Browse content similar to 07/11/2011. Check below for episodes and series from the same categories and more!
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Tonight we have a special investigation about a woman's fight | :00:02. | :00:08. | |
to be reunited with her children. Sam Raw lost contact with her two | :00:08. | :00:13. | |
boys after they were held in France by their father. There is me | :00:13. | :00:17. | |
praying it is going to go well and they're going to pass me Austin, | :00:17. | :00:25. | |
but they don't. The number of abducted children is | :00:25. | :00:32. | |
on the increase and some never fully recover from the experience. | :00:32. | :00:34. | |
I was incredibly distressed, I thought constantly about ending my | :00:34. | :00:39. | |
life. We show what happened when Sam | :00:39. | :00:44. | |
tried to rescue her children from France. Just keep driving and hope | :00:44. | :00:48. | |
I see somewhere I recognise. That's our special investigation on | :00:48. | :00:58. | |
:00:58. | :01:09. | ||
Two years ago, Sam Raw's sons, Dylan and Austin, were abducted by | :01:09. | :01:13. | |
their French father. The highest courts in Britain and France | :01:13. | :01:16. | |
ordered the children should be returned to their mother. But their | :01:16. | :01:21. | |
father has refused to hand them back. Sam hasn't given up and this | :01:21. | :01:31. | |
:01:31. | :01:36. | ||
summer we followed her as she It doesn't feel like real life. All | :01:36. | :01:40. | |
of a sudden I went from family life to a life of grief and strife, you | :01:40. | :01:50. | |
:01:50. | :01:53. | ||
know? In one day. The day the children didn't come back. | :01:53. | :01:57. | |
Sam Raw who now lives in Norfolk, moved to France with her parents | :01:57. | :02:04. | |
when she was 16. I went to college there and I | :02:04. | :02:07. | |
became an English teacher and worked in a school in an | :02:07. | :02:14. | |
apprenticeship college teaching. And that was where I met Thierry | :02:14. | :02:19. | |
who was a panel beater, teaching panel beating in the same school. | :02:19. | :02:29. | |
:02:29. | :02:30. | ||
And we got married and had two children, Dylan and Austin. | :02:30. | :02:34. | |
Both the boys are now wards of court. Legally this is the only | :02:34. | :02:38. | |
picture of them we are allowed to show. Sadly after a couple of years | :02:38. | :02:43. | |
Sam's marriage ran into problems. Things deteriorated after about the | :02:43. | :02:48. | |
first two years. We clung on for another three, but we came to a | :02:48. | :02:56. | |
mutual decision divorce was inevitable. | :02:56. | :03:01. | |
Sam went to court and was awarded custody of her two sons. The three | :03:01. | :03:04. | |
of them moved to Norfolk, although it was agreed the boys would stay | :03:04. | :03:06. | |
with their father during school holidays. | :03:06. | :03:13. | |
The arrangements had been going very well for five years. He | :03:13. | :03:18. | |
started to not want to bring the children back. I was then having to | :03:18. | :03:22. | |
go to court to retrieve the children. It was getting more and | :03:22. | :03:30. | |
more difficult for me to trust him to bring the children back. | :03:30. | :03:35. | |
Things came to a head in the summer of 2008. Her former husband refused | :03:35. | :03:39. | |
to hand the boys back. The High Court here in London and the | :03:39. | :03:42. | |
highest courts in France have both ruled Sam's two sons should live | :03:42. | :03:46. | |
with her. But her former husband has repeatedly ignored the court | :03:46. | :03:56. | |
:03:56. | :03:56. | ||
orders. HE SPEAKS FRENCH. | :03:56. | :03:59. | |
Sam's ex- husband recently appeared in a French documentary about | :03:59. | :04:05. | |
custody disputes. He insisted the two boys wanted to stay with him. | :04:05. | :04:08. | |
But Sam says her former husband has deliberately tried to turn her | :04:09. | :04:16. | |
