What is the name of your state? Texas
I apologize in advance for the length of this post and hope I am able to make sense here. I am a 41 year old female with an adopted brother who is 5 years younger than I. I learned last evening that he has fabricated a story that I sexually molested him about 25 years ago, and in fact, claims I did so with our nephew at another time as well. This brother has a steady history of drug abuse, theft, lying, legal troubles including jail and prison time, etc, and actions of this nature are not unique for him, although he has never told such hurtful and damaging lies. He often resorts to such things in effort to hurt others who don't do what he wants of them. To my knowledge, he has thus far only told my older brother and the nephew he has involved, and possibly a relative that he is currently living with. He has not indicated that he intends to take legal action, but needless to say, this is not something I want him to continue telling people. I read a legal definition of defamation of character and understand that in order to file a suit, one must be able to prove the accusations are false. I'm uncertain I can do that, although there is one possibility: he told our older brother that he informed a high school counselor of the incident. It is my understanding that counselors (among others) have a legal obligation to notify the authorities in the case of a report of child abuse, and obviously there was never a report filed (no investigation, etc.). Would this be considered 'proof' that the accusation is false? I suspect not, since he need only to deny ever having reported it, deny telling our older brother, and it would basically be his word against the other's. Other family members feel I should simply ignore this and let it play itself out, so to speak, but this accusation is extremely hurtful and quite damaging.
Would the lack of any investigation be sufficient proof (assuming he sticks with the story of having reported it to a school counselor)? Do I even have a case, considering that I can only prove he's only verbally shared this information with our older brother and our nephew? I don't know what is involved in filing such a suit, and not really in a financial position to take on this battle, but there must be some way to stop this viciousness. Or would you recommend, as my family has suggested, that I simply ignore it and hope for it to blow over, so to speak? Any advice that can be offered would be so greatly appreciated.
Thank you.
I apologize in advance for the length of this post and hope I am able to make sense here. I am a 41 year old female with an adopted brother who is 5 years younger than I. I learned last evening that he has fabricated a story that I sexually molested him about 25 years ago, and in fact, claims I did so with our nephew at another time as well. This brother has a steady history of drug abuse, theft, lying, legal troubles including jail and prison time, etc, and actions of this nature are not unique for him, although he has never told such hurtful and damaging lies. He often resorts to such things in effort to hurt others who don't do what he wants of them. To my knowledge, he has thus far only told my older brother and the nephew he has involved, and possibly a relative that he is currently living with. He has not indicated that he intends to take legal action, but needless to say, this is not something I want him to continue telling people. I read a legal definition of defamation of character and understand that in order to file a suit, one must be able to prove the accusations are false. I'm uncertain I can do that, although there is one possibility: he told our older brother that he informed a high school counselor of the incident. It is my understanding that counselors (among others) have a legal obligation to notify the authorities in the case of a report of child abuse, and obviously there was never a report filed (no investigation, etc.). Would this be considered 'proof' that the accusation is false? I suspect not, since he need only to deny ever having reported it, deny telling our older brother, and it would basically be his word against the other's. Other family members feel I should simply ignore this and let it play itself out, so to speak, but this accusation is extremely hurtful and quite damaging.
Would the lack of any investigation be sufficient proof (assuming he sticks with the story of having reported it to a school counselor)? Do I even have a case, considering that I can only prove he's only verbally shared this information with our older brother and our nephew? I don't know what is involved in filing such a suit, and not really in a financial position to take on this battle, but there must be some way to stop this viciousness. Or would you recommend, as my family has suggested, that I simply ignore it and hope for it to blow over, so to speak? Any advice that can be offered would be so greatly appreciated.
Thank you.