Living Fear-Free Everyone should be able to live without fear for their wellbeing or life, and, certainly, everyone who has suffered at the hands of another should never have to worry about them again. However, this is simply not the case. Our incredibly brave OM Rhianon Bragg (PR 1988-90) has decided to open up about the horrors she went through and continues to go through since, once out of prison, abusers can move back to the area where their victim lives.
I
t was 22nd April 2019. The time approaching 9am. I sat in my car outside the police station anxiously waiting for it to open. I had had enough. He had gone too far. Scrolling through my phone, trying to distract myself, I read the headline of the local paper, ‘Five women killed by men they’d previously reported to police in North Wales in a three-year period’. Domestic abuse was reported to the Criminal Justice System (CJS), but not enough was done to protect these victims from known threats. Little did I know how close to their tragedies my own life was soon to come. Giving that first statement that morning, the officer told me it was harassment, menacing behaviour, coercive control, offences committed throughout the relationship, the list went on. I had no idea I had become used to his abuse and had normalised it. When I ended the relationship a few weeks previously, I asked him to leave me alone. He ignored my request and instead stalked and threatened me. Having been arrested three times in the following three weeks, the matter went to the CPS, who decided it was a no-further-action case. As a license holder, his guns, confiscated during the investigation, were returned to him again.
CCTV
Rhainon remembers clearly the first police officer who saw these images saying, ‘It’s a good quality camera. You can see your emotion, see that you’re terrified, and you can see his finger on the trigger.’
Rhianon Bragg The Marlburian Club Magazine
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