Mr Justice Moor has today published his judgment about the death of Elsie (known to her biological family as Shayla). You can read the judgment here: The County Council of the City and County of Cardiff -v- Matthew Scully-Hicks and Others.
The judgment was written in December 2016 following a family court trial. The family court had to decide whether one of Elsie’s adoptive parents had inflicted her fatal injuries and whether either had failed to protect her from harm. It had to make those decisions because safe decisions needed to be made for Elsie’s adoptive sibling “C”. Decisions about C could not wait for the criminal trial – at the time of the decision, some 7 months after Elsie’s death, the police had not even made a decision whether they would charge Matthew Scully-Hicks with any crime in connection with her death. So the family court held a fact finding hearing to provide a factual basis to go forward on, for C.
In the family court a judge can “find” that an allegation is proved if it is more likely than not (this is called the balance of probabilities), but as it happens Mr Justice Moor concluded that he had no doubt that Elsie’s injuries were inflicted by Matthew Scully-Hicks. Later, the jury in the criminal trial came to the same conclusion.
It is not completely clear whether or not the local authority who brought the care proceedings suggested that either Craig or Matthew could have been responsible for inflicting the injuries, but it appears that they only sought a finding of infliction against Matthew, and that they asked the court to find that Craig had failed in protecting Elsie. From the judgment it appears that the Guardian of C did not seek a failure to protect finding.
Why is this judgment only just being published?
As the judgment itself explains, this judgment could not be published whilst it was possible there would be a criminal trial because it would have risked prejudicing that trial, which could have led to the crown being unable to pursue a conviction for Elsie’s death. The judge explains that he made clear that the judgment would be withheld and a reporting restriction order put in place only whilst a decision about criminal charges was being made, and if the charges were laid only until the trial had concluded. Now, good to his word, Mr Justice Moor has published his judgment, recognising that it is in the public interest that he should do so.
Why was the judgment published at all – does it tell us anything we didn’t know?
Well, it tells us that both the family and criminal courts heard extensive evidence and reached the same conclusion to a high standard. This is not always the case – in the case of Ellie Butler the family and criminal courts reached contradictory conclusions in relation to Ellie’s head injury and when her father’s conviction was quashed the family court held a rehearing and exonerated Ben Butler of injuries it had previously decided he had inflicted. Ben Butler went on to murder Ellie. The second time around both the family court and the criminal courts reached the same conclusion.
Perhaps more importantly this judgment tells us that Craig Scully-Hicks was cleared of harming Elsie, and of knowing about what was happening or failing to protect her – professionals had not spotted any warning signs and there was no reason to treat Craig any differently. The evidence supported the theory that Matthew Scully-Hicks was a Jekyll and Hyde character that even his own husband had not seen the other side of. He separated from Matthew Scully-Hicks in late 2016 and according to the judgment is devastated by what has happened. The judge said :
I have therefore come to the clear conclusion that I should exonerate Craig of any failure to protect Elsie. There is nothing he could or should have done but I fear he may find that difficult to accept.
The judgment also tells us in a post script that the text messages from Matthew calling Elsie unpleasant names and which have been referred to in press coverage had not been shown to the family court. It appears from press coverage of the criminal trial that some of these were sent to friends and some to Craig Scully-Hicks. Text messages were also of crucial importance in the Ellie Butler case. That too was a case where there was a surviving sibling and a fact finding judgment was withheld until the criminal trial was finished (see here).
The Judgment also makes clear that it was the family court judge who instigated the process of making sure that Elsie’s biological family were told of her death, and it appears that took place in early 2017. Until now it was unclear quite what had happened regarding this issue, and the answer appears to be that nothing happened until prompted by the judge.
Finally, the judgment makes the point that the fact that Elsie’s adoptive parents were gay had nothing to do with anything. It is sad that such a point needed to be made, but it is quite right that it has been.
Does the judgment tell us whether any agency was at fault?
No. It raises the possibility – but does not suggest that any agency was at fault. In fact, from the information in the judgment there is no obvious failure on the part of professionals identifiable, and most decisions made appear to have been reasonably made at the time on the basis of the information known. The judge concluded that nobody was able to see the other side of Matthew Scully-Hicks However, the judgment makes clear that it will be for others to scutinise the professionals involved with Elsie’s care and adoption, via an Extended and Concise Child Practice Review (the Welsh version of a Serious Case Review).
