PASSAGE OF THE DAY: "Last week, the country’s top family court judge gave a ruling effectively ending the use of unregulated psychologists as expert witnesses. That may well prove to be the case law that prevents such calamities from happening again. The credit, first and foremost, lies with Erin. For years, she and other mothers did painstaking detective work digging into Gill’s credentials. But strict contempt laws meant they couldn’t speak out. As her barrister described last week, Erin never accepted Gill’s claims or the decision of the court, and she never gave up on her kids. Her unwavering six-year battle means her son is finally back home – and it might well ensure that others are protected from a similar horror."
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PASSAGE TWO OF THE DAY: "The Bureau played a role too. Our reporter Hannah Summers has reported on four cases involving Gill, seen her cross-examined and helped expose her shocking biases as part of an undercover investigation. She covered these stories in forensic and exacting detail, and led challenges in court which have ensured they could be told in full. Hannah would be the first to credit Erin and other mothers affected by Gill’s evidence but, as her editor, I am more than happy to wax lyrical about her role in bringing transparency to the family courts."
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EDITOR-IN-CHIEF'S NOTE: "For Years, bogus court experts have torn families apart. Has that finally come to an end?, by Franz Wild, (CEO and Editor-In-Chief) published by The Bureau of Investigative Journalism, on March 4, 2025, in a commentary sub-headed, "We've been reporting on unregulated experts because we hoped our scrutiny would help drive change. Now it has."(Franz Wild is TBIJ's CEO and editor-in-chief. Before being appointed as TBIJ’s editor in 2022, Franz led the Bureau's Enablers team, which landed front-page splashes in the New York Times and Sunday Times, and helped prompt backbench MPs to push for measures to curb ‘Lawfare’ by private investigators working for oligarchs and autocrats. Before that, Franz spent 13 years as a reporter for Bloomberg, covering everything from politics to economics and mining in west, central and southern Africa, as well as London. He has led investigations into grand corruption, fraud, insider trading and everything in between. Franz’s subjects have included giant commodity corporations, New York hedge funds and a string of colourful billionaires. He has won several prizes for his work, including at the British Journalism Awards, and was a Gerald Loeb Award finalist. Authorities in the UK, US and elsewhere have opened criminal investigations into some of his subjects after his articles were published.)
GIST: "Last month we reported on the shocking story of Erin*, a mother of two who had been kept apart from her kids for six years thanks to a draconian and unjust ruling handed down by the family courts.
In 2019, a judge granted sole custody of the children to their father, a man who Erin had made serious allegations of abuse against. That decision was informed by evidence given by Melanie Gill, an unregulated psychologist who specialises in a subject area since discredited as a harmful pseudoscience. Gill advised the judge that the abuse allegations didn’t need investigating and that Erin should be banned from seeing her children until she had undertaken a course of expensive private therapy.
We’ve long been reporting on experts like Gill, whose evidence (for which they are paid handsomely) has a profound and irreversible impact on families’ lives. Some of these dubious experts tend not to be registered with any professional regulator. They might hold questionable qualifications. And often they argue that a mother has turned her kids against their father – a claim increasingly used in response to allegations of domestic abuse.
We reported on these stories because we hoped our scrutiny could do something to help drive change. And now it has.
Last week, the country’s top family court judge gave a ruling effectively ending the use of unregulated psychologists as expert witnesses. That may well prove to be the case law that prevents such calamities from happening again. The credit, first and foremost, lies with Erin. For years, she and other mothers did painstaking detective work digging into Gill’s credentials. But strict contempt laws meant they couldn’t speak out.
As her barrister described last week, Erin never accepted Gill’s claims or the decision of the court, and she never gave up on her kids. Her unwavering six-year battle means her son is finally back home – and it might well ensure that others are protected from a similar horror.
The Bureau played a role too. Our reporter Hannah Summers has reported on four cases involving Gill, seen her cross-examined and helped expose her shocking biases as part of an undercover investigation. She covered these stories in forensic and exacting detail, and led challenges in court which have ensured they could be told in full. Hannah would be the first to credit Erin and other mothers affected by Gill’s evidence but, as her editor, I am more than happy to wax lyrical about her role in bringing transparency to the family courts.
Our investigation into the use of unregulated experts helped prompt a public consultation on banning them (we’ve raised concerns about regulated experts too). Our series on how the courts handle allegations of domestic abuse has informed new guidance aimed at protecting victims. Mothers have used our findings to successfully challenge rulings which have resulted in their children being taken away by the courts. At every step we have amplified the voices of survivors.
We’ve set legal precedents, winning permission to name a serial rapist given unsupervised access to his daughter by a judge on the advice of a children’s guardian. He later had his parental responsibility revoked. In January we launched a new mentorship scheme aimed at increasing the number of reporters covering family proceedings.
There is a lot more we want to do, more positive change we think our work can spark. But reporting on and investigating family courts is time-consuming and expensive work. We are looking for funding to enable us to significantly increase our capacity over the next three years and to turn the Bureau into the centre for family justice reporting in the UK.
In October 2023 we reported on one of the first cases to be brought under a new pilot, since expanded, to increase the transparency of the family courts. Hannah secured a “transparency order” which allowed her to interview a mother whose allegation of rape against her former partner had been dismissed in error by a judge. The mother later received compensation from the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (Cafcass), which had been criticised for downplaying her allegations.
After that decision, she wrote to us to say our reporting had been the “turning point” in forcing Cafcass to take her complaint seriously (she was later invited to contribute to new policies being developed by the organisation). “The impact of TBIJ’s involvement in my case was immeasurable,” she wrote.
It’s this sort of impact, with your support, that we hope our work will continue to have."
* Name has been changed"
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The entire Editor-In-Chief's note can be read at:
PUBLISHER'S NOTE: I am monitoring this case/issue/resource. Keep your eye on the Charles Smith Blog for reports on developments. The Toronto Star, my previous employer for more than twenty incredible years, has put considerable effort into exposing the harm caused by Dr. Charles Smith and his protectors - and into pushing for reform of Ontario's forensic pediatric pathology system. Please send any comments or information on other cases and issues of interest to the readers of this blog to: hlevy15@gmail.com. Harold Levy: Publisher: The Charles Smith Blog.
Lawyer Radha Natarajan: Executive Director: New England Innocence Project;
FINAL, FINAL WORD: "Since its inception, the Innocence Project has pushed the criminal legal system to confront and correct the laws and policies that cause and contribute to wrongful convictions. They never shied away from the hard cases — the ones involving eyewitness identifications, confessions, and bite marks. Instead, in the course of presenting scientific evidence of innocence, they've exposed the unreliability of evidence that was, for centuries, deemed untouchable." So true!
Christina Swarns: Executive Director: The Innocence Project;
