Lovefraud.com recently heard from a woman in Illinois, who we’ll call Mary. Mary is trying to protect herself and her eight-year-old daughter from her ex-boyfriend, the daughter’s father, who has guns and has threatened to use them. Not only is Mary fighting the ex, but she’s fighting lawyers—both hers and his—and an unresponsive family court.
Mary left the ex for good in 2001, when their daughter was three. The guy has an alcohol problem and a 20-year arrest record. He has five arrests for DUI (driving under the influence of alcohol) and 14 DWLR arrests (driving while license revoked). He has two arrests for domestic battery. Two different women have sought protection orders against him, including Mary.
In July, 2004, after three years of seeing his daughter sporadically at best, the ex decides he wants to be an involved parent. Coming from a wealthy family, he can afford to initiate a lawsuit and hauls Mary into court to get visitation rights. Mary works full time, but as a single mom, struggles to support her child. She can’t afford the best lawyers money can buy, and she doesn’t qualify for public assistance.
Arrest and conviction
Now, prior to filing his petition for parental rights, the ex was arrested for DUI and DWLR in February, 2004. He gets arrested two more times, in July and November, 2004, for DWLR. So on November 15, 2004, family court awards him supervised visitation rights. Eight days later the ex beats up his current girlfriend. She gets a protection order against him. Then in December he goes to jail for the DUI conviction. He serves 90 days of an 18-month sentence and is released on parole.
All of this happens while he is petitioning the court for his parental rights. The court appoints a clinical psychologist to evaluate both parents and the child. After 20 hours of interviews and evaluation over four months, the psychologist reports that the ex has a history of alcohol abuse and is vulnerable to relapses. He recommends that visitation continue to be supervised, and that the father complete an intensive substance abuse treatment program before overnight visitation is allowed.
Mary’s days in court
On November 15, 2005, Mary is back in court with the ex. Her legal counsel is less than stellar. Mary’s lawyer refuses to subpoena the woman who filed a protection order against the father. Mary talks the woman into showing up in court anyway, but Mary’s lawyer never calls her as a witness. And, Mary’s lawyer never asks the psychologist any questions related to the ex’s violence.
After a six-day trial, the judge rules. In giving his decisions, the judge notes that the ex’s alcohol dependency has not been resolved, and that the man’s mother and stepfather both believe he still has an alcohol problem. The judge notes that the ex has a tendency to disobey court orders. Yet he says the psychologist’s recommendation of no unsupervised visits until after the father completes a chemical dependency treatment program is an unwarranted restriction of his right to visitation. The judge rules that there is no risk to the child, apart from the alcohol issue, and awards the ex unsupervised visitation. He orders the father not to drink alcohol during visitation or for 24 hours before visitation.
Threats of violence
Two days later, the ex calls Mary and tells her he still has his handgun and that he would be a better parent if Mary were no longer around. Mary interprets this as a threat on her life, and asks her lawyer to get an order of protection against the ex. Her lawyer refuses.
The ex continues his threatening and abusive behavior. By February 8, 2006, Mary has had enough. With the help of a family advocate, she gets a protection order on her own. A different judge hears her case.
In the meantime, the ex’s lawyers file a petition to reconsider the parental rights decisions. They want the ex to have unsupervised overnight visitation immediately upon completing a substance abuse program, without an additional court hearing. And, they want his support payments to be reduced, arguing that he really doesn’t get any income from his two trust funds.
On February 16, five days after being served with the order of protection, the ex follows Mary as she drives home from work. Mary photographs him in his car with her cell phone camera and calls the police. The ex is arrested again for DWLR and charged with a criminal felony.
Mary is nervous about testifying against her ex in the felony case. Here’s what the police officer says to Mary: “I have his record in front of me and I can tell you from experience that he is capable of killing you whether you are a witness to this case or not. You need to make a choice to stand up for yourself or let him keep coming after you.”
Back in court
The ex’s lawyers ask the court to combine the protection order hearing with the parental rights case. So on March 1, Mary is back before the family court judge about the protection order. She no longer has a lawyer, so she tries to represent herself. Her ex has two legal teams, who claim that the man has never harassed her. The judge refuses to admit any of Mary’s evidence and vacates the emergency order of protection. The judge further orders that Mary and her ex communicate in a non-abusive and non-harassing manner, and that the father is entitled to telephone visitation daily with his daughter from 7 to 7:30 p.m.
Mary begs the judge to allow her to communicate with her ex only by e-mail. The judge refuses, stating that all communication must be by telephone.
Last week the ex harasses Mary over the phone again. She gets another order of protection.
