Remember Samantha Baldwin? It’s okay if you don’t, you’re not meant to. Samantha Baldwin is someone the state has a vested interest in you forgetting. There is a court order in place preventing anyone publicly discussing the case. That’s why I’m not going to.
I just want to talk about the woman. To be very clear, I don’t know her. We are facebook friends and have on occasion, liked the other’s post, but I am not one of her confidants. I imagine few people are. If there is one thing family court teaches every smart woman, it is to be very careful who they speak to, and what they say. Much like the refrain of the American cop show your words ‘can and will be used against you.’
So how can I talk about a woman I don’t know? Here’s the thing, I feel like I do know her. I feel like I have always known her. I feel like all that separates us from having an identical fate is the grace of God.
Samantha Baldwin is to me, an ordinary mum, who has gone to extra-ordinary lengths to protect her kids. If she’d been trying to protect them from a stranger, she’d have her got her own book deal, and Cameron Diaz might have played her in a movie. But Samantha’s predator wasn’t the elusive weirdo stranger with acne scars and a dodgy raincoat. It was someone much closer to home. Given that 90% of child victims are abused by someone they know , this assertion makes her all the more believable, but only if a family court judge chooses to believe her.
Darn! There’s me bringing up the case, when I’d said I wouldn’t. But there’s nothing I’m telling you here, that you can’t google for yourself. It is a statement of fact that Samantha accused her husband of committing unspeakable acts with his own kids. It is a fact that the family court judge choose not to believe her. It is a fact that the most unusual aspect of the case was not the horrific accusations of a mother against a father, but the mother’s absconding with her children, thus pushing the dark, secret world of family courts, into the cold light of day. That’s why details of this case have wound up in the public domain.
In reality, women accusing men of grotesque acts of violence against themselves and their children is the bread and butter of the family law business. Much time and money is spent investigating the claims these women make, yet invariably these enquiries fall short of an industry standard, and ofttimes don’t amount to much more than the subjective ramblings of a number of people, many of whom have an appalling record in child protection. Who, for example, only the truly desperate, would turn to a social worker for advice on child welfare?
Having not objectively seen the evidence in Samantha Baldwin’s case, I cannot testify as to the veracity of her claims. Having been a mother before the family courts, I can say, they don’t put much stock in objective truth. Having witnessed countless legal and state professionals withhold and manipulate information, I can say that no state organisation functions effectively, when it is not held to the highest standard of public scrutiny, In a nutshell, in every walk of life people are malevolent, judge mental, lazy and careless. In a culture which does not root out these traits, and a secret court by its very definition can’t, they grow and become a way of life.
So, when it comes to Samantha Baldwin I don’t have the luxury of being able to forget her, even though the state says I must. I don’t even have the luxury of calling her a liar, thereby insulating myself from the truth, that the state can and does steal children, if their mother’s don’t do as they are told.