Reuniting Beth with Her Sons

 

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Adina BV

To reassure anyone who is a deep thinker and has similar questions, I want to share some thoughts, rationale, and digging I've done.

The first I heard about this case in 2012 when a petition circulated. At that time, I did not know Beth but knew both Graeme and Adrian personally and well enough to know they were good guys and menschlich. It wasn't immediately clear to me whether to sign the petition or not as I wanted to believe there was some independence and fairness to the courts or some reason we were unaware of. I asked a very trusted friend who knew Beth personally and had very good judgement and observed Rabbis getting on board having investigated the case, and felt confident that signing the petition was the right thing to do.

I can also share that I was told at that time by the same mutual friend/community organiser that Michael had become increasingly controlling and abusive over the course of the marriage. So, the allegations currently being made online by the "Daniel Cohen" profile that these reports were fabricated later are entirely false; Beth has been consistent in her testimony throughout. I believe survivors and I believe Beth's testimony personally and encourage you to. Here's why: This "Cohen" character states it is reasonable to be suspicious of reports of domestic violence without external verification. However, research and statistics about intimate partner violence indicates that false allegations are rare whereas attrition rates (reports not making it to court or conviction) are incredibly high. Victim testimony is admissable as evidence in court and it's known that abusers hide their abusing - therefore, we ought reasonably be far more suspicious of those individuals who are bending over backwards to point out there is no "independent" evidence (there never is) and trying so hard to clear Michael's name and invent a new narrative suggesting this consistent claim is new. Moreover, Jewish Women's Aid, an organisation with a huge amount of expertise, has examined the case and come out in support of Beth. An organisation with therapists and professionals with a huge amount of experience believe Beth's testimony.

Over the years, I got to know Beth Alexander . I don't know Beth especially well but I know she is honest and shares her truth and her pain, she is kind, generous, caring.

The case is impossible to make sense of.

There are essentially only two possibilities:

1. There is another side to this story which Beth is not sharing - something so extreme and severe that a fair court in a modern democratic country was justified in removing very young children from their primary care-giver mother, placing them in the custody of their alleged abuser father, and ordering supervised contact in a contact centre.

2. Beth is correct that there has been a miscarriage of justice and the community, Rabbis, and Esra are complicit in this.

Neither of these are things we would want to be true. Nothing about this case is something we would want to be true.

Having worked with children including Looked-After children for many many years as an SEMH teacher, volunteer Childline counsellor, and at an advocacy charity with local authority commissioned contracts for children in care, I am not unfamiliar with the reasons for supervised contact and removal of children from mother's. I have worked with children having court ordered contact with parents with serious issues.

What would this need to be? A parent who is unfit for custody might have incapacitating mental illness, serious substance and alcohol misuse, etc. Anyone who has ever met Beth can tell she isn't hiding an IV drug addiction, let alone for over a decade. Beth has a stable life and career. Not just this, but a parent who knew deep in their heart that they were hiding something terrible wouldn't be actively and publicly fighting this. The Chief Rabbi's delegation and JWA would simply have been told the truth, once, by the other 'side' and ceased intervening in support of Beth.

So, we can pretty much rule this out. But, to set my mind at ease, I actually asked two Jewish people in Vienna. One knew only very little but confirmed there was no "missing piece" known there and not here - indeed offered to help Beth! The other had known Beth at the time and said they fully support her fight. They described her as a loving parent who did everything for the boys with little support.

This leaves us with only really option 2 - miscarriage of justice not in the boys' best interests at the hands of a partial judge influenced by a senior colleague who is a personal friend of the father. Custody to the father, who then requests supervised contact - without indication of it actually being needed - as a way of continuing to perpetrate coercive control. When this is declined, he blocks and declines enough calls and letters to convince the children.

The conclusion, then, is clear. #helpbeth

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