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You would think that if you were a victim of domestic violence, the last thing you would have to do is to face a court order to have to maintain any kind of contact with your abuser. But that's exactly what a woman in the UK faces. Unless she complies with a court order to write to the man who nearly killed her, she could go to jail. Tell the UK's justice minister to end this travesty.
Back in February 2011, Natalie Allman wanted to break off her engagement with James Hughes, a soldier in the UK's Territorial Army--the equivalent of our Army Reserve. It was only two months before they were due to get married. Hughes crept up on Natalie while she was asleep and tried to smother her with a pillow. When that didn't work, he beat her up with a dumbbell, then slashed her throat. Their twin sons, barely two years old at the time, saw most of this barbaric display. Hughes only let Natalie call an ambulance seven hours after the ordeal began.
Natalie came out of this with eight wounds to her face, and her throat was so badly cut that she needed cosmetic surgery to fix it. Hughes openly admitted that he wanted to make Natalie look "ugly" for dumping him. He's serving nine years in prison. That should have ended the matter, right? Not by a longshot.
Last year, Hughes petitioned a judge to be allowed "residence and contact" with the twins Natalie had by him. He did so under a law intended to ensure children have contacts with both parents when relationships go south. But you would think that if a guy who beat his girlfriend up in full view of their kids made such a petition, the judge would ball it up and throw it back at him. Not in this case. Natalie was ordered to send Hughes letters every Easter, September and December telling him how the now five-year-old twins are doing, along with recent pictures. If she doesn't comply, she could be held in contempt.
Natalie is devastated, to put it mildly. She told The Sunday People--the Sunday edition of The Daily Mirror--that the judge who issued this order isn't allowing her or her kids to heal, and is legally allowing Hughes to "control us from behind bars." She's already spent £3,000 (roughly $4,600) fighting the petition, and is probably going to have to spend a lot more.
Last night, someone started a petition on Change.org asking Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice Chris Grayling–who is the equivalent of the Attorney General here in the United States--to overturn this order. That's only a first step. Grayling also needs to find a way to close any loophole that makes it possible for an abuser to elbow his way into his or her victim's life again in this way. Many of you know that I was in an abusive marriage for three years. I couldn't even imagine being forced to write to a woman who not only yelled and cursed at me all the time, but also tried to get me framed and then nearly exposed me to bigamy charges by trying to get me to sign fake divorce papers. Simply put, what Natalie is going through should never happen--anywhere, anytime.