repossession, divorce economical domestic abuse

Cornishmama

Hi I am looking for some help regarding my financial remedy. I left my marriage due to prolonged domestic abuse. I was with my husband 26 years, married for 14 years, and we have two dependant children, who he does not support financially or otherwise, and they do not have contact with him.

We all lived together with his mum, and after 8 years together, she offered for us to take advantage of her right to buy scheme so we could get on the property ladder. But, because the tenancy was in her name, she had to be on the mortgage, and I could not. i did not see this as a problem, because they both said that when we could remortgage after the first 5 years, she wo9uld come off and I would go on, but this never happened.

In 2019 i finally left because his abuse was now effecting the children. I did not apply for divorce because his mum was now terminally ill, and I feared this would tip him over the edge. She died a few months later, and that further prolonged me going for divorce and adding my matrimonial home rights notice with land registry because I felt so unsafe, and thought he would consider that an act of war and take revenge. In  March 2020 i started divorce proceedings, but then the pandemic hit and everything halted.

I had initially not told him where we lived, but had remained in contact for the children. But the abuse would not stop and so I blocked all contact, but in 2022, he managed to get hold of me via a friend, and he informed me that the mortgage company had started possession proceedings for failure to pay mortgage, which was granted. Now he had cashed in the mortgage ISA, that was meant to pay off the mortgage when it matured in 2026, his mum also had life insurance cover that was a mortgage requirement, to pay off the mortgage should one of them die, and when she died, he cashed this in and he shared it with his sister, spent his half, and did not use it on the mortgage. because I did not have home rights notice logged, I was not notified in time to stop things, and even though I tried to appeal afterwards, was told I was not party to the case and the court could not help. My solicitor would not help, because this was not family law, litigation told me i would not get anywhere and so it was sold. 

there was equity that is now sat with the courts while I sort the financial remedy. I want to try and claim some of this back from his share of what is left, because if he had not wasted this money, and paid the mortgage our children would have a home. 

he also sold our family car, and my old car that he told me broken and needed to be scrapped, only for me to see if being driven around by someone else. He sold my sons expensive digital camera, that was for his college last year; burned my piano and sent me an abusive message, he also burned other items of mine including business paperwork which he also sent me a photo of.

He has recently started sending our son  messages where he is being abusive about me to our son.

I have not been able to find any case law on if this is possible, and from what i have read it seems that i may have a case if he did this deliberately to stop me having the money, in other words spend the money so it wasn't part of the divorce settlement. i do not know if he deliberately spent this, or if he deliberately  stopped paying the mortgage so he didn't have to sell the house and give me anything, or to stop me moving into the house with our children when the divorce came through. he told me i am not entitled to anything from the house because it was his and his mums,  he refused me anything, including child maintenance, and he works self employed hiding his money, so looks like he has none, so I have not bothered with child support for those reason, but also because I am still scared of him. he does not reply to court paperwork, has failed to acknowledge any solicitors letters. My solicitor is also not able to offer legal aid, and and I have not been abele to find another legal aid solicitor so will be an LIP, and I need to know if I put all of this in the court bundle. I have proof of him cashing in the isa and his mums life cover, I also have proof that the mortgage company knew about me, but failed to notify me of the repossession, which is also a failing on them that has considerably cost me a home for me and my two children. I am disabled on benefits. 

If anyone knows if all of this would help prove bad conduct, where the caveat is that conduct is only seen as relevant where it is so serious it would be unfair for the Court to ignore it. Would all of this be part of that?

I read that domestic abuse is occasionally considered in settlements but is often dependent on whether the contact has negatively impacted a party’s financial position or on the party’s ability to generate an income and support themselves. Well clearly I am now forced to rent, where before we had our own home, I have been so unwell since all of this I am not able to work, and I am registered disabled.

tacpot12

I'll prefact this advice with the fact that I am not a solicitor... 

As your research suggests, you can ask the court to consider whether your husband carelessly or deliberately deprived himself and therefore yourself of assets while you were married. I think you will have a harder case to win that most people, as your contention is that he was careless rather than deliberate. (It is quite common for people to try to hid assets that they want to retain after a divorce, but most of the time they do so deliberately and it is very easy to see that they have done so. Most people are found out when they try to do this.) 

