Sir, - In Ellen Coyne’s article “Tusla objects to removing parental rights of killers,” (Social Affairs, February 2nd) she makes reference to the fact that Tusla, the child and family agency, claims that children’s best interests are served by them having a connection with their birth parents.
However, when reading further into the article it would seem that Tusla argues that parents accused of a “suspected killing” still have “inherent rights”, which is different from a convicted murderer having parental rights.
Family law is very complex when it comes to parental and children’s rights. However, if in a criminal court of law it was proven, beyond all reasonable doubt, that a parent, who was a domestic violent abuser, had maliciously planned and murdered the other parent, without any thought or care given to the consequences for the children who had been exposed to the domestic abuse from the perpetrator, surely it’s in the best interest of the children not to be exposed to this parent.
Some would argue that the imprisoned parent should have at least supervised access to the children. However, I would argue that even when access is supervised, child victims of domestic violence cannot be fully protected from further abuse from the perpetrator.
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This is because no one can know what communications (which can be non-verbal) have been developed between perpetrators of domestic abuse and child victims, during their formative years. These communications may be the cause of the fear, anger, anxiety, self-harm and many other problems that children can develop when they have been exposed to domestic violence situations.
Children have a right to know who their parents are and where they are if that is known, which includes prison. I believe it’s in the best interest of the child to ensure that, in the years after the guilty verdict and imprisonment of the perpetrator of murder, they are given as much love and opportunities as possible for them to grow into responsible adults.
Then, when they reach the age of maturity they can make their own informed decision as to whether they want to have contact with the offending parent.
In the case of a convicted domestic abuse murderer, I would support Valerie’s Law. - Yours, etc,
ELLEN O’MALLEY-DUNLOP,
Member of Council of Europe’s GREVIO expert group,
Adjunct professor UL Law School,
Dublin 6W.
