond the mother’s accounts in police reports, there is no such corroborating evidence. The medical material relied on by the mother, including the photographic evidence, do not corroborate the injuries the mother alleges she sustained. In particular, the credibility of the mother’s allegations is undermined by the fact that they appear to escalate in severity each time an account is given and that it was only once the father had issued proceedings under the 1980 Hague Convention that the mother began to allege that the father attempted to rape Q on 26 April 2017. Within this context, the fact that the mother withdrew civil and criminal proceedings with respect to the father must attract some weight. I am conscious that in her letter to the Children’s Guardian, P makes allegations of sexual abuse that could relate to the 26 April 2017. However, and as I will come to below, there are significant difficulties with P’s statements made seven years after the event.

I am further satisfied that the mother has fabricated her account of the father attempting to rape Q on the morning of 26 April 2017. Despite the gravity of that alleged abuse, the mother did not mention to any law enforcement officer on the scene on 26 April 2017 nor thereafter, nor to UK Border Force officials. Further, the allegation was only made after it became apparent that the father was seeking the return of the children to the United States under the 1980 Hague Convention. In these circumstances, I am satisfied on the balance of probabilities that the mother fabricated the allegation that the father attempted to anally rape Q in an effort to discredit the father and undermine his case.