Abusive mother 'changes ways'

A young mother who was found guilty of severely abusing her three children has been allowed to keep the eldest after she convinced probation officers that she had changed her ways. The probation services were asked to monitor the woman for some months before sentencing and concluded that she was making an effort to take care of her children and provide them with a decent quality of life, sources close to the case have told The Times.

Last week, the 30-year-old was found guilty of child abuse along with her former partner (who is not the children's father). The children, two boys and a girl, were respectively aged one, two-and-a-half and five at the time around 2002.

Following these abuse incidents she went on to have another four children. Three live with a foster family, one in a children's institute while the eldest (who was one of the abuse victims) and two youngest children live with her.

According to the evidence produced in court the children were subjected to routine beatings with belts. The two-year-old was burned twice with a cigarette while a witness said she had seen the mother crush Valium tablets and then put them into the children's bottles to make them sleep.

She received a six-month suspended jail term while her partner was sentenced to six months in jail, mostly on account of his long criminal record.

But while over the past few days many people have commented that the sentences were far too lenient when compared to the abuse, the probation services told the court the woman tried to get back on her feet after turbulent years in which her life literally went down the drain.

The same sources said she has now managed to keep a job and decent accommodation.

In the period when the abuse took place, the woman moved from one place to the next and left the children to live in dirty conditions. In fact, the children were found to have lice and would go without food for three-day stretches while the little one, then aged just under one-and-a-half, was found to have rubbish stuck up his nose. Yet, since then, the probation services have found her to have made great strides, particularly considering her background, and believe she can take care of herself and the children who live with her. The woman, who is under a supervision order for three years, will now be carefully monitored.

The authorities were alerted to the abuse when the woman's mother and sister took the children to the health services. A care order was issued and the children were placed in a Church home for a while.