children against her. The boys are so stiff, you know? | :04:16. | :04:26. | |
:04:26. | :04:27. | ||
Very rigid. It just breaks my heart to see that. I know for a fact he | :04:27. | :04:30. | |
would sit the children opposite each other and make each other tell | :04:30. | :04:33. | |
each other what negative things they could think up about their | :04:33. | :04:42. | |
mother. Sam claims her sons are victims of | :04:42. | :04:45. | |
parental child abduction. She says her husband poisoned the boys | :04:45. | :04:48. | |
against her to the point they wouldn't even speak to her when she | :04:48. | :04:58. | |
:04:58. | :05:05. | ||
tried to call them. This is really sad. It's exactly | :05:05. | :05:10. | |
how it's been every time I've tried to ring. And of course I'd ring and | :05:10. | :05:14. | |
I'd feel nervous before ringing as well because I knew what was about | :05:14. | :05:24. | |
:05:24. | :05:26. | ||
to come. There's me just praying it is going | :05:26. | :05:33. | |
to go well and they will pass me Austin, but they don't. | :05:33. | :05:43. | |
:05:43. | :05:44. | ||
Sam is very concerned about the emotional effect this could be | :05:44. | :05:50. | |
having on the two boys, who are now both teenagers. | :05:50. | :05:53. | |
To try to help understand what her children are going through | :05:53. | :05:56. | |
emotionally, she's off to London to meet someone with first hand | :05:56. | :06:00. | |
experience. Sam's battle to recover her two sons has also come at a | :06:00. | :06:05. | |
high personal cost. I suffered depression, I was on | :06:05. | :06:11. | |
medication for depression. I'm now on medication for post-traumatic | :06:11. | :06:21. | |
:06:21. | :06:21. | ||
stress disorder, and the prevention of depression returning. So it is a | :06:21. | :06:24. | |
massive impact. The lengthy court battles have also | :06:24. | :06:31. | |
taken their toll financially. It's cost me at least �40,000. I | :06:31. | :06:37. | |
didn't have much money before, I was struggling before. But you have | :06:37. | :06:40. | |
to pay for trips to France, a French lawyer and I've had to beg | :06:40. | :06:45. | |
and borrow money from family and friends. I have two credit cards I | :06:45. | :06:54. | |
have had to max out. We find the money somehow. | :06:54. | :06:57. | |
Sam's meeting a woman who was abducted by her father when she was | :06:57. | :07:02. | |
just 12 years old. She's hoping it will give her an insight as to what | :07:02. | :07:08. | |
her own son's are going through. Hi, so nice to meet you. | :07:08. | :07:12. | |
And you. When her parents relationship broke | :07:12. | :07:15. | |
down, Nicky Hewitt and her younger sister were taken to Australia by | :07:15. | :07:21. | |
their father. When I was in Australia I | :07:21. | :07:28. | |
experienced a lot of propaganda from my father and his whole family. | :07:28. | :07:31. | |
Actually telling us we wouldn't be wanted, telling me specifically I | :07:31. | :07:35. | |
was unwanted, unloved and even if I went back to England I would be put | :07:35. | :07:41. | |
into a children's home and stuff like that. That my mum didn't want | :07:41. | :07:45. | |
me at all. Was there a point in Australia where you started to | :07:45. | :07:51. | |
understand what was happening? Absolutely, I got it really quickly. | :07:51. | :07:54. | |
I twigged very early on and as an adult looking back 21 years ago, I | :07:55. | :08:03. | |
can see the manipulation that was going on. How did you cope, how did | :08:03. | :08:10. | |
you get through it? Did you feel you had to go along with them? | :08:10. | :08:14. | |
I went against them a lot. I fought and I made things difficult for | :08:14. | :08:19. | |
people. What impact did this have on you at the time? Mentally I | :08:19. | :08:23. | |
wasn't well. I wasn't eating, I wasn't sleeping and I was | :08:23. | :08:28. | |
