I have seen this in action. The simple fact is that abusive men are also charming, adept at "showing" their partner to be lacking, and in general sociopathic (will use whatever means necessary to win). My ex - during his trial with juvenile court for child abuse - won over my children's guardian ad litem. He was so successful that even though he pleaded guilty, he never received any punishment unless you count 2 years of probation and supervised visits for 1 year after which he was given minimum standard visitation. I have no question in my mind that if he had wanted sole physical custody or had fought for it to punish me (more likely), he would have been awarded it. This man skates through life with no consequences for his actions. He was only recently fired from employment at the IRS after 20 years - 20 YEARS - of bad behavior, including incidences where he threw temper tantrums in the office requiring homeland security to be called in. But when it came to the family courts, they literally could not have cared less that he was violent even in public settings. Imagine what he's like behind closed doors! And when I mentioned it I was looked at with suspicion because it is an unspoken rule that you don't mention dv in family court.

I wrote a short piece about my experiences here https://medium.com/long-after-the-thrill/its-only-money-and-other-things-i-learned-from-leaving-my-abuser-9a8d59697a6d

Thank you for your response, clearly it has brought up a lot of feelings for me.