A cafcass officer said that my wife alleged that "you self harm by cutting yourself with a breadknife".
I have evidence from my GP, after a humiliating full body examination, that I show no evidence of self harm. This information has been sent to the family court.
Can I sue my wife/cafcass for making such a demonstrablly false allegations?
hi,
I don't think this is worth pursuing. there's a lot of hearsay during these court proceedings, so Cafcass/judges are going on hearsay/whatever is put on front of them. allegation is not a fact, just merely an allegation and up to your ex to prove it. ex partners make dozens, hundreds of allegations like this and courts have heard it all before. allegations are not held to a high standard in family courts, like criminal courts. maybe you can pursue it through criminal court proceedings. probably a good idea to have a chat with a lawyer.
CAFCASS are only reporting the allegation to the court - it's their job to report what's been said to the courts , if mum is fibbing , it's not CAFCASS' fault
Don't let false allegations rattle you. They are common place in court proceedings.
If there is a pattern of repeated false or unproven allegarions then it will affect your ex's credibility as a witness. You just need to play the long game and show that you are the opposite:
-Child focused.
-Credible.
-Works with Cafcass and the court to move things forward.
Furthermore allegations are usually categories as the following:
-Risk of harm to a child
-Welfare concern
-Irrelevant
Judges hear hundreds of cases every year and have come across exaggeration, lies and twisting of facts thousands of times throughout their careers.
They see through it. Parents aren't expected to be perfect robots and the focus is on determining serious risk of harm or deliberate patterns of abuse. Don't be rattled by false allegations or take them to heart.
@mrstrange yes good points. I got used to silly allegations being made against me. often cafcass and courts are sensible enough to ignore/dismiss the ridiculous allegations and just move on with things.
For the Section 7 report we had to submit statements and allegarions to cafcass. My ex wrote multiple pages of "allegations" and included a gazzilion pages of exhibits.
In my statement two paragraph statement, I didn't respond to a single allegations. Less than 2% of what wrote was cited in the section 7 report =D
Sometimes the key to being a successful defendant is to say as little as possible.