incredibly distressed. I thought constantly about ending my life. | :08:28. | :08:33. | |
What an awful position to be in at that age? At 12, and I made plans | :08:33. | :08:40. | |
as to how to do it. The only reason I didn't was because of my sister. | :08:40. | :08:43. | |
After a court hearing Nicky and her sister were finally returned to | :08:43. | :08:47. | |
their mother in the UK. But even 20 years later Nicky is still | :08:47. | :08:52. | |
struggling to come to terms with what happened. | :08:52. | :08:55. | |
Not only do I have depression but I have post-traumatic stress disorder | :08:55. | :09:00. | |
as a result of the abduction. And that's only been diagnosed in the | :09:00. | :09:08. | |
past couple of years. There is a whole world of other difficulties I | :09:08. | :09:11. | |
have been experiencing and not being able to make sense of them. | :09:11. | :09:17. | |
Sam, you just had a chat with Nicky. How was it for you speaking to her | :09:17. | :09:21. | |
as the abducted child? Very interesting. What a brave lady to | :09:21. | :09:29. | |
come out of it. It has taken her a long time to recover. She is still | :09:29. | :09:35. | |
in recovery. I have been trying to get into my children's minds, heads, | :09:35. | :09:40. | |
to understand how they are feeling. Which is painful for me to do, and | :09:40. | :09:50. | |
listening to Nicky has been a great insight. | :09:50. | :09:53. | |
On the way home Sam told me that her custody battle intensified | :09:53. | :09:57. | |
following a shocking incident just over two years ago. She went to | :09:57. | :10:00. | |
collect her children from France at the end of the school holidays but | :10:00. | :10:03. | |
the eldest, Dylan, was unexpectedly violent and punched her several | :10:03. | :10:09. | |
times. Sam says her ex-husband had turned the boys against her. She | :10:09. | :10:17. | |
came back from France distraught and alone. | :10:17. | :10:20. | |
Courts recognise that children in cases like Sam's can be turned | :10:20. | :10:23. | |
against a parent. So despite Dylan's violent outburst they've | :10:24. | :10:28. | |
repeatedly ordered that Sam's children must be returned. After | :10:28. | :10:32. | |
more than two years without seeing her boys, Sam had given up hope of | :10:32. | :10:38. | |
a quick resolution. But then recently, events took a | :10:38. | :10:42. | |
dramatic twist. Sam's younger son, Austin, contacted one of his | :10:42. | :10:46. | |
English friends on Facebook. He had an important message for his mum - | :10:46. | :10:53. | |
come and rescue me. My dad and my friend, Wendy, came | :10:53. | :11:01. | |
with me. We set off from London. We travelled to France together and we | :11:01. | :11:04. | |
were looking at how to navigate round Paris easily so we didn't get | :11:04. | :11:12. | |
lost. The journey needed meticulous | :11:12. | :11:19. | |
planning. Sam was worried the French authorities could scupper | :11:19. | :11:23. | |
the escape. We had planned food and petrol for | :11:23. | :11:27. | |
the car. So my dad actually got some money out, made sure we had | :11:28. | :11:30. | |
enough cash for the return journey so the French authorities couldn't | :11:30. | :11:36. | |
trace us. The planned rescue was fraught with | :11:36. | :11:41. | |
risk. The foreign office here in the UK had warned Sam if the French | :11:41. | :11:44. | |
authorities caught her trying to take Austin out of the country, | :11:44. | :11:47. | |
potentially she could be arrested and Austin returned to his father, | :11:47. | :11:57. | |
:11:57. | :12:06. | ||
even though she had court orders in When we got to the village we | :12:06. | :12:12. | |
decided to stop in the outskirts somewhere quiet. So we found a | :12:12. | :12:15. | |
hotel car park and we had about three hours to wait in the car park | :12:15. | :12:25. | |
:12:25. | :12:28. | ||
before we got the call from Austin for the go-ahead. Whilst we were | :12:28. | :12:31. | |
