Father Of Caesarean Scandal Woman: Why I DON'T Believe She Should Keep The Baby

The father of the Italian woman ordered by British judges to give up her baby after a forced caesarean has backed the court’s decision to put the child up for adoption.

Marino Pacchieri said his daughter Alessandra is a ‘threat’ to the baby because she experiences ‘manic, paranoid delusions’.

He added that his daughter, who suffers from bipolar disorder, frequently defies doctors by refusing to take her medication.

'She's a threat': Marino Pacchieri has backed the court's decision to put his daughter's baby up for adoption

‘It may seem harsh,’ Mr Pacchieri said, ‘but I do not believe my daughter should be allowed to keep the baby.’

The child, now 15 months old and who cannot be named for legal reasons, is in care in the UK on the orders of a judge in the notoriously secretive Court of Protection.

The case has sparked a wave of anger with MPs condemning the treatment of Alessandra, 35, as totalitarian.

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But speaking last night, Mr Pacchieri, 73, said: ‘At the time I did question whether the British authorities were being heavy-handed, but knowing Alessandra like I do, I believe they were acting in her best interests.

‘At that point she had stopped taking her medication and was extremely agitated. She was not mentally well enough to take care of her baby.

Together: Alessandra Pacchieri, who suffers from bipolar disorder, is pictured with her child in England

‘My worry is that if she is given custody and stops taking her medication again, as she has done countless times, she will become a threat to the child.

‘I see Alessandra most days and I have asked her, “How can you cope as a mother? You already have two children who are looked after by your mother so how can you care for a third?’’ ’

Mr Pacchieri said his daughter began suffering from bipolar disorder after moving in 2001 to Los Angeles to work as a waitress. ‘Within three months she had married and fallen pregnant. It was around that time that her behaviour became very strange.

‘I visited Alessandra five or six times while she was in America and I was shocked by what I found. ‘It was as if she was two people, one minute normal and fine, the next paranoid and talking about how people were spying on her.

‘My worry is that if she is given custody and stops taking her medication again, she will become a threat to the child'

- Marino Pacchieri

‘She became obsessed with keys and would steal them from friends, family, whoever. All over her house she had drawers full of keys.

‘She was always very paranoid about losing her own keys. She would lose them all the time but would think people were stealing them.

‘It began to affect her work and she started going into the restaurant dressed in increasingly bizarre outfits. Her manager became frustrated with her. Urged her to seek help. Her response was just to get angry and in the end she had to let her go. Mr Pacchieri said that Alessandra separated from the father of her child in 2004. The child was adopted by the father’s sister in America. Alessandra finally sought help from a doctor in 2007. Was given medication that helped with her erratic moods.

However, once it started to work, her father said, she believed she didn’t need it any more and stopped.

‘Her symptoms flared up again and in 2008 her mother Pini and I had become so worried that we begged her to come home to Italy so we could take care of her and she agreed. ‘She came to stay with me. I convinced her to go to see a doctor at hospital. The doctor told her that she would benefit from a stay at the psychiatric ward.’

She was discharged after a week’s stay in Montepulciano Hospital near Siena with a diagnosis of bipolar disorder.

Mr Pacchieri said she applied to have her child returned from America in 2008. The application was granted on the grounds her daughter would live with Alessandra’s mother, who is divorced from her father. He said: ‘Alessandra was receiving the right treatment. Started to get things back together but wanted to go back to America to meet an old boyfriend. She went in 2009 and came back a few months later pregnant with his child.’

‘I may have had three children by three different fathers, but it does not mean I am not a good and caring mother'

- Alessandra Pacchieri

Alessandra stopped taking her medication in case it harmed the unborn baby and became unwell again. She was admitted to a psychiatric clinic in Tuscany. Her father said: ‘She was discharged. Came to stay with me to give birth to her second daughter. Social services made a court order. The second baby also went to live with her mother. She was very angry and accused us of stealing her children, but it was a decision made by a court and for her best interests.’

But after this, Alessandra went back on her medication, held down a job at a hotel and was seeing her children every day.

