Shame that makes clever, popular women the silent victims of domestic abuse
By our advice columnist BEL MOONEY who’s seen the heart-breaking evidence
WHILE I have never been a ‘ lock ’em up and throw away the key’ merchant, I feel totally outraged at the case of the cricketer who walked free from court this week after brutally assaulting his wife.
The facts of the case are horrible enough. Mustafa Bashir is a muscular professional sportsman who forced his wife Fakhara Karim to drink bleach and swallow tablets while instructing her to kill herself.
On another occasion he bashed her on the back with his cricket bat because she had been talking ‘too long’ on the phone to a friend, and gloated that if he had used his full strength she’d be dead.
The court heard he grabbed his wife by the throat on a day out and only stopped when a passer-by threatened to call the police. Nice guy, eh?
Yet, even more shocking — if possible — was the ignorance of the judge who decided not to lock him up. his reason? Because Bashir’s former wife was a well-educated, sturdy sort with a network of friends. Not what he saw as a victim.
This learned man appears to believe that a woman will suffer less from brutal control and violence if she happens to have a brain and a jolly group of friends.
In letting Bashir walk out with an 18month suspended sentence Judge Richard Mansell QC has demonstrated, yet again, that the law is often an ass.
The case really was not complex, yet demonstrated a curious element of inverted racism mixed with outdated class prejudice and an astonishing lack of awareness of how women from all
social backgrounds can be controlled, terrified and beaten by their husbands.
I have witnessed this countless times in my years as an advice columnist. A woman who appears to be in control of her life can be a wreck underneath, still terrified of her partner years later, and believing subconsciously that she deserved her treatment.
Often the most intelligent suffer the worst for they are too ashamed to seek help.
THIS judge’s decision, which I’m sure he’s regretting, offered a ‘Get Out of Jail Free’ card to every bully on the block.
Bashir’s card was his claim that he’d been offered a professional contract by top club Leicestershire on condition he didn’t go to prison. This turns out to be a lie.
But the decision shows Judge Mansell found the brute’s sporting career more important than his wife’s injuries and the terror he inflicted.
It’s not irrelevant to point out that the judge has form. Last year, he allowed footballer Danny simpson (Leicester City) off the night-time curfew imposed after he’d tried to throttle his wife. Why? so he could enjoy a team victory celebration. The player’s ex was understandably furious. Degree or no degree, I can’t imagine how frightened Ms Karim must have been. she endured Bashir’s abuse of her friends (he called them ‘English slag girls’), her clothes and spending habits.
These are hallmarks of coercive control — emotional abuse through threats and restrictions as well as physical violence.
This was criminalised in 2015, with a maximum sentence of five years. At the time, the Director of Public Prosecutions said: ‘Repeated humiliation, intimidation or subordination can be as harmful as physical abuse.’
she didn’t qualify that by saying a well- educated woman is less vulnerable. Yet that was the verdict of Judge Mansell.
he handed down a penalty determined by the social circumstances of the victim.
The middle-class couple met in Pakistan and the judge made an oblique reference to this: ‘sometimes women who move from their country become trapped in a relationship where they lose their support network.’
It’s as if the judge would be more inclined to recognise the severity of what Ms Karim endured were she a downtrodden Asian woman in a hijab, not able to speak English and kept behind closed doors. It’s a very old misconception that domestic violence happens among the lower classes. You know, the miner staggering home filthy drunk and knocking his wife about as a matter of course.
For centuries it was seen as a man’s right to beat his wife — it still is in many parts of the globe.
The great social reformers of the late 19th and early 20th century ( such as henry Mayhew and Jack London) remarked that violence and rape were so common in city slums as to go unnoticed.
Ye t an y social history of marriage shows that such abuse happened in the middle and upper classes as well.
When I was a young journalist, I interviewed the wife of a wealthy accountant, who had been beaten by her husband because he didn’t like his meal.
Naturally, this chatelaine of a beautiful home was too ashamed to tell her friends, but was prepared to talk anonymously to a reporter. After the coercive control law came into force, police watchdogs reported a ‘staggering’ increase in reports of domestic abuse, with recorded crimes rising almost a third in less than two years. home Office guidance then stipulated the alleged behaviour must have ‘a serious effect’ on the victim. They must have feared violence on two occasions or been caused alarm and distress that had ‘a substantial adverse effect’ on their daily life. And there’s the problem. how do you define ‘a serious effect’? The treatment Ms Karim endured ticked the right boxes, but how to prove the ‘substantial adverse effect’? Well, by listening to the victim, obviously. Even if that was something this judge found hard to do. Ms Karim stated that the abuse had drained her confidence and altered her self-image. Judge Mansell did not believe her. he said: ‘I am not convinced she was a vulnerable person.’ What? so being forced to slosh bleach down her own throat wasn’t so bad because ‘she is an intelligent woman with a network of friends who did go on to graduate from university’.
Oh, that’s all right then. If you can argue in words of more than two syllables, you couldn’t have been really damaged.
And if you dress smartly and seem successful, then your vile husband’s cruelty clearly hasn’t had ‘a serious effect’.
It’s outrageous that any judge should be so arrogant and ignorant about domestic violence. The crime has nothing to do with class or perceived ability to cope.
Many successful women appear in control over their professional lives, but walk into disaster areas when they fall in love.
Do you remember the pictures of the glamorous pop star Rihanna, beaten and bruised by her boyfriend Chris Brown?
At the time, I feared the story might encourage young women who idolise her to tolerate the ‘bad-boy’ behaviour of their men.
There is, unfortunately, a certain sort of collusion among some women that plays to the worst tendencies in some men.
Extremes aside, many women can find themselves caught in controlling relationships.
EMOTIONAL abuse can be so powerful that the woman suffers depression and suicidal thoughts even after the relationship has ended.
Domestic abuse (from beating to belittling and cursing) blights the lives of millions of women and has no place in a civilised society — no matter what community the perpetrator belongs to or the social standing of his partner.
Legislation is useless unless police, prosecutors and the judiciary understand the nature of the crime. That necessitates a leap of understanding into what victims endure.
Laws alone don’t change culture; intelligence and empathy are essential. And so is punishment. This sentence must be reviewed.