Victim :- Cancer, Perpetrator :- Aries
Requested by animeandarmy
Key words: [Sexual abuse] [Economic abuse] [Emotional and psychological abuse] [Following, harassing and monitoring] [Exposing children] [Damaging property] [Systems abuse] [Risk] [Women] [People with children] [Pregnant women] [People with mental illness] [People from CALD backgrounds] [People affected by substance misuse] [Victim experience of court processes] [Questioning witnesses] [Protection order] [Breach] [Parenting orders][Weapons][Family Law]
Cancer and Aries met overseas in Cancer’s home city. Aries was taking a break from a job that he said had caused him post-traumatic stress disorder and a persistent back injury, for which he received benefits and self-medicated using marijuana and medicinal painkillers. Cancer has post-graduate qualifications and was working in a well-paid position at the time. The relationship developed quickly and Cancer was soon pregnant.
During the pregnancy Aries resigned from his job while Cancer continued to work. Cancer found that she often had to ask Aries and his friends not to smoke marijuana near her. After the birth, they lived with Cancer’s mother who helped with the baby. Cancer received part-paid maternity leave, which she used to support the family. Aries refused to make any contribution to rent or other living expenses and, when asked, would angrily yell and throw things, including a computer on one occasion. Cancer felt fearful of these early behaviours, but didn’t react, trying not to hurt Aries’s pride or add to the damaging effects of his job.
Aries persuaded Cancer to move to Australia where he grew up. He went ahead alone to prepare for the family’s arrival, and Cancer and the baby were to follow when Cancer’s visa issued, and the baby was around nine months old. Aries did very little in that time: he lived off friends, failed to look for a job and eventually sought help from his father to find accommodation. Aries then insisted on returning overseas to collect Cancer and the baby.
Once back in Australia, Aries pressured Cancer into paying off his credit card debt, which she was not liable for. Cancer’s maternity leave money soon ran out. Cancer also understood that Aries had or was due to receive a significant lump-sum compensation payment from his employer for his post-traumatic stress disorder but he kept the detail from Cancer. One day Aries fell in the kitchen, further injuring himself, resulting in his increased use of marijuana and painkillers, which Cancer observed made him angry and depressed.
Increasingly, Aries would verbally and emotionally abuse Cancer and damage household property. Cancer felt isolated with a very young child, no family or friends nearby, and no car licence. Aries made frequent sexual demands of her that she found distressing and painful.
In time, Cancer was employed again, Aries enrolled in a university course, and the child went to day care. Aries also began rehabilitation for his injury and psychologist appointments for his post-traumatic stress disorder. Cancer felt that life had become more normal and bearable until one day Aries threw a piece of furniture around the kitchen in a rage about medical expenses that had to be paid to treat a condition Cancer had developed. Cancer took the child into the bedroom and locked the door. Aries never struck Cancer or the child, but would raise his hand menacingly in anger. Aries was well over double Cancer’s weight.
When not at university, Aries spent more and more time during the day and night drinking and taking drugs with his friends while Cancer worked and cared for the child. Without asking Cancer, Aries invited a female friend to stay because she needed somewhere to live. Aries’s drug taking made his behaviour more abusive and irrational. He would accuse Cancer of lying about her whereabouts, and, despite her resistance, his sexual violence towards her escalated. He wrote her a letter complaining that the child was taking up too much time and that she was not paying him enough money.
Cancer reached emotional breaking point and sought psychological help through her employer. She moved into another bedroom and they began living separately under the one roof. Aries discovered from reading Cancer’s emails that she had made a male acquaintance. He became very aggressive, repeatedly texting her (and the male friend), demanding that she leave without the child, reminding her of his weapons licence, and threatening suicide. Cancer could not afford other accommodation and refused to leave the child in Aries’s care. While she had no intention of leaving her job and uprooting the child from day care – and in any event had no funds – to return overseas, Aries had hidden her passport, which she managed to retrieve before finally leaving.
With the help of support services, Cancer and the child were housed temporarily in a motel then moved to a shelter. Inevitably this caused upheaval with work and day care, but Cancer was grateful for the assistance she received with visa matters and an application for a protection order. Initially acting for herself (while Aries had a lawyer), Cancer was unable to obtain a temporary order and the matter went to trial, for which she was granted Legal Aid. Cancer describes an intimidating courtroom experience where: during cross-examination, she was yelled at by Aries’s barrister, and the Magistrate was unable to respond effectively; she was not allowed to give evidence of the sexual violence because she was told it could no longer occur due to separation; and she was told that because there was no physical violence or harm, the texting, suicide threats and reference to a weapons licence were minimised and not considered sufficiently abusive to establish domestic and family violence. The court dismissed Cancer’s application and she was denied a protection order.
Despite strict security controls, Aries was able to locate the shelter where Cancer and the child were living. Concerned about the risk to the shelter and its other residents, and the complications associated with moving to another shelter, Cancer decided to stay with friends. Again, Aries revealed to Cancer an address in the vicinity. Distraught, Cancer searched for an explanation, and then discovered Aries had sewn a GPS tracking device in the back of a doll that he’d insisted Cancer take for the child.
Cancer went immediately to the police and gave a statement. Initially police told her she couldn’t get a protection order because there was no physical violence, but she persisted and the court granted a temporary protection order. At the final hearing, Cancer was unrepresented and Aries’s lawyer offered a protection order without any admission of facts. Cancer resisted because she knew that Aries’s behaviour was abusive and he should be held responsible. The Magistrate declined to make a final decision on the basis that Family Court matters were pending; and instead extended the temporary order. While an interim parenting order was put in place for shared care, there are multiple problems regarding changeover and other arrangements and Aries flouting the order. The matter was referred to mediation, however precluded from proceeding due to risk of domestic and family violence.
Aries soon sought a cross order against Cancer fabricating evidence of her beating and raping him, which at the final hearing she was able to resist using audio and social media records she had diligently gathered, and ultimately was granted a final protection order, however the child and others are not listed as protected parties. Before the hearing, Aries had also tried to run Cancer over in his car. Aries continues to breach the good behaviour provision of the protection order and the terms of the parenting order. Aries has never been charged with breach, or with any criminal offences relating to the stalking and monitoring, attempting to run over Cancer, or the false affidavit evidence.
Cancer agreed to settle final parenting orders with Aries, avoiding a trial. Cancer finds changeovers distressing and demeaning: Aries yells commands at her. She is concerned about how they will jointly manage ongoing parenting decisions and arrangements in the best interests of the child while she endures ongoing abuse. Aries is still unemployed and demands that Cancer pay him child support. Cancer would like to visit her home city with the child, but expects that Aries will take any steps to prevent them from going. They were together for only three years, and yet Cancer feels she and the child will live with Aries’s abuse and its harmful consequences for many years yet.
