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‘I assumed he’d been killed in a car crash’

“I was expecting him home for supper at 6:30pm and he just didn’t arrive”, says Anne about her husband. “I was getting quite anxious and then at 9:30pm, the door went, and I opened it to find two uniformed police.

“I automatically assumed that they’d come to tell me he’d been killed in a car crash or there was something seriously wrong. There was no other reason I could think of for two police on my doorstep.

“They told me he’d been arrested. He’d been caught in a sting by vigilantes, and he’d subsequently been arrested for attempting to meet a 13-year-old girl at a hotel.”

‘I stood there behind the door and thought: What am I going to do?’

Anne says that it would be an understatement to say she was shocked by what the police told her.

“I don’t know how I functioned, but I did manage to function. It’s really weird, I think I’d just gone into severe shock.

“I was still able to offer them a cup of tea, for example. I took them everywhere in the house where I knew he had devices - they took every single one he had access to.

“Then, off they went, and that was it. I just stood there behind the door and thought: What am I going to do?”

‘I trusted him with my life’

Anne and her husband had been together for 39 years and she had thought that they had a good marriage.

“We started going out together at 17 - a long, long time ago. He was just a lovely man. Everybody loved him. That was it. It was sort of, this is the one for me.

“I would say we had a pretty perfect marriage for our age, you know. We weren't fortunate enough to have children, so that was a big sadness, that was an unexplained infertility. But there were advantages in that and that's how I looked at it. You've got to look at the bright side.

“We had lovely holidays, and we were looking forward to a very comfortable old age. We had plans that we were going to sell up in the UK, buy a house, maybe in Spain, and just live a good life and a relaxed life.

“I trusted him. I really trusted him with my life.”

‘I was left to pick up the pieces’

Looking back, Anne says she’d trusted her husband so didn’t ever check what he was doing on his phone.

“I had no reason not to trust him. And I was very unaware of this as an area of crime anyway. But you look back and you question everything. And you think, did he really need to be spending so long in the bathroom in the morning? You know, he always had. If you're not careful, it can drive you nuts.

“I'm not a stupid woman. I am quite a good judge of character, and that's what everybody that I've spoken says: ‘We don't believe it’.

“It's come as a massive shock. I was left to pick up the pieces.

“Even with the best marriage in the world, the only people we really truly know are ourselves.”

Anne says that she’s barely seen her husband since the arrest.

“He just ran from it all. I didn’t talk to him for days and since his arrest, I’ve spent probably an hour with him and that’s just to hand over property.

“He hasn't ever been back to the house. I wouldn't want him anywhere near it, I still feel anxious.”

‘The whole world was getting to know before I’d even had the chance to understand it myself’

Anne recalls the reaction she got to her husband’s actions and how it took a long time to get over.

“I had to have this great big bolt put on the back gate because I was frightened of people coming in, attacking things or setting fire to the house. At one stage, my goddaughter phoned me and said: ‘Your address has been put on Facebook, people know where you live, and your car is on there’.

“In her view I was in danger, and I panicked.

“The whole world was getting to know about this before I’d even had the chance to understand it myself - and they’d all decided that he was guilty. It’s something I don't think anybody should have to go through. And then they all seemed to work together to make sure it spread far and wide.

“What hurt the most was people saying that I must have known and that I was going along with it.”

Anne’s experience also tainted her relationship with children.

“I felt guilty even looking at children after that. It was a really weird thing. I've got godchildren with their own children, and I felt I didn't want to be around them. I didn't feel I could touch them because I felt like I was as guilty as he was, even though I had nothing to do with any of it.

“It's a horrible thing that you're left with that scar and you think everybody's looking at you and judging and yeah, it took me a long time to get over that, to be honest, to actually hold another child and have them on my knee. That was really painful.

“I'm getting upset about it, thinking about it, but yeah, it was hard. And I don't think people who get behind their keyboards and write this stuff understand that there are innocent people who are very much impacted.”

‘There’s no closure on it’

Anne is clear that she would have preferred if the police had said her husband had been killed in a car crash, rather than what he was actually arrested for.

“That would have been easier to deal with, if I'm brutally honest. It sounds really awful.

“I've got a friend who lost her husband a year before, and we often have this discussion, and she says that she believes mine's much worse because there's no closure on it. There is no end to it.

“He is still out there living his life and we're still trying to untangle everything.”

Anne explained to Jo why she made the decision to divorce her husband.

“He's now remembered by everybody as the person who went to meet a 13-year-old. No matter how many promises he makes, I wouldn't ever believe him. So, for me, that was the end of the relationship.

“But that doesn't mean to say that I disagree with anybody who makes a different decision, because it is a very personal thing. But for me, my values and my morals and just the way I am, I just know life would be miserable for both of us if we tried to carry it on.

“But for others, they want to carry on, they want to work hard, and they want to make it good. Particularly if there's children involved.”

'Not having children was a blessing’

Anne told Jo that she was glad she hadn’t had children with her husband.

“For me, suddenly not having children was a blessing.

“I'm so relieved not to have children and grandchildren to have to factor into this and to keep going on strong for. So, it's that trying to look for the little silver linings and the blessings that I have with it. I am very, very fortunate and I so recognise that. I've been so well supported by people.

“But I think some of that is about the fact that I've been quite open about it all as well.”

Anne also explained why she wanted to speak to Woman’s Hour about her experience.

“I just want to try and influence some change, just to get people to really think about this as a problem for society. And it's going to be happening and is happening every day. There's a family being destroyed every day.”

If you’ve been affected by issues raised in this article, there’s more support on the Lucy Faithfull Foundation website or the ´óÏó´«Ã½ Action Line website.

If you want to hear the whole Woman’s Hour series, The Knock, head to ´óÏó´«Ã½ Sounds and listen to the Woman's Hour episodes from 12 September & 13 September.

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