Don't be harsh on Tony.

Unless I've misunderstood previous postings, that lady spent most of her life in Germany, only moving to England two years ago. So it's not astonishingly surprising that the first place authorities would look for her would be... Germany.

Why is that a reason not to be "too harsh" on Tony Gosling? I think he has a lot to answer for, whether or not his blabbing and dangerous postings contributed to this very dubious state kidnapping.

That'll be for the children to decide, either now or when they're grown up. I wonder if they'll be rushing to thank mr Gosling for helping them escape their mother or whether they'll curse him for ruining their lives.

The British authorities obviously contacted and liaised with authorities in Germany very early on in this case but only renewed their international queries after their fresh appeals over here sparked a Tony Goslings latest revelations. Yesterday they finally got the breakthrough they wanted with Natalie and her daughters were identified on a watch list trying to board a bus for Turkey and an international bus terminal in Munich.

Natalie is apparently in custody being questioned by police officers (British?) about her movements over the last sis months so those who help her better watch their backs. The children have been taken from her and their exact whereabouts is unknown.

Natalie wanted to get to Germany because she felt that she would be out of the jurisdiction of the British Family Court system. I don't think she realised that she would be arrested over there. Whatever, she will be much happier to be in the hands of the German authorities than the British and it was not realistic for her to be on the run forever. At some point, preferably of her choosing, she was always going to have to turn and face her accusers. She would say that was much better happening in Germany than in the UK.

The key point in all this was when the authorities took her passports away. From then on she was a prisoner in the UK and slowly the Social Services legal net started tightening. Eventually we were told by Northumbria police just before we were unlawfully arrested, that she may well kill the children. I turned to the detective and said "have you ever met her?" Clearly they hadn't, that last statement was just made up by social services and used in secret by the High Court to order that the kids could be taken into 'care'. And we all know what that means. They may well get abused. Natalie knew that too. I'd like to know the name of the social worker or lawyer that made that little chestnut up. I think we all would.

Will having been on the run help her prove she is not mentally ill? IMO one of the best proofs that she's a level-headed mum is in the 'communique' she wrote just before she was discovered down in Somerset.

I'm also going to have a crack at getting some dosh for my picture used around Europe and use it to help start a legal defence fund.

BTW - I was told that she had been captured the day the police swooped on the Somerset Community. Not disinfo but a genuine mistake.

have read a huge amount tonight on indymedia about this case and am struggling to understand one particular thing. forgive me if i have missed something but what are the police saying she has done to her children that makes her unfit to be a mother?

all i keep reading, in mainstream media, from cops, and sadly also from indmedia posters, is that she may have a diagnosed personality disorder. the word fantasist has also been banded about, but nowhere can i find mention of harm done to the children up until she went on the run or after that.

even mark brown in his statements seems to think it reasonable to a point to have believed that the kids needed rescuing because cops told him she was mad (obviously i paraphrase). not only was it a mistake to speak to them without first substantiating their claims (i.e. always no comment throughout an initial cop interview, you can always go back and blab later that day/night if you are that way minded, after you have done some research and thinking), it was a hugely ignorant act to do it because you are prejudiced towards parents with mental ill-health diagnoses.

whatever anyone thinks of the children's welfare issues whilst they were on the run, it seems from what i read that the social services were about to take them away because of a mental health diagnosis and not because of actual harm done. assuming (which i don't necessarily, since i don't have access to those facts) that her statements are not based on reality and she is a "fantasist" does these mean the kids need to be snatched from their mother in the first place? many parents with mental health diagnoses give their children "good enough" parenting, some do it better than those without a diagnosis. was this ever based on anything other than prejudice?

i was once given a diagnosis of personality disorder after being asked three questions by a psychiatrist met me for less than ten minutes. those questions were: are you bisexual? does your mood change during the course of an average day? do you sometimes feel rushes of emotion towards those you love or hate? i answered yes and was stuck with that diagnosis for three years. before and since then other psychiatrists have labelled me with other diagnoses, meanwhile i continue to live a fulfilling life in which no-one in my day to day life finds me particularly odd (i work and i am a parent, amongst other things). i have met socially with psychiatric nurses who have told me that it is label given to people whom psychiatrists don't personally warm to, find a bit wierd, and can't think of a way to "cure" from their "wierdness". my medical records i now know have me quoted as identifying as a queer anarcho-feminist.

all this is just to say - be careful in your assumptions based on psychiatric labels!