Then in 2012 she met a Senegalese man in a Florence nightclub who said he was a basketball player. They had a fling. She became pregnant. Again, she stopped taking her medication.

In June that year, and at four months pregnant, she travelled to England for a training course to become a stewardess for Ryanair.

She stayed at the Hilton Hotel, Stansted, but ran short of money to pay the bills. She suffered a panic attack. Rang the police for help. She gave them her mother’s number in Italy, who informed them her daughter was bipolar.

Order: The child, now 15 months old, is in care on the orders of a judge in the secretive Court of Protection

Alessandra claims the police told her they would take her to hospital to check on the baby, but she was seen by two psychiatrists and on June 13 last year was sectioned under the Mental Health Act.

In a closed hearing, the local health trust made an application to the Court of Protection on August 23 and were granted permission by Mr Justice Mostyn to perform a caesarean without her consent. The judge ruled it was in the mother’s best interests. She was too mentally ill to make the decision herself. The following day Essex Social Services applied for a temporary care order and the newborn baby was taken away.

Mr Pacchieri found out what had happened and Alessandra was flown back to Italy, accompanied by British social workers.

Ruling: Following Miss Pacchieri's unsuccessful appeal, Essex County Council, pictured, obtained permission to place her child for adoption

He said: ‘I met them at the airport. The social services asked whether I or Pini would take the baby, but I am too old and Pini is already looking after Alessandra’s other two children.

‘The authorities even went to ask the father in Florence if he would take care of the child but he is an illegal immigrant with no job so was not a suitable father.’

Again, Alessandra began taking her medication and she was well enough to get a job caring for an elderly couple near where her mother lives with her daughters, now aged 11 and four, in Chianciano.

In February, judge Roderick Newton began the adoption process at Chelmsford County Court.

In May, Alessandra applied through the Italian courts for custody of the child, but the court ruled that the baby must remain in England. She challenged the decision in October at Ipswich County Court but her appeal failed. Essex County Council obtained permission to place the child for adoption.

The case came to light this week, and following international outrage Britain’s senior family judge Sir James Munby has demanded to oversee further hearings.

Last night, Alessandra’s Italian lawyer Stefano Oliver said he would lodge an appeal.

Alessandra, who is allowed to visit the child during her visits to England for hearings, has said she is committed to her medication and would like the child to be returned to a foster home in Italy so she can prove she is a responsible mother.

She said: ‘I may have had three children by three different fathers, but it does not mean I am not a good and caring mother. I have never done anything to hurt my other two daughters and I never would.’

A spokesman for Essex County Council said: ‘The long-term safety and wellbeing of children is always our priority. A British woman has revealed that she was given an abortion without her consent -. Said she was ‘horrified’ by how authorities still deal with distressed women.

Teresa Cooper, 46, a mother of three, received £27,500 in compensation after the Princess Alexandra Hospital in Harlow, Essex, carried out an abortion on her unborn baby boy without proper consent in November 2003.

Now the furore over Alessandra Pacchieri’s case has brought back the nightmare of her experience.

‘When I read about what happened to this Italian woman I lay down on my bed and cried,’ she said. ‘It was almost the tenth anniversary of when my baby boy - whom I had named Tristan - was killed. It brought back the horror of what was done to me.

‘This country needs to look at the way hospitals treat women who are distressed.

'Too often they brand them as seriously mentally ill, in my view to cover up the appalling shortcomings in the system and the way they deal with them.’

In Ms Cooper’s case, the health trust admitted that she had not received adequate counselling and that the procedure had gone ahead without confirmation of her consent or consultation with a surgeon.

Ms Cooper, of Ongar, Essex, was 36 when she fell pregnant to her fiance in 2003.

It was planned, but she had ‘reluctantly’ signed the consent form for an abortion after repeated bleeding left her fearful for the health of her baby, and her own welfare. Two days before the procedure she watched a ProLife video. Decided she would not have the abortion before seeking another opinion from the doctor.

Instead she was sedated and the abortion went ahead without any attempt to get confirmation from her that she consented.