The next day Mary is back in court in response to her ex’s motion to reconsider the rulings on his parental rights. Although she contacted 43 attorneys, none will take her case, so she is there alone. The judge postpones the hearing, but tells her that if she doesn’t have an attorney on the next trial date, Mary will have to represent herself.
On March 23, 2006, the ex’s home is searched by his parole officer and a representative of the sheriff’s department. They find guns and drugs. He is thrown in jail again.
Can you help?
“It took a long time for me to really understand that he is as dangerous as he is,” Mary says. “I have always been someone who believed all people had some good. I don’t believe that anymore. No matter what I do (try to help him or speak out against him—I have done both), his only goal was to manipulate me and keep me from achieving success of any kind in any aspect of my life. If he does kill me I am not taking his secrets with me.”
Now that’s courage.
Mary still needs to respond to her ex’s demands for visitation rights. Her goal is to keep her daughter safe. If you know an Illinois attorney who can win her case, please contact Lovefraud.
Hi Kathy — Really great stuff in your entrepreneurship/business post, and I will take what I can use if applicable.
Hi libelle, regarding your: “My advice to recovering would be to avoid at all cost THIS money you already know the psyche of the owner of.”
Oops — I already have money that was borrowed from the “owner of the psyche” I speak of. So my hands are already dirty. LOL.
Unfortunately, I’ve also accepted money in the past from racists, sexists, philanderers and other assorted people of ill repute, I’m sure…should I return that money from former bosses in corporate America too? LOL again.
Not poking fun at you or anyone.
It’s Saturday night, and I needed some comic relief after such a lengthy exploration of the topics.
Not sure where to put this – tired and need to not spend time searching for the right article.
Today, while concentrating and working away on a grant under I experienced whole minutes of time when the experience of being with the spath didn’t take up brain space on a conscious level. which was really nice.
When i got up to take small breaks (mostly freking out about my impossible time line) the information about Haiti and how people are using social networking and technology to find each other, report on conditions, rally support and donate money. Even google has a link on the search engine’s home page has has been filtering into my consciousness.
Now, part of the reason the disaster is so serious in Haiti is because sociopathic government and social systems exists in the world. So, it is the collision of economic conditions (enbaled and created by bad people doing what they do and good people not doing enough to mitigate it) and natural disaster that has devastated Haiti.
And I am thinking today as i walk into the kitchen for yet another cup of tea: here is this dire situation, tragedies too numerous to collect and tell – these visceral life altering tragedies. A nation has been affected; it will take decades for it to recover and find its feet.
And in the midst of thinking about Haiti, RAGE rises: THAT F*CKING SPATH BITCH *WILLFULLY* TRAUMATIZES PEOPLE, EVERY DAY, OF EVERY YEAR, OF HER LIFE – ON FUCKING PURPOSE. ON FUCKING PURPOSE!!!!!!!!!!
Now, maybe she HAS NO CONTROL. Maybe, that’s the truth of these creature’s brains – BUT I FUCKING DOUBT IT!!!! SHE IS ALSO STILL ACCOUNTABLE.
Like there isn’t enough tragedy and trauma in the world; these people are evil.
I have so much work to do! For my own love affair with myself; to construct a a well laid out plan to slow her down; to learn about sociopathy and warn others.
But first, I sleep. Flaming sword by my side.
xx
one step
…well, let me restructure that 3rd paragraph so it makes sense:
When i got up to take small breaks (mostly freking out about my impossible time line) the information about Haiti and how people are using social networking and technology to find each other, report on conditions, rally support and donate money has been filtering into my consciousness. Even google has a link on the search engine’s home page.
tired.
Dear Kathy! Thanks so much for your detailed answer.
We were initially planning to set up this partnership right from the start in May this year, and friday he told me that it would be wiser to take things slower and start with me as employer and then later in one to two years go into partnership.
I told the bankman, my mother and my godmother who all are in business and all told me that it would be a good thing to proceed this way. But you are also right, that I have to fix this future prospect in the actual contract, and why not put right now a small amount (say 10% – 15% of the investment) into it as a sign of commitment on my part? I have some money on my bank “for bad weather” and it would be a part of it that does not harm.
I will discuss it with my sister this afternoon (she is a seasoned lawyer with special interest in contracts, corporate law and the like).
You are right, I am polite and not assertive at all (some people mistake it for stupidity). I will have to sit down with him to define my role being “one of the bosses” and in the same time being “employed”. I did not think of that either; it is another weak boundary of mine that needs refurbishing I think. That was one of the crucial things at my old place: the bigot colleague who was initially below my position but was brought by my new boss from his old working place and I were battling over the position of “FIRST corporate wife” with me being runner up.
And I will have a contract with the commitment and the possible partnership fixed in it.