Interested talks sense, of which there's been very little in this sad affair.

Flo is right to emphasise what the children think. The oldest of them, remember, is 13, maybe 14 by now. Those who've met them and posted here or elsewhere say the children desperately wanted to stay with their mum but that they preferred to be in Germany rather than here.

There seems to have been a lot of very bad judgment and lack of gumption in several quarters. One of the worst has been the failure to maintain absolute internet silence about the whole affair. Some people appear unable to contemplate electronic abstinence, regardless of the consequences.

It's by no means certain that better judgment, careful thought and restraint would have prevented this outcome, which is apparently the one the children didn't want (apart from being back in Germany). But there are certainly lessons to be learned.

well said, interested.
i hope that we can all learn from the mistakes that were made by certain individuals. I wish that Natalie could comment on these things herself, but iam sure she would not have wanted the authorities to have been alerted to the possibility that she had gone to the continent. yes they may have suspected this already, but they didnt know for sure. if its true that mr g was the one to confirm where she might be, then if i was natalie i would be very cross that my confidence had been betrayed and the info was put out in the public domain without her permission. think how you would feel in her shoes. she might well have been able to get to turkey if the authorities had not been sure where she was.
we dont know how much of her story is true. but at the end of the day, those that helped her did so because of the children. if they were to be taken into care, they would most likely be separated from each other as well as their mother, which is emotional abuse by the state, whereas the police claims that natalie might harm her children physically was clearly wrong as many witnessed her loving care for them. As has been mentioned, it is all too easy to be labelled with a mental illness and stigmatised from then on, especially if you are a dissident.
shame on the mainstream media for yet again, reporting what the police etc say as if it is the facts, the news.
not once have they said the police allege......one wonders what this means for our so-called democracy and how can we trust the news on other issues such as so-called terrorism cases? Remember the experience of this with the Irish? think its any different now? No. wake up all of you and challenge the official police view on everything yers even on 7/7.

I would suggest indymedia stops posting stuff from Tony Gosling, 'statewatch' and any other person who uses the site to disseminate information that may harm others or set the cops on them. It should not have happened and must not happen again.

I totally agree with Clarence. Natalie was relying on others to keep her confidence.
But Chiara, I dont think statewatch has done anything.
Good points by Clarence - how we need to be very critical about events when reported solely from the Police or other Authorities points of view.
I hope anyone else who may find themselves in a similar position to Natalie finds more competent people to rely on.

statewatch did not do anything? Apart from putting all the children's names on indymedia?
 http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2008/11/413360.html

Chiara, the names of the children were published in dozens of newspaper both local and national after police made a fresh appeal on the 17th November, fresh from persuading the high court to lift the standard ban on publishing such info in these case.

 http://news.google.com/news?client=safari&rls=en-us&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&tab=wn&ncl=1271492610&hl=en

By the time 'StateWatch' posted the info on ( http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2008/11/413360.html) the story had already been broadcast on national TV. What additional harm did 'StateWatch' cause by reposting that info?

I wonder why Gosling thought he knew better than the mother in alerting the authorities to her reappearance in Germany and likely her eventual capture? It looks like he's betrayed her all because he's more concerned with getting his name in the public domain.

how can he live with himself?

Several reports appeared in German papers around the 19th. of Nov. I posted them to indy uk but they were censored.

One article argued that this case was one of overzealous social workers and relentless authorities in England.

Now, I have never experienced personally British care authorities, but I will have to tell you one thing. If Nathalie thinks German authorities are less restrictive she´s very naive. They´re definetly relentless when it comes to "suspect" mothers.

England based German journalists got "hold" of the story by indymedia and there articles deffinetely contributed to her being tracked down in Germany.

She had made to Munich though - that´s quite a long way down the map she got.

So part ofn the blame could be put down to indy and Gosling.

On the other hand, the only thing a person being harrassed by whatever authority really needs is publicity. There´s is no other way to help Nathalie and her children from being harassed by overzealous social "workers" then control of those species by a equally relentless media.

In that respect it´s is a shame that indy Germany has censored any reporting on Nathalie since summer.