I read it as a female, too. I thought it was because I am a woman, but I think whoever pointed out men aren't likely to claim Dad's a stalker is probably right.

I've worked with teens, and my kids aren't that far removed from being teens. A 14 year old knows right from wrong. Any teen psycho enough to try intentionally to harm an infant, forget about the step-mother, is a bad seed. I don't care what her (or his) problems were; others have problems and they don't generally try to harm babies or to get their parents arrested on trumped up charges. 14 is plenty old enough to be tried for 1st degree murder, had any other booby traps worked better than anticipated.

I understand thinking Daddy should forgive Psycho-Dearest because "she's fam-blee!", but it sounds like the psycho did everything in her power and then some to cause as much harm as possible to everyone associated with the father. It also sounds like Dad did everything he could to try to improve the situation. However, when the police tell a man to stay away from his own daughter, I'd probably have made it a permanent situation, too.

Maybe once the other kid (or kids) is no longer living at home, Dad would consider meeting in neutral territory, with witnesses present in case psycho tried to claim Dad tried to rape her or something. But I wouldn't hold my breath.