So what has happened to C?
The judgment doesn’t tell us, although from the conclusions reached there would seem to be no reason for C to continue to be separated from Craig Scully-Hicks, his/her adoptive father.
Feature Pic : Ink Stained Wretches by Jeff Eaton on Flickr (creative commons – thanks!)
‘Biological family’, ‘birth family’, just the adoption industry’s way of reducing the women who carry these children to gestational vessels, and emotionless conduits. May as well call them breeders. Natural Mother was the phrase used to describe a Mother who was separated from her child by adoption right up until an SW decided that to make the language used more friendly towards adopters. To do that she would need to dehumanise the Natural Mother, as adopters didn’t feel comfortable at the implication that adoption wasn’t a natural way to build a family (it’s not, and is usually done as a last resort after failed medical interventions, and no more funding to continue them. It’s a last resort shot at parenting for most). Reading some of the stories about how some women have moved mountains and yet still not ‘survived safeguarding’, to reduce those women as people who have just given birth is utterly degrading and inhumane. Note also, men cannot give birth so how on earth do they qualify as the ‘birth Father’?
Unfortunately for poor Shayla, an LA employee with a BA in a soft subject most likely gained from a former polytechnic, AKA BA Social Work. decided that her Grandmother wouldn’t be able to cope with her, and decided that the vague prophecy that there was a ‘risk of future emotional harm’ meant that she had to be separated from her NATURAL family, and she was sent off to her death with a man who actually couldn’t cope. The irony. Poor girl.
Surely poor Shayla just goes to show that you cannot accurately predict the future, let alone, the risks of undefined harms.
Anon-a-mouse, We’ve used the term adoptive and biological parents to distinguish between Shayla’s two families. We don’t have the judgment relating to her removal from the care of her mother to know the detailed reasons for her removal, but we are told in this judgment that Shayla’s mother was a drug addict and had been in and out of prison. So it is unlikely to have been a case solely based around future emotional harm, even if Shayla was removed at birth or shortly thereafter.
I am aware of Shayla’s Mother’s predicament. However, her Grandmother was not a drugs user, or a convict. Just a woman who was discarded by the social services based on an opinion that she would not be able to cope.
The discarding of family members as I see is routine within the courts. [edited]
Anon-a-mouse, We’ve edited your comment for legal reasons.
The publication of this judgment answered a major question I had (“Whatever happened to the unharmed older child?”) and a few I didn’t realise I had (eg “Was C S-H found to have failed to protect Elsie?”). I read it with interest and sadness.
It is clearly right that this was published.
‘drug addict’. The term is a proxy for ‘awful person’. Most people today are drug addicts- antidepressants, antipsychotics, ‘pain meds’. Illegal drug addiction brings different problems related to the cost and supply of the drug but Shayla’s mother appeared to have loved her. She was subject to the same value judgment that a ‘moral defective’ or ‘fallen woman’ would be in days’ gone by,
Catherine Geldart,
“drug addict” is really all we have. The judgment sets out a sketch of Elsie’s early background : “Her birth mother is a drug addict who was certainly in prison at one point during the adoption proceedings.” Its probably reasonable to assume if its mentioned that this was the sort of drug addiction that had an impact on her ability to care for Elsie either directly or through incarceration, but as you quite rightly point out there are different types of addiction, some of which will have little bearing on the ability to care for a child. We would need to see the original family court judgment to fully understand why Shayla was adopted and whether it was justified, but it is certainly true that many children are removed from loving parents – even dangerous parents love their parents and they are usually doing their best. Sadly though sometimes it is not good enough to keep a child safe. The family court evidently thought in this case love was not sufficient. We can’t say more without the judgment.
I sat through the full murder trial of Matthew Scully-Hicks [comment edited for legal reasons]
Why did the Judge have to make an order to the LA to inform the birth family of the tragic death of this child. Does this mean the LA don’t have to tell the birth family if a child passes away how do they explain why letterbox contact has stopped
And what of the other child who probably witnessed this abuse and his birth family. There could be many worried families worried that he could be their child whatever the reasons for his adoption
It’s not clear that he DID make an order per se, but he certainly raised it as a matter of common humanity and prompted the telling of the birth family (quite rightly). As a matter of law the birth family would have had no legal connection to the child and no legal right to be told anything about the child, but I think most people would agree that they should be told.