It has been 810 days since we learned
that Gaia was never going to make it home to us,
For 810 days we have been without
a voice, without any of the answers we
need to even begin to heal. In some ways
it feels like just yesterday but at the
same time we struggle to remember what
life was like before our sleepless
nights, unanswered questions and
impassable grief. For 810 days deadlines
have been delayed and decisions made
behind closed doors. Even today a great
many questions remain unanswered so we are deeply thankful to our legal team
and the coroner herself for helping us
secure an Article 2 inquest with a
mandate to leave no stone unturned in
the search for those answers. We have
always known that we have a case to make that Gaia was badly let down by the
systems we all hope will support us and
that this contributed to her death but
to have that acknowledged in court today
gives us hope. Our thanks also go to
those individual police officers and
healthcare professionals who did go
above and beyond for Gaia. We also want
to thank everyone in our local community
and across the country whose support has kept us going these two long years.
Each act of kindness and show of support means more to us than we can say.
We believe not only that Gaia should have
been found sooner but that if she had
been given access to justice and
appropriate support after she was raped,
that she might never have gone missing
in the first place. She was allowed to
fall between the cracks in the system
and she died there. Hers was a death by
indifference and that makes justice for
Gaia a matter, not just of our private
grief but of public concern. At the
moment there is what the Association of
Child Psychotherapists describes as a
silent catastrophe in child and
adolescent mental health services. Meanwhile, almost half of women and girls
who experience severe mental distress
are survivors of sexual violence yet
mental health issues make you 40% less
likely to have your case referred for
prosecution by the police.
Dorset Police has the worst rate in the
country with 82 recorded rapes per
conviction last year. As Gaia's story
shows this denial of justice especially
when coupled with a lack of adequate
mental health supports can have
devastating and deadly consequences.
We can't turn back... we can't turn back
the clock on the last 810 days. We can't
fill the hole in our hearts what we can
do is our best to ensure that this
community is safeguarded and that the
rights of others are being respected and
their needs met. That is what justice
means for us: working for the better
worlds that Gaia believed in because
it's what she would have wanted.
Thank you.
