‘My childhood stopped’: woman sues CPS after taking stepfather to abuse trial | Crown Prosecution Service

A.Annie* sits at the kitchen table in a village in the south of England with a blue binder filled with court documents, witness statements and correspondence about her stepfather’s case, which she reported to the police for alleged childhood abuse.

As he was preparing to tell his story for the first time, he was overcome with emotion when a photo fell from the file. The square Polaroid showed a young girl wearing jodhpurs and a riding hat, standing next to a pony in a field.

The young girl was Annie, who was 12 years old at the time. “I was like that when the abuse started,” she said. “I was just a budding young girl, and that was when my childhood ended.”

Annie reported her childhood stepfather to the police in 2017. She had previously disclosed the alleged abuse in front of her mother, stepfather and a friend when she was 18, but no action was taken.

It had been some time since she last disclosed the alleged abuse in 2017, but she had learned her stepfather had been babysitting young extended family members and felt “it would never stop” unless she came forward.

Annie decided she was going to “do something about it.” This was the beginning of a struggle that would last almost ten years. And an ongoing one.

When Annie’s case against her alleged abuser finally went to trial in 2021, after multiple canceled court dates, the case ended with not guilty verdicts and a hung jury.

In a rare case, he is now prosecuting the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS). Her lawyers at the Center for Women’s Justice (CWJ) argue that the investigation was so poorly conducted that it amounted to a violation of her human rights.

One of Annie’s major complaints is that prosecutors failed to apply to introduce bad character evidence against her stepfather, and so all references to domestic violence, cruelty and neglect that she claimed she experienced as a child were omitted from the police interview.

The jury was not shown a photograph he gave to police, clearly showing his mother’s injuries, which he said was taken immediately after he was attacked by his stepfather; A lawyer’s letter mentioning a violent attack on another family member was not cited, and reports that police interviewed him about allegations of domestic violence were also not presented to the court.

This meant that Annie was unable to put her allegations and her difficulty in reporting them into the context in which she said they had occurred.

“How can I not talk about the fact that these huge fights are going on?” he said. “And that’s fear: that’s the main thing around this family, fear.

“We’ve been walking on eggshells our whole lives since they got married, more like broken glass. That’s how it was.”

“There was a loaded shotgun behind the cellar door. How can you live a normal life with a loaded shotgun in there? You can’t live a normal life. You’re afraid that if you make a wrong step, that gun will come out.”

A. 2025 review report on adult rape cases He found that bad character practices needed to be better defined and evaluated to strengthen prosecution cases, noting: “In less than two of the 10 cases he was involved with, the prosecutor expressed how bad character in relation to the suspect could strengthen the case.”

Annie said: “Child sexual abuse does not happen in isolation.

“There’s often something going on in the background. There’s violence, there’s intimidation, there’s domestic violence.”

When the case eventually went to court, her stepfather had been charged with multiple counts of indecent assault and one count of rape.

Several times before the hearing, Annie had to sit through an best evidence (ABE) interview that lasted three and a half hours, but the court dates were canceled at short notice.

When his case finally came to court, he met his CPS-appointed solicitor.

“I have not met my lawyer, who will defend me, even once in four years,” he said. “He comes to see me after re-watching my ABE. His first words to me were: ‘Honestly, I’m sick of your face.’ And I literally couldn’t speak.

He said this “because he had to watch my ABE so many times.”

“And I felt like I was about to collapse,” he said. “I just felt like apologizing. You know, what are you saying?”

A trial was initiated and canceled after incorrect evidence was shown to the jury.

Annie said the police “wrote a letter saying how sorry they were that the judge had been disturbed that day.” “I had to re-watch my ABE in the downstairs victim room with the cleaner, the court staff listening to my abuse, and discussing my rape.

“Nobody wrote me a letter saying, ‘I’m really sorry you had to do this,’ but the judge did get a written apology..”

According to Annie’s complaint, key witnesses were not called during the hearing to support her version of events. He says he wasn’t told why.

Bad character and hearsay evidence can only be admitted if the judge accepts that the jury can hear it, and so it is not clear whether this will be the case if the CPS requests it.

The jury found her stepfather not guilty of some sexual assaults. No majority decision could be reached on the others or rape. His defense was that Annie had made up the allegations.

It is not possible to know whether the decisions would have been different had bad character evidence been introduced.

Shortly afterwards, Annie attended an online meeting with the CPS and learned days later that they would not be seeking a retrial.

“I had no advance warning about this; just as I was about to walk out the door, I received a letter saying my stepfather had been acquitted of all charges,” he said.

“I was so shocked I took the letter upstairs, fell on the bed and was so upset I couldn’t even explain it.” [my husband] “I couldn’t do that,” he said. “I couldn’t tell anyone because I didn’t have the language for it.”

But that didn’t mean the end for Annie. He began to devote himself to legal research.

“So I had to start writing this complaint, feeling alone, physically and mentally, the worst I’ve ever felt in my life, and it took a year,” he said. “But eventually the CPS came back and said they had made this legal mistake in not presenting bad character evidence.”

Armed with this admission of failure by the CPS, she took her case to the CWJ, who brought proceedings against the public body on Annie’s behalf.

“In Annie’s case there appear to be many bases on which the CPS could apply to present evidence of bad character,” CWJ lawyer Kate Ellis said.

“For example, the law recognizes that evidence of domestic violence may be considered evidence that the defendant has a propensity to commit other forms of violence against women and girls.”

“We therefore consider that the CPS, in its response to Annie’s complaint, has admitted that it misunderstood the law,” he added, “but this admission is sadly too late.”

“I don’t think I could have imagined that almost ten years later I would still feel the way I did this morning,” Annie said. “Finding the photographs and looking at all the documents leads me to the same feelings.

“I still have to fight to have my voice heard. I haven’t been able to get justice. But I see an end is coming and I hope something good comes out of it.”

“So that other women can be heard, and their abuses can be heard in their entirety.”

A CPS spokesman said: “Due to live litigation proceedings we are unable to comment on the details of this case.

“More generally, we recognize the profound impact rape and serious sexual offenses can have on victims and are committed to continuous learning to strengthen consistency across the CPS.”

*Name changed.