waiting in the car park, it occurred to us once outside the | :12:31. | :12:34. | |
father's house he may be able to hear the car doors opening and | :12:34. | :12:43. | |
closing. So we practised opening the car doors and closing them very | :12:43. | :12:50. | |
quietly. We just wanted to make sure Austin remained safe, that he | :12:50. | :12:55. | |
wasn't caught by his father. So we were doing everything possible we | :12:55. | :13:00. | |
could to make sure that didn't happen. And also, I was desperately | :13:00. | :13:05. | |
excited to see him. We needed to keep each other awake. We were very | :13:05. | :13:09. | |
tired. We knew we would have a long journey back where we wouldn't be | :13:09. | :13:14. | |
able to stop off and sleep but we still had to keep each other awake. | :13:14. | :13:19. | |
So we sang songs, told each other jokes. | :13:19. | :13:29. | |
:13:29. | :13:30. | ||
We got a phone call from Austin's friend's mother who said Austin had | :13:30. | :13:33. | |
sent a message saying can we wait another half an hour because his | :13:33. | :13:42. | |
dad wasn't in bed yet. So we said OK, we sent the message back to let | :13:42. | :13:47. | |
Austin know it would be fine, we would wait another half an hour. In | :13:47. | :13:56. | |
that situation, we found ourselves having to sit on our own anxiety. I | :13:56. | :14:06. | |
:14:06. | :14:06. | ||
knew Austin would be much more anxious in his situation than I was. | :14:07. | :14:10. | |
We made sure we arrived at 1:30am on the dot outside his father's | :14:10. | :14:19. | |
house. We drove up very slowly and turned the lights off. We just | :14:19. | :14:27. | |
waited. After about ten minutes there was a figure that came to the | :14:27. | :14:33. | |
window and it looked too tall for me to be Austin. And we thought it | :14:34. | :14:43. | |
:14:44. | :14:46. | ||
As we were driving off, we were saying to each other, "What do we | :14:46. | :14:51. | |
do now? What do we do? We can't go home." If Austin is in trouble I | :14:52. | :14:56. | |
don't want to leave him, you know, in this position. And then we got a | :14:56. | :14:58. | |
phone call from Austin's best friend's mother, saying, "Austin's | :14:58. | :15:03. | |
on Facebook. He's saying, "Turn round. I've been at the window | :15:04. | :15:08. | |
watching you, waiting to come out. Turn round, turn round, don't leave | :15:09. | :15:16. | |
me here." So at that point we turned round, but I had to go over | :15:16. | :15:24. | |
a flyover, and I got lost. I don't recognise this road. | :15:24. | :15:29. | |
Just keep driving and just hope I see somewhere I recognise. | :15:29. | :15:34. | |
Austin's friend's mother was saying, "Austin's desperate to leave. Can | :15:34. | :15:40. | |
you get there quickly?" And we asked him, I asked him, "Can you | :15:40. | :15:43. | |
wait till 3pm, just to be sure, to make sure your dad's in bed and | :15:43. | :15:50. | |
he's asleep?" And he said, "No, I'm coming out now." And this is while | :15:50. | :15:54. | |
we're still lost. And then he logged off Facebook. So I'm | :15:54. | :15:57. | |
desperately trying to find the house again and navigate the roads, | :15:57. | :16:00. | |
and eventually, in what seemed like an hour we managed to find the | :16:00. | :16:03. | |
house, and there was this figure, Austin, with his bags, waiting | :16:03. | :16:13. | |
:16:13. | :16:21. | ||
When he saw our car lights, he hid behind the bush, because obviously | :16:22. | :16:31. | |
:16:32. | :16:33. | ||
he couldn't be certain it was us until we drew up. And he was there, | :16:33. | :16:36. | |
he was actually there, it was him, and he did have his suitcase that | :16:36. | :16:45. | |
he'd packed before, and, you know, he really had planned this to a tee. | :16:45. | :16:49. | |
My dad got out of the car, helped him put his baggage in the car, his | :16:49. | :16:52. | |
