Senior judge takes rare step of naming parents and council in care proceedings

The President of the Family Division last week took the rare step of naming the parents and council involved in care proceedings, after the mother was found to have manufactured allegations of sexual abuse against the father.

A "private investigator" involved in the case was also jailed for nine months for contempt of court after she was found to have breached reporting restrictions.

Lord Justice Wall said two judges had now heard different aspects of the case at great length.

The first judge found that allegations of sexual abuse made against the father of the child, David Tune, were “not just untrue, but manufactured by the child’s mother who then caused her daughter to repeat them”.

The mother, racehorse trainer Vicky Haigh, did not seek to appeal against the judge’s decision that the father had not sexually abused his daughter, and that she had manufactured the “evidence”, the President said.

But Ms Haigh was wholly incapable of fostering a relationship between her daughter and the child’s father, refused to accept the judge’s findings, and continued to assert that the father was a paedophile.

As a result, the President said, a second judge had found that the mother had caused the child significant harm and made a care order in favour of Doncaster Council.

The care plan saw the child move from her paternal grandmother to her father’s care, which is where she remains. Ms Haigh “did not seek to appeal against this order either”, Lord Justice Wall said.

“The child’s mother is wholly unable to accept the court’s verdict, and with the misguided assistance of Elizabeth Watson (the private investigator) has unlawfully and in breach of court orders put into the public domain via Email and the internet a series of unwarranted and scandalous allegations abut the father and others,” the President said.

“She has repeated the untruth that the father is a paedophile, and – without a scintilla of evidence – has attacked the good faith of all the professionals who have had any contact with the case.”

Lord Justice Wall said he had read all the papers in the case carefully. “The father of the child, who may be named, is not a paedophile and he has not sexually abused his daughter,” he said. “Two judges have so found, and their decisions stand. That is how our system of law operates."

The President ruled that the parties – with the major exception of the child – could be named.

“Due to the actions of the mother and Elizabeth Watson many people in the immediate locality will know who she is,” he said. “But many will not, and in my judgement I owe it to her to preserve her anonymity as far as it is in my power to do so.”

Lord Justice Wall added: “These proceedings have had a serious effect on the life of the father, and have threatened the stability of the child. Her mother’s actions are wholly contrary to her interests. The father is entitled to tell the world, and the world is entitled to know, that he is not a paedophile; that he has not sexually abused his daughter, and that the allegations made against him are false.”

The President ordered that Ms Haigh be prevented under section 91(14) of the Children Act 1989 from making any application in relation to her daughter without his permission for at least two years.

The judge said Ms Watson, from Bournemouth in Dorset, had known what she was doing when breaching the reporting restrictions on the case.

In April John Hemming MP used Parliamentary privilege to raise Ms Haigh’s case, telling the Speaker, John Bercow, that she was the subject of an attempt by Doncaster to imprison her for speaking at a meeting in Parliament. Hemming last week dismissed calls for his resignation made by another MP, John Mann.