Daphne Franks is a Communication Skills Teacher at Leeds Medical School, and founder of the Justice for Joan initiative. In this guest blog, she discusses the progress she’s made in her fight against predatory marriage.
“Daphne,” said my mother’s GP, sounding worried. “Did you know your mother was married?”
We could not believe that this news at first. My mother was almost 92 with advanced vascular dementia and terminal cancer. We lived next door and saw her several times a day. I had Power of Attorney. We had been to all the authorities – Police, Social Services, her GP, a solicitor – with our worries about the man who had suddenly moved into her house. Either they didn’t perceive the threat, or they didn’t know what to do.
Five months before my mother died, the man organised a secret wedding to my mother. The witnesses were his son, and a lady the man knew from the pub. My mother never knew she was married. She was wearing the wedding ring that my father had given her until her death.
Because marriage currently revokes a will in the UK (except in Scotland) the man inherited everything in her house, and the first £270,000 of her estate (all of it!). He also had complete rights to her funeral. This meant he had no obligation to invite us, so he didn’t tell us when and where it was, and we could not go. We tracked down her grave. It is unmarked.
We learned that there was almost no safeguarding at marriage. Registrars should assess capacity to marry at every wedding they do, which can be up to eight a day.
You can read the full version of this story on the Justice for Joan website.
Predatory Marriage
In Canada, this is referred to as “predatory marriage”. This is now a common term in the UK. Once we set up our website, we started hearing from other cases. We then went to our MP, Fabian Hamilton, who has raised the topic in Parliament three times. Each time we have made progress with our campaign.
I wondered what else I could do. I’m a teacher, so I’m used to speaking to groups. So I started giving talks about predatory marriage to anyone who would listen.
One of my earliest talks was at The Ann Craft Trust’s Safeguarding Adults Conference in 2021. Since then, I have given over 300 talks nationally, both in person and online. I have spoken to safeguarding professionals, solicitors, NHS personnel, marriage registrars, Police, and general-interest groups. Last autumn I gave a talk at the United Nations in Geneva, for Widows’ Rights International.
I’ve done lots of radio and television interviews too. Perhaps my most surreal moment was filming at my mother’s grave for “Rip-Off Britain” with Angela Rippon, who was highly supportive.
Law Commission Consultation, and The Wills Bill
The Law Commission recently conducted a consultation into Predatory Marriage, and whether marriage should continue to revoke a will. This law dates from the 1837 Wills Act, and I think it’s about time it was changed. It provides such a strong incentive for predators.
Professor Nick Hopkins lead the consultation. He said that our campaign was “instrumental” in bringing it about.
In May 2025, the Law Commission published their Wills Bill. They are proposing to change the Law so that marriage will no longer revoke a will. This bill just needs to go through Parliament now. The sooner the better!
The Forced Marriage Unit has started giving online training to registrars, social workers and Police. This includes some training about Predatory Marriage. I’d like this training to be mandatory, and delivered face-to-face.
Next Steps
I have recently been awarded a Churchill Fellowship. This is a charity set up in 1965 in memory of Winston Churchill. They fund Fellows to travel abroad to investigate their chosen topic, with a view to bringing about improvements in the UK. I will be travelling to Canada, the Netherlands, and France to study these countries’ laws and procedures around marriage.
In the UK, Associate Professor Rachael Clawson has begun some research into Predatory Marriage. I hope that there will be more to come.
I have tried not to make our campaign about my mother’s predator. For me, it’s all about the victims and their families. He has never been prosecuted, because there is no evidence kept at marriage. There are no videos or audio recordings. The registrars wrote a letter explaining how my mother couldn’t answer some of the questions. One of them queried whether she was fit to marry. But they went ahead with the wedding anyway.
I don’t blame any individual or any group for what happened. It’s not about bad people. It’s about outdated laws and procedures around marriage, which have not kept pace with the huge rise in dementia across the world. There are nearly a million people living with dementia in the UK.
I will carry on campaigning until this hidden abuse is no longer happening.
Further Resources
- Daphne Franks discusses Predatory Marriage on the Safeguarding Matters podcast.
- My Marriage, My Choice – Resources concerning forced marriage and other forms of coercive marriage.
- “Inheritance Wars” – Documentary about predatory marriage.