Domestic abusers winning time with children by accusing mothers of parental alienation, study finds | The Independent | The Independent
▻https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/domestic-abuse-parental-alienation-family-courts-brunel-study-a929472
Dr Adrienne Barnett, who carried out the research, said these cases were just the “tip of the iceberg” as the study had not looked at the thousands of cases heard by district and magistrate courts every day that are not published in the official court reports she examined.
“There will be thousands of cases where parental alienation is raised but we do not know what happens,” Dr Barnett, a senior lecturer in law who specialises in domestic abuse and the family courts, told The Independent.
“Playing the parental alienation card is proving more powerful than any other in silencing the voices of women and children resisting contact with abusive men. Parental alienation is not an equal counterpart to domestic abuse, it is a means of obscuring domestic abuse, and should be recognised as such”.
Dr Barnett, who specialised in family law while practising as a barrister for more than 30 years, said the theory of parental alienation had been slated and discredited by many experts but was now becoming more mainstream.
