A convicted rapist who was previously allowed to have unsupervised time with his child has been stripped of his parental responsibility.
Kristoffer White, who has been described as a “danger to women and children”, failed to turn up to court last week for a hearing, attended by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism (TBIJ), to determine the involvement he could have in his daughter’s life.
White has a criminal conviction for the rape of a stranger, and the family court found he had also raped the child’s mother on three occasions.
Charlotte Proudman, the mother’s barrister, told the court: “The father inflicted devastating emotional harm on the whole family, including the child, which he continued to deny. It’s hard to see how there can be any positive factors that justify the father being capable of exercising his parental rights.”
White being able to liaise with the mother about the child’s medical records, school reports or other welfare matters would cause her emotional trauma as a victim of rape, Proudman argued.
Despite the serious findings made against him, including rape, by District Judge Sophie Harrison, White had previously been granted unsupervised access to his daughter after a recommendation by the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (Cafcass).
Harrison’s order permitting contact, made in February, was overturned after a successful appeal by the mother. White’s contact with the girl was suspended pending the court’s final orders, and the matter was referred to Moradifar.
After the appeal, the TBIJ and the freelance journalist Suzanne Martin successfully applied to the court to name White. A new children’s guardian from Cafcass advised the court at that point that White was “a danger to women and children” and “unsafe to have any involvement in [the child]’s or her family’s life”.
In an interview, the mother, who had represented herself in court up until February’s hearing, said it was concerning that two Cafcass employees came to polar opposite conclusions.
Speaking after the ruling, the mother told TBIJ she felt bittersweet relief. “My daughter is better off with this outcome, but it’s sad that this is my child’s life.
“I am not naive to the fact that this outcome would never have happened if I had remained a litigant in person [someone representing themselves without a lawyer]. If I hadn’t had legal representation, it could have been a very different result for my daughter.”
[Ed: Unfortunately this is not an isolated case and we are seeing similar decisions made frequently by Australian courts, with no media coverage and typically no access to legal representation for the distraught mothers.)