luggage, and we drove off slowly, and as soon as we got to the end, | :16:52. | :17:02. | |
:17:02. | :17:07. | ||
I was driving, and I got a glint of him getting into the car, and I | :17:07. | :17:12. | |
really wanted to hold him, you know, I really wanted to hold him. And I | :17:12. | :17:16. | |
drove, because I had to make sure that we got out of France safely, | :17:16. | :17:19. | |
you know, kept him safe, and I just kept looking in the rear-view | :17:19. | :17:23. | |
mirror and saying to Wendy, "Is it really him, is he really in the | :17:23. | :17:33. | |
:17:33. | :17:46. | ||
car?" And she went, "Yes, it's But the drama certainly wasn't over. | :17:46. | :17:49. | |
Instead of heading straight for the port, the group raced towards | :17:49. | :17:53. | |
Belgium, the reason was that Austin didn't have a passport. Without one, | :17:53. | :17:57. | |
he wouldn't be getting back into the UK. So they spent a very | :17:57. | :18:00. | |
nervous day waiting in a hotel room in Brussels for the British Embassy | :18:00. | :18:04. | |
to open. Only once they had a temporary passport for Austin could | :18:04. | :18:10. | |
they breathe a sigh of relief. When we got back to England we just | :18:10. | :18:18. | |
wanted to kiss the ground, all of us. At last, on safe territory. And | :18:18. | :18:23. | |
we can go home and be a family again. Without Dylan, obviously, | :18:23. | :18:30. | |
but we're nearly there. Austin's home and he's safe. | :18:30. | :18:33. | |
Court orders prevent us from seeing or hearing Austin, but Sam says | :18:33. | :18:40. | |
he's glad to be back, and has settled in well. Having managed to | :18:40. | :18:44. | |
rescue one of her children, Sam Raw is more determined than ever to | :18:44. | :18:48. | |
bring her other son Dylan back to the UK. The judgments at the | :18:48. | :18:51. | |
highest courts in the UK and France are clear, Dylan must be returned | :18:51. | :18:56. | |
to Sam. But the problem is that the court orders have not been enforced | :18:56. | :19:04. | |
The Hague Convention requires France to recognise and act on | :19:04. | :19:10. | |
legal judgments made in the UK and vice versa. But it's not happened | :19:10. | :19:15. | |
in this instance. Sam's local MP, Norman Lamb, has | :19:15. | :19:20. | |
taken up her case. He wants to resolve the situation, so he's gone | :19:20. | :19:26. | |
to France on Sam's behalf. I want to meet with the authorities | :19:26. | :19:30. | |
and with the father. And I want to try convince them that the court | :19:30. | :19:34. | |
order should be enforced, and we have just got to hope that they | :19:34. | :19:37. | |
will recognise what should have happened a long time ago, and allow | :19:37. | :19:42. | |
Dylan to return home. You just feel as a parent yourself, what must she | :19:42. | :19:47. | |
be going through and how awful it must be. Not just the fact you are | :19:47. | :19:51. | |
missing your children, but you fear for their safety. So you do | :19:51. | :20:01. | |
everything you can to support her. Norman Lamb is meeting the local | :20:01. | :20:06. | |
prosecutor in Poitiers, the region where Sam used to live. The MP | :20:06. | :20:15. | |
wants answers as to why Dylan is still living with his dad. | :20:15. | :20:18. | |
There was a very bad relationship between the children and the mother. | :20:18. | :20:21. | |
The children cannot go back with their mother, given the historical | :20:21. | :20:29. | |
behaviour. There was shouting, hitting the mother. Sam says that | :20:29. | :20:31. | |
refers to just one emotional meeting. | :20:31. | :20:36. | |
The highest courts both here and in the UK are aware of what happened. | :20:36. | :20:39. | |
They have ruled it doesn't alter the fact that Sam should have | :20:39. | :20:46. | |
custody of her child. We try to do things so the decision | :20:46. | :20:51. | |
