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A judge removed three young children from their parents’ care after hearing allegations that they were stripped and spanked by their father at home.
In a hearing in family law court, the judge awarded a 28-day interim care order (ICO) for the children to Tusla, the Children and Families Agency (CFA).
The address of the children’s new home must not be disclosed to the parents by court order.
A childcare support coordinator at a local shelter told the court how the couple’s six-year-old boy told her: “My dad whips me with a wire and I have to take off my pants and it still hurts.”
The court also heard an accusation that the man struck the three-year-old girl with a shoe, leaving bruises and marks on her.
The judge told the court that she has heard “the most extraordinary allegations of serious physical abuse against three young children” by the man.
She said, “I can’t tell if it’s true or false right now.” In July, the mother of the three children gave an affidavit before the flogging and nudity court where she obtained a protection order against her husband, who is the father of two of the children.
However, the woman told the judge that what she testified in July and what the children told social workers about her husband’s physical abuse “are lies.”
The mother told the court: “Everything I said and what the children said were lies.
The mother said: “I want my family and my children to come back to me. I don’t want to be taken care of. I want to take responsibility for my children and my husband ”.
The judge said to the woman: “After you told me that you came to court in July and committed perjury and are saying that your daughter is a liar and told her to be a liar? Who am I supposed to believe? “
CFA attorney Kevin Sherry said what the mother is saying now that it is all a lie “is completely incredulous and in no way credible.”
Tusla moved to file the “extremely urgent” interim care order (ICO) request after the mother took the children to the father’s new address in violation of a safety plan established by Tusla for the children.
Gardaí and Tusla social workers arrived at the father’s address and took the children to the home of a relative of the mother, but that location is no longer available and requires the ICO.
The woman and her children were admitted to a local women’s shelter in June and a childcare support coordinator told the court that the boy also told her:
The boy told a CFA social worker that he wanted the “knuckles” to stop.
She told the same social worker that her father kicked her in the stomach around Christmas time when he opened a Christmas present that belonged to her father.
The six-year-old also alleged that his father used to beat him with a pipe that was used to hold the hangers in the closet.
The six-year-old boy told the social worker that he does not want to go back to his father.
The two older children Tusla interviewed also alleged that they saw the man slap and hit their mother.
The judge told the father that he may not have to testify as he could be facing assault and damage charges in criminal court.
However, the man with the sworn evidence told the court that: “Everything they said about me is lies from the beginning. I love my children and would not do anything to them. I would never hurt my children. ”
When asked why his wife went to court and said that he beat her and the children, the man said it was a misunderstanding around money.
He said: “Everything is made up and everything is a lie.” Two CFA social workers told the judge that the allegations made by the children are credible.
One told the judge: “In my professional opinion, I have no doubt that the children’s version is credible.” The other told the judge that she was aware of the father’s refusals and stated: “I have no doubt that the children have gone through these experiences and what they said is not trained.”
As part of a Garda investigation into the allegations, the children have been interviewed by specialized Garda interviewers and the children’s mother also made a statement to Gardaí.
One of Tusla’s social workers told the judge that a relative of the family tried to intervene when he saw that the father allegedly assaulted the children “but that he told her to take care of his own affairs, that he was the father of his children and that he could basically do whatever he wanted. “
The social worker said that the children’s mother had told her that she had covered the children’s bruises with foundation before going to school.
He said that the mother, when making the initial accusation, was crying and that her information was very credible and detailed.
The social worker said that she asked the mother if her husband had threatened her and she said no.
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