Abandoned

Monica Allans, 54, has won a ground-breaking battle in the supreme courts for the right to claim compensation for the sexual abuse she suffered as a child. Her legal victory set a precedent and has opened the floodgates for others to claim in her wake.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 288 pages
Publication date: 27 April 2023
Publisher: Mirror Books

I had been walking past a door that had been locked my entire life, afraid to even rattle the handle. I was now smashing the locks, wrenching it from the hinges, and marching through. Here I am! A woman whose mother twice tried to kill her as a child has won a groundbreaking battle in the supreme courts for the right to claim compensation. Monica Allan's legal victory set a precedent and has opened the floodgates for others to claim in her wake. Thanks to her 12-year legal fight, other victims now have hope. Other victims now have a voice. In her memoir, Monica, 54, tells the story of her childhood, when her mother, Betty Mount, forced her head under running bathroom taps and tried to strangle her. She had previously tried to kill Monica as a baby. Monica was taken into foster care, where her new parents ran a brutal regime. To the outside world, the family was devoutly religious and respectable, but behind closed doors, Monica was physically and sexually abused. Failed by a second mother figure, she moved into her own home at the age of 18 and went on to have four children. Monica loved her children but battled constantly with the demons from her past. She carried her dark secrets around with her for 40 years until, in 2010, haunted by her trauma, she finally decided to seek justice. She was told she could not seek compensation because of the "same roof rule," meaning victims who lived with their attackers up to 1979 were ineligible for pay-outs. For the past 12 years, Monica has been fighting her case through the Supreme Courts and was recently awarded compensation from CICA in respect of the sexual abuse she suffered in foster care. She is awaiting a second settlement for the attacks by her mother.

Weight: 210g
Dimension: 128 x 198 x 21 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781915306326