You are asking the court to confirm that he had a duty of care towards you, and that he failed in that duty in a serious manner, i.e. he was negligent. I think his defence could have many strands including naivety, misundertanding, mistakes, errors of judgement, etc. Thus I think it much less likely that a court would find in your favour, unless you can assemble evidence to show that he knew what he was doing or did things deliberately to deprive you. Text messages telling you what he was going to do (before he did it) and that he was doing it to harm you would be the best sort of evidence to have. Anything less than this and the case gets harder and harder to win.   

I also don't think you will get vey far with trying to claim that the mortgage company made errors that depreived you of a home. Their contract was with your husband and mother in law , and so they were only liable to communicate with them, not all the adults living in the house at the time.

I think the best advice would be to go to see a solicitor for advice about whether such a case has any chance of being won. Most solicitors will give you their opinion for free if you can summarise the situation for them and the evidence you have within 10 minutes.

If they say that the chances of winning are very small, and that it will be very expensive, then clearly the best thing to do is let it go. It can be very hard to do this when it feels so unfair, so I would recommend seeking some support, possibly via a professional counsellor, to help you accept that your decision is the best that can be taken under the circumstances. You need to be able to move on with your life, and dwelling on past unfair treatment doesn't allow this. 

born_again

No idea on the main point but

He has recently started sending our son  messages where he is being abusive about me to our son.

Needs reporting to the police.

LightFlare

born_again said:

No idea on the main point but

He has recently started sending our son  messages where he is being abusive about me to our son.

Needs reporting to the police.

depends on what he is actually saying and whether it is true -- there are 2 sides to this story and we are only hearing/getting one

swingaloo

LightFlare said:

born_again said:

No idea on the main point but

He has recently started sending our son  messages where he is being abusive about me to our son.

Needs reporting to the police.

depends on what he is actually saying and whether it is true -- there are 2 sides to this story and we are only hearing/getting one

That's the nature of someone posting on the forum. The fact that we only hear one side doesn't mean that born agains post isn't valid.

Savvy_Sue

Women's Aid. https://www.womensaid.org.uk/

How old is your son? He can block his dad, surely?

Cornishmama

Tacpot12, thank you for that advise. I do have some text messages. One where he has put my piano in the garden and set fire to it, another one where he had my business materials burning in our open fire in the living room. I don't want the extra money for me, I want it in a trust fund for our children because he doesn't pay maintenance at all. I have tried getting advise from solicitors and they say similar to you that it is hard to prove. I have numerous abusive messages, witness statements, a social worker report and two police visits logged. He also has a conviction for abusing the next door neighbour, so there is plenty of evidence of the abuse. I have one where he said he is putting 30k in trust for the kids and I can have 10k if I want to fight him over it. 

Cornishmama

lightFlare, thank you for your comments, you are right yes there are two sides to most things, and I have spent years explaining his side, making excuses and allowances for him, but domestic abuse is never ok regardless of what struggles you go through as a couple or family. I stayed for years recognising he had a mental illness, and wanting to support him because I loved him, but to the detriment of me and my children's mental health, which is why i had to leave in the end. I would not be on here looking for advice on a lie, that would be a waste of the kind people who reach out to comment. I am also autistic and find it hard navigating this, especially because I am still scared of him. I wont go to my nearest town, because he lives there, and it's hard. I just want my children to be provided for, and the fact that he is so intent on making me suffer, they are the ones ultimately that pay the price. He is so blinded by his hatred of me because I left that he wont pay toward the care of his two children that is f***ed up.

Cornishmama

Savvy_Sue, my son is 17 and yes I have advise that he block him, and also explained more about the abuse because I had tried to keep them out of it as much as possible, despite my son seeing things when he was younger. But i am not sure if he will, and that is his decision to make, I suppose I was adding that to build the picture of what I am dealing with, he hates me that much that he says awful things about me to our son, that is not ok to involve children in adults stuff, that is a form of abuse. But thank you for the comment.