Family Rights Group | Kinship carers’ Forum

I don't know if I've came to the right place, but im desperate for some advice since ive been through a lot the past year/year and half.
Basically, I'm in a relationship with a registered sex offender since a year now. He is literally the love of my life. I've known him for a fair few years now through work and we just clicked and fell in love. But obviously there some complications due to his past. I'm 22 and he's 32 (i know quite a big gap but i do believe in age is just a number plus i'm quite mature for my age.
Basically, when he was in his teens, he was a mess. He had bad family problems, his dad was an alcoholic and he seen stuff that a child/teenager should never had seen (his dad's suicide attempt). He was in with the wrong crowd and developed to be a drug addict (wiz in particular) and when he was 18 he was convicted of rape by knife-point after trying to rob two 16 year old girls for money on his way home in order to get more drugs. This happened whilst off his head on 'wiz' and very drunk and it lead to one of the girls performing oral sexual acts instead of handing him her bag like he wanted and then he ran away after realizing what had happened. He woke up the next day to police at his door and couldn't remember about it until they explained to him and straight away he got flashbacks and never denied a thing. He felt horrible.
I know, it's so so so horrible that he let such a thing happen, I hate that person he used to be and i hate what he did to this day, and I hate that this is a big part of his life now- so does he. After several suicide attempts whilst in jail, he's worked hard to better himself as a person and CHANGE, took on all the programs offered to him, did different college courses, did everything he could to change, and to this day he is drug free and only drinks a small amount of alcohol - he genuine is a COMPLETE different person and i DO believe in him,. Yet again, this will never justify what happened and I feel sick thinking of what happened, but since it happened so many years ago I can somehow deal with it, i'll never forgive or forget what he did, but I can deal with it.
Anyway, I'm in contact with his PPU officer and he always has positive things to say on how he's developed and kept his head down since he came out - he's had no other convictions since or no involvement with anything illegal. Therefore, he was said to be very likely to get off the register once he's allowed to apply. But in the mean time, my family is the issue - my mum HATES him that she had stopped me from spending individual time with my brother (9) and sister (13) and this is killing me..... Also, I used to work as a support worker for ill and disabled children, but due to my Mum telling them about my relationship, I've been suspended until my circumstance changes. I am very upset about this seeing as we went to a solicitor before telling my parents about his past and he informed us that this shouldn't happen as long as he has no contact with my siblings and my work (which he wouldn't). Therefore, the moral of the story is, my Mum has stopped me spending time with my siblings without any supervision because she says that they would be taken off her if social services found out about my relationship. Also, I am concerned that I may have had an unfair dismissal with my job. I constantly get grief off my Mum saying that he's a horrible person and that she needs to safeguard the kids so they're not allowed to come to my house or anything (my boyfriend doesnt even live with me, he has his own place) therefore I don't see how she can stop them from coming to mine????
I'm just so fed up about everything when all i get is messages off my Mum saying that I have destroyed the family when all I did was be honest with her and I've never asked her to have any contact with him AT ALL. My counselor has even said that she's emotionally blackmailing me but I really don't know anymore, I'm just looking for some advice about the situation that I am in.

THANK YOU!!

Hi bananagirl1.

This isn't really the right forum for your query as its aimed at helping those who are looking after, or concerned about children of family and friends. However I cannot think of an appropriate forum to direct you towards so I'm going to give a bit of advice. If FRG admin feel this is inappropriate, please delete my response.

I'll tackle the sibling issue first. Quite simply, your mum has parental responsibility over your brother and sister and therefore has a duty to protect them from harm. She also has the absolute right to decide who they should, or should not see. You could apply to the court for an order, but it would cost you money, drive a deeper wedge between your mum and yourself, and I suspect the court would not view your mum's concerns about your boyfriend as unreasonable, and would therefore, in my opinion, be unlikely to make such an order. However, I am not legally trained, and court decisions are not always predicable.

On the employment issue, again it is absolutely normal to suspend people if they are in a relationship with an inappropriate person until such time as the risk is fully investigated, or circumstances change. The company have a duty to protect, clients and, sad as it may be, there have been several very well publicised cases where female partners have lined up victims for abuse and indeed murder by the other because males who commit such offences are usually very controlling and are able to manipulate their partners to achieve their own sordid desires. Your employer would be investigated, and possibly prosecuted/closed down if something happened and they were aware of your boyfriends history, especially given the vulnerability of those you were caring for.

The third point I'd make is that you seem only to have your boyfriend's explanation of what happened leading to the conviction. This is likely to have been coloured by the passage of time and the reality may have been very different. Only the authorities will be aware of all the details.

Finally, your mum is likely to be concerned as while you are not currently living in the same house as your boyfriend, eventually, if you are as in love as you say, you will want to be together. If you then have children social services will almost certainly become involved to ensure your children are then safe. Rightly or wrongly, sexual offences against children, whatever the justification, are viewed seriously for very many years.

Given all the above and the age gap, your mother's response actually quite rational. She probably thinks you are on a self destruct course and are going to get hurt, it's hurting her to see you getting hurt, and while she has taken action to protect the younger children, she will know that they are also hurting. The only way you will ever change her mind is to be calm, caring and show her over a long time that you love your family.

Hopefully this is of some assistance. Only you can decide on the next steps.

Best wishes ..... Robin

Thank you for the reply -
Sorry i should of said, he didn’t do anything to a minor, and the details i have is from himself and his PPU officer when we had a meeting and he his happy that i know the truth seeing as he is a public protection officer. Therefore, what i said, happened..
this is what’s frustrating since his past seem to make people think that he would control me, but 100% he doesn’t.. he’s not the horrible person he used to be and it’s a shame that the horrible past makes people think that what happened years ago would happen to me. I know that it wouldnt.
Thank you for your reply.

Sorry bananagirl1, but your original post said the offence was against two sixteen year-olds. That made "minor's" as they are under 18 and therefore not adults. The 16 age of consent is irrelevant in this setting.

I appreciate what you are saying about how what he did as a seventeen year-old is having such a negative effect on his life. People do turn themselves around, but people will always be cautious with this type of offence. Indeed, its the reason that the sexual offenders register , DBS etc was created in the first place after people re-offended and hurt and murdered again, sometimes after many years. Parliament then passed the legislation to provide long term protection for children from offenders.

Hi Bananagirl1,

Thank you for your post. You have already had some good advice from Robin, who has also mentioned that your post is outside the remit of Family Rights Group (FRG). At FRG we give advice to families who are involved with, or who are seeking help from, children’s services (the new name for social services).

You say your mum is preventing you from having contact with your siblings. If you would like advice on how to deal with this, you could contact Child Law Advice, which is a charity that provides advice on private law children matters: that is disputes about children between individuals.

With respect to the issues of you employment, I recommend you contact the advice service at ACAS.

Best wishes

Suzie