Family and Friends Forum

It's funny how something as small as a knock at the door can destroy your life more completely than an intercontinental ballistic missile.

As May rolled around my husband and I and our two girls were firmly entrenched in lockdown. We were struggling a little under it all but we were coping. One morning as we were getting ready to tackle the day someone knocked on our door. What immediately followed were over 5 plain clothed policemen and women who charged into our house, demanding that they search the house.

My husband and I were shocked, and we asked what it was all about. They refused to tell us until we allowed them inside and into our lounge. After they made us sit down they told us that they received intelligence that an IP address registered to our address had been used to access illicit images of children over a year previous.

The world fell out from under me. I head what they said, understood the words individually, but I simply couldn't process it. How could that be? It was impossible. I kept repeating 'I don't understand', and the policeman kept talking as he loomed over me. I struggled to slow my breathing to prevent myself from hyperventilating. My husband was shocked and appalled.

We weren't given any further time to process it. They immediately seperated us and I was relegated to rouding the girls up as another policewoman declared that they were going to be taken from us as both my husband and I would be arrested. I was horrified and I started to break down, but I couldn't allow myself to do that because I didn't want to frighten my babies. The policewoman questioned me and asked about where I worked and what my work pattern was while the policeman took my husband outside to the garden where he collected the passwords to our various devices.

While they started to search the house, I frantically collected clothing for my children and tried not to let them know how terrified I was. I had no idea where they would end up since the social worker they brought with them declared that any place they would be taken to had to be vetted by them first. All the while the policeman questioned my husband over and over, repeating 'If you just put your hand up and say you did it, we won't arrest your wife and we won't take away your children.

My husband, not wanting to confess to something he didn't do did not confess. And they followed through with their threat and arrested me and took my children away to stay with some of our family members.

We were taken to the custody centre where I was processed and put into a custody cell. I suffer from PTSD stemming from previous instances of abuse, and I kept having panic attacks. I couldn't eat, and I kept breaking down into sobs as I tried to make sense of what just happened. I began to feel very very cold and I couldn't stay warm and I couldn't focus on anything. I know now that I was going into shock. My anxiety and panic had upset my stomach and I begged to be allowed to use a toilet that wasn't a foot from the metal bed that was in the cell. They refused, and I had no choice but to use the custody cell toilet.

They kept us in custody for nearly 12 hours without speaking to a solicitor, all the while I had to smell the stench of my upset stomach from the toilet.

Eventually I was allowed to speak to a solicitor who was shocked that they arrested me. They had questioned me about my work hours, and they knew the time and date of the alledged offense. They knew at the time I was in the office and therefore couldn't have done it. It became very clear that I was arrested, and my children were taken away from me, so that the police had leverage to force a confession out of my husband.

They interviewed us. I had to answer horribly disgusting questions. I insisted that I couldnt possibly have done this as any hint of anything relating to child abuse always triggered panic attacks due to PTSD. They ignored me, and questioned me further about my sexual habits and whether I viewed porn, and if so what type of porn.

Several hours later we were released. I was exhausted and still hadn't eaten or been able to keep any fluid down. I was still in shock. As I was waiting for them to bring my husband out so that we could be taken home, the arresting officer turned to me and said 'The sooner either of you puts your hand up, the sooner it will all end. This can take a very long time. You could go 9 months without seeing your children'. Her words destroyed whatever shreds of strength I had left.

We were taken home, where I kept slipping in and out of shock. My husband wasn't much better. He swore he didn't do this and I believed him. We remained under bail restrictions that prevented us from getting our children back. Even when I produced evidence two days later that proved I was not home when it happened, I was kept from them and only allowed two hour supervised visits every day. This went on for nearly 3 weeks.

At the end of his tether, my solicitor put a super-human amount of pressure on the police. I was innocent, I had proved I was even though it was not my job to do so. The police had failed to confirm prior to my arrest if I was at work that day with my employer when they knew that I would have been at work according to my work schedule. The police reluctantly admitted that I was not a person of interest and dropped my bail conditions. My girls were returned to me but that meant my husband had to move out and stay with his parents.

For the past year we had been having odd instances associated with our internet. We had trouble downloading things or accessing websites that should have been easy to open. Our devices dropped off the wireless constantly. We didn't know what was going on and our internet provider couldn't figure it out either, so they just increased our bandwidth. But they never found out the true cause.

We found out that our emails had been compromised. Our passwords, physical address, and personal information had also been stolen in over 25 seperate instances. My passwords have been compromised on 56 different occations. We locked everything down and changed our email passwords. Then someone tried to use my email to sign up to a bit coin purchasing site. My facebook password was attempted to be reset. So was my instagram. I started getting calls from someone who pretended to be my interenet provider trying to get access to our systems.

On the third call like this I questioned them heavily. They had my internet provider's account number. They had my address. But I knew it wasn't them. When I questioned them a bit further they became abusive and started shouting at me 'you're a motherf*****!' and started threatening me. I was so scared I called our solicitor who told me to contact the police investigator. They have had the numbers that have been calling me, and all the details of our compromised information.

They still have my devices, my passport, and have so far refused to return them claiming they still need to review the data. I haven't ever been a serious person of interest so I am unsure where they have the right to do any of this.

We are both destroyed. Absolutely utterly destroyed. We're in purgatory, every day the same like some nightmarish version of Groundhog Day. I'm not sure I have the strength to keep living like this. I'm afraid all the time. Every night I get torn out of sleep by panic attacks about being in the custody cell. Or back in that closet-sized room where they examined my girls for signs of abuse (they found none). I have never felt so powerless.

Social services have implemened a child protection plan, which I follow religiously.

I used to think that it was the police's responsibility to protect innocent people. How very wrong I was.