can be implemented. But in view of the children and their reticence | :20:51. | :20:58. | |
about living with their mother, we did not implement the decision. | :20:58. | :21:02. | |
But as Norman Lamb points out, they have no right to do that. Court | :21:02. | :21:06. | |
orders are clearly being breached. Dylan is effectively being held | :21:06. | :21:13. | |
illegally in France. Concerning the fact that it has not | :21:13. | :21:16. | |
been possible to implement the decision of the Court of Appeal, it | :21:16. | :21:21. | |
shows its difficulty. But at the same time, it's very difficult for | :21:21. | :21:25. | |
someone to take a child of 13, 14, 15 from one country to another | :21:25. | :21:30. | |
between two policeman. It would cause me big difficulties to say to | :21:30. | :21:36. | |
two police officers, "Take this child." Although Norman learns why | :21:36. | :21:39. | |
the order had not been implemented, it doesn't seem as if any real | :21:39. | :21:45. | |
progress has been made. How did it go? | :21:45. | :21:50. | |
Well, pretty frustrating, to be honest. I mean, he gave us a lot of | :21:50. | :21:53. | |
time, but I was struck by just how different things are here compared | :21:53. | :22:00. | |
to the UK. In the United Kingdom, if there is a court order, it will | :22:00. | :22:02. | |
be complied with, as the authorities will make sure that | :22:02. | :22:08. | |
happens. Here, the court makes a decision, and they carry on | :22:08. | :22:16. | |
regardless and make their own decision. | :22:16. | :22:20. | |
Norman Lamb's next stop is a large town on the west coast of France | :22:20. | :22:25. | |
called le Roche sur Yon. It's the home of Sam's ex-husband, Thierry | :22:25. | :22:32. | |
Giraudeau. He's agreed to meet the MP to discuss the issue of custody. | :22:32. | :22:36. | |
I've come now to see Sam's ex- husband. I thought we were going to | :22:36. | :22:39. | |
see him in his own home, but we have been directed to his lawyer's | :22:39. | :22:44. | |
office. So that's where we will see him. | :22:44. | :22:51. | |
Bonjour. Norman Lamb. Merci. My plan is, and I've talked to Sam | :22:52. | :22:56. | |
about this, is to try and move forward. There is inevitably going | :22:56. | :22:58. | |
to be irreconcilable differences about the past, but let's try and | :22:59. | :23:01. | |
think positively about the way forward, let's try to rebuild | :23:01. | :23:10. | |
relationships and give Sam the chance to see her son again. | :23:10. | :23:14. | |
The appointment is for midday. Norman's a few minutes early, he | :23:14. | :23:21. | |
waits with the lawyer for Thierry to arrive. | :23:21. | :23:25. | |
Also in La Roche is Sam. She's hoping Norman can help broker a | :23:25. | :23:32. | |
meeting with her son. It's the first time since the rescue of | :23:32. | :23:39. | |
Austin that Sam's been back. She finds it very painful being here. | :23:39. | :23:45. | |
Being back makes me feel nervous. I look around me, and all I see are | :23:46. | :23:55. | |
buildings that remind me of horrific events. The school where | :23:55. | :23:57. | |
the children were being illegally detained, the gendarmerie, there is | :23:57. | :24:07. | |
nobody in authority I can trust here. | :24:07. | :24:10. | |
In the lawyer's office, Norman Lamb is still waiting for Thierry, who | :24:10. | :24:17. | |
is now over an hour late for the planned meeting. | :24:17. | :24:25. | |
His lawyer then receives a text message. It's bad news. | :24:25. | :24:31. | |
"I'm in the hospital. I couldn't predict it. You have to explain it. | :24:31. | :24:36. | |
Goodbye. Thank you." Norman wonders if the message is genuine, or | :24:36. | :24:40. | |
whether Thierry has just changed his mind about meeting. It's a blow, | :24:40. | :24:43. | |
especially for Sam, who was desperate to see her son. | :24:43. | :24:50. | |
Well, Sam, he didn't turn up. He didn't turn up. He eventually, | :24:50. | :24:53. | |
