Bail extended
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My oh was supposed to report to the police station yesterday as per his bail as it has been 3 months since the knock. But on Monday he had a voicemail from the police that they needed his computer longer and will be extending his bail, but they didn't know for how long. We hadn't heard anything from the police for 3 months until this voicemail. A few weeks ago, we tried contacting the police officer in charge and left a message as we went on holiday last week and wanted to check if they needed to know, instead of just disappearing, but he never returned our call.
When all this happened, we were told to carry on as normal, but there is nothing normal about this situation as my oh is not sleeping at home and can't spend any time with our 15 year old daughter on her own. Wednesday night was always their night watching Grange Hill while I went to knitting group.
We are still waiting to hear how long the bail is extended for. We received one other voicemail on Wednesday making sure he wouldn't turn up at the police station yesterday and that they didn't have a date for how long the bail has been extended, but that is the only communication we have had from the police.
When all this happened, we were told to carry on as normal, but there is nothing normal about this situation as my oh is not sleeping at home and can't spend any time with our 15 year old daughter on her own. Wednesday night was always their night watching Grange Hill while I went to knitting group.
We are still waiting to hear how long the bail is extended for. We received one other voicemail on Wednesday making sure he wouldn't turn up at the police station yesterday and that they didn't have a date for how long the bail has been extended, but that is the only communication we have had from the police.
Sadly you may only hear from the police if they want something, Dawn. At least that's our experience along with the ignored emails/calls from us. I think a few people get welfare checks occasionally but our son gets his as a precursor to wanting something from the OIC eg 'hi there (inserting son's first name and using a friendly voice) how are you doing? Everything OK? still getting support from your parents blah blah blah, followed by dropping some kind of bombshell or request for help over something. It makes me sick as it's so two-faced. She couldn't care less really and just needs to tick the box that says she's checked on the offender's mental health.
We are midway through bail extension 2 and fully expecting another 3 or 6 months if there's been no progress with the case. It makes a joke of the official Bail arrangements laid out in all the CPS and Gov documents which implies that after 2 extensions the police should think again as it has to go through the magistrates - I think a few people on here have changed to RUI at this point but many describe multiple extensions.
I'm so sorry to say all this as the waiting game and the powerlessness felt is horrid, plus the damage to your family day to day routines like the TV time your daughter is missing so much. If we were being treated so carelessly and unfairly and ignored in any other setting we would be complaining loudly but there is always that fear of making things worse so we put up with it.
I feel like a real pessimist here, sorry to not be more positive - maybe others will come along with better stories as there does seem to be a huge difference in how the police treat people in these situations.
We are midway through bail extension 2 and fully expecting another 3 or 6 months if there's been no progress with the case. It makes a joke of the official Bail arrangements laid out in all the CPS and Gov documents which implies that after 2 extensions the police should think again as it has to go through the magistrates - I think a few people on here have changed to RUI at this point but many describe multiple extensions.
I'm so sorry to say all this as the waiting game and the powerlessness felt is horrid, plus the damage to your family day to day routines like the TV time your daughter is missing so much. If we were being treated so carelessly and unfairly and ignored in any other setting we would be complaining loudly but there is always that fear of making things worse so we put up with it.
I feel like a real pessimist here, sorry to not be more positive - maybe others will come along with better stories as there does seem to be a huge difference in how the police treat people in these situations.
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Our son has been on bail since January - two extensions and next one in November (if no progress with his case still) so time frames really seem pointless. He has a solicitor (mainly because we couldn't cope with his OIC any more and wanted someone to be the intermediary to spare our stress) and she wanted to challenge the bail conditions saying they must be proportionate and appropriate so saying no contact when the offences are all online is unlawful. Also the police can't base them on a 'just in case we find evidence of contact offences' scenario until there is actual evidence. She wrote to the OIC but assured our son that the response would be negative and she would then take it to magistrates for him. At that point the OIC actually rang our son about something quite unecessary but referred to the bail thing and said she'd have to go to court if he did that and she'd never done that before - how weird, was she expecting him to feel sorry for putting her under so much stress???? Anyway, we decided to just keep going with things as they are because we knew SS would still expect no unsupervised contact and we didn't want to complicate things (that's another long story) but it's annoying that the police can slap these 'one size fits all' conditions which hugely affect people's lives and finances if they have to keep forking out for hotels if they want to see their children, as is the case for us.