after an hour, he texted the lawyer to say that he was in hospital, | :24:53. | :25:00. | |
that he'd gone to hospital and couldn't come. Who knows whether | :25:00. | :25:07. | |
it's true. So it ended up with me talking to the lawyer. I told him | :25:07. | :25:10. | |
eventually that you were here, I said that you were obviously very | :25:10. | :25:17. | |
keen to see Dylan, could he help to fix up a meeting? Obviously, you | :25:17. | :25:21. | |
waiting here for the rest of the day, there is just a chance, I | :25:21. | :25:24. | |
don't know how high that chance is, but there is a possibility of you | :25:24. | :25:33. | |
seeing Dylan, but I don't want to build up your hopes at all. | :25:33. | :25:37. | |
Sam did wait. But the call from her ex-husband never came. She didn't | :25:37. | :25:41. | |
get to see her son. The trip to France had been a big | :25:41. | :25:48. | |
A month on, and back home in Norfolk, it's a chance for Sam and | :25:48. | :25:52. | |
Norman Lamb to catch up. We exchanged e-mails with the | :25:52. | :26:00. | |
lawyer, but he hasn't contacted me since then. I haven't e-mailed him | :26:00. | :26:03. | |
because I felt I shouldn't without your permission, and I wanted to | :26:03. | :26:09. | |
discuss that further with you. But so far, nothing further to report, | :26:09. | :26:13. | |
I'm afraid. But Sam has some good news to tell | :26:13. | :26:16. | |
Norman. She's taking her case to the European Court of Human Rights, | :26:16. | :26:21. | |
and she has just heard the action will be fast-tracked. She hopes the | :26:21. | :26:27. | |
court will force the French authorities to hand over Dylan. | :26:27. | :26:30. | |
Is there a way forward for Sam at this point? | :26:30. | :26:32. | |
Sam's absolutely right to be pursuing the European Court of | :26:32. | :26:35. | |
Human Rights route, and the fact that they are fast-tracking it is | :26:35. | :26:41. | |
fantastic news. I still have anxieties that it will | :26:41. | :26:44. | |
take a long time, but let's just hope that it forces France to | :26:44. | :26:50. | |
comply with the law. We have this extraordinary situation that the | :26:50. | :26:53. | |
French state is complicit really in allowing a court order not to be | :26:53. | :26:55. | |
enforced, and that is an extraordinary situation for EU | :26:55. | :27:05. | |
country to be in. A ruling from the European Court of | :27:05. | :27:08. | |
Human Rights could come early next year, but after all the setbacks | :27:08. | :27:14. | |
she suffered over the years, Sam struggles to remain optimistic. | :27:14. | :27:21. | |
It's very distressing. I find it really hard to be in this room. I | :27:21. | :27:24. | |
think as time is going on, I am finding it harder and harder to | :27:24. | :27:31. | |
come in, because I'm dusting a dead room, basically. And sometimes it | :27:31. | :27:34. | |
seems pointless, and sometimes I get the hope back and it comes back | :27:34. | :27:41. | |
again. His belongings are all around the house. We are surrounded | :27:41. | :27:45. | |
by Dylan in the house. He is part of the house. | :27:45. | :27:48. | |
Do you think that's important to keep that hope alive by having this | :27:48. | :27:52. | |
room ready for him should he come home? | :27:52. | :28:02. | |
:28:02. | :28:03. | ||
Yeah. Oh, yeah. You know, he's my child. I love him. I just feel so | :28:03. | :28:13. | |
:28:13. | :28:14. | ||
desperate that he is in this If you've been affected by anything | :28:14. | :28:17. | |
in tonight's programme, you can get in touch with the charity Reunite. | :28:17. | :28:20. | |
If there is something we should investigate, send me an e-mail - | :28:20. | :28:27. | |
[email protected]. I will see you next week, and I'll be back | :28:27. | :28:33. | |
Next week, we investigate why this man is one of thousands being | :28:33. | :28:38. | |
wrongly assessed as fit to work. After 12 months of extreme | :28:38. | :28:44. |