It is hard to look up the special business plans in the internet as it is very specific, but I know from other colleagues that mostly they are first employed but after a year they have to “buy in” into the partnership with a huge amount of money. I will ask them as well now with specific questions! Then I can get specific answers as well. It is not usual in my country to talk about salaries and business plans and the like, but with you in my imaginary back I will dare to go for these informations!
Thank you so much, and have a very nice sunday!
further to my above post- the spath was always *dying*. serious/ several illnesses and operations during the time I knew her. And emotional meltdowns. and surgeries. and suicide attempts. and a prognosis of 5 years to live at most….if she could make it to wednesday….CONSTANT trauma. all a lie. every. fucking. word. of it. it served to keep me in a loop, keep me off balance, and hide some of her oddness and emotionally disconnectedness. She revealed that later, much more clearly. she is an evil thing. evil evil evil.
evil is my new fave word in learning about and unraveling this.
I mean someone spends ALL their time every day doing this shit. I mean who DOES THAT!!!???? Crazy people. Evil people. That’s WHO.
I am starting to feel some disgust. hmmm, ya think 😉
one_step_at_a_time: Your comment, “I mean someone spends ALL their time every day doing this shit. I mean who DOES THAT!!!???? Crazy people. Evil people. That’s WHO.”
I understand your sentiments — just the audacity of it all. I once asked you where the S you were dealing with found the time to do such an elaborate scheme, such gaminess, when there was no certainty of apparent reward or outcomes she hoped for.
Requires that a person does not have an inner life of their own, at the very least. A very empty shell and lost soul.
I would like to share a little nugget of wisdom that my salesmen mentors always stressed to me as they trained me in sales many years ago.
They would tell me, “Rosa, a contract with no money attached to it is like toilet paper…..you can wipe your ass with it.”
To sum it all up, a contract with no money behind it is like talk with no action to back it up….both are USELESS!!
libelle, I forgot that you are in another country. So what I “know,” except for the parts about dealing with narcissistic business people (to be expected and worked with), may not be valid in the details. I know that here, if any partnership or equity expectations are not agreed upon up-front, they are unlikely to materialize.
But there may be other standard progressions where you live.
However, buying into the partnership with a great deal of money after working there for some time, does seem odd to me. If you are a salaried employee, unless that salary is very high, it seems unlikely that you are going to accumulate a great deal of money (except in a retirement plan).
So, as you said, probably the most meaningful advice is to get clarity about your career path with your partner. As well as clarity about your job function and possible areas of authority.
European cultures (as well as former European colonial cultures) present challenges for woman. Possibly the Germanic and Scandinavian are are less so. I’ve done well with them, for the most part, but I have the advantage of an American specialty, because American marketing is globally regarded as the most advanced. But even so, I’ve been astounded by the way women are generally assumed to be rightfully placed in “serving” and “housekeeping” roles, even if they have executive and managerial titles. And the absolutely worst experience I had with this was in the U.K.
I know that you won’t take my advice to be assertive as a suggestion to be “in your face” or confrontation. Politely stubborn in your question for information and your requirements for yourself would probably be more like it.
And congratulations on coming in second for the corporate wife. That’s not a role I would wish on anyone.
Kathy
Recovering- i suppose she is like all the spaths out there jerking people around – sometimes its for money and sometimes it’s not. i suspect that besides being a spath she is a very creative individual. WHY in hell she doesn’t channel that into novel writing…well, she doesn’t cause she is disordered and i suspect the tedium of writing is not something she could possibly endure. she got LOTS of feel good endorphins from me. her main character was VERY impullsive – hell, all of them were – which suggests to me that she isn’t actually aware of the extent to which she is impulsive/ or how much it shows.
i am very happy for this time of unraveling – seeing her in context of all of the traits and behaviors of all the writing here. i looked for weeks, online every day before i came across the term ‘love fraud’, and googled it and found this site. I am thinking about what i want to do in terms of public education on the net about spathness and about HER. she doesn’t get away with this one. and it won’t be the first time she has been outed publicly on the net. i know who she is because of what exists about her on the net. i surmised she was a sociopath before i found lovefraud and before i knew who she really was. it is an onging learning, and unlearning.
and then there is all the personal work i need to do and the work of keeping roof over head and stress levels down. SOOO much. but it feels kinds exciting in a positive way.
i didn’t sleep much last night – i am stressed about the grant deadline and the neighbours were noisy (whcih they never are). Upstairs guy wa sup and down all night and coughing his lungs out from smoking too much dope, and the young ones across the stree thought that middle of the night outdoor partying was a great idea until i leaned out the window and told them to shut the fuck up and they had 5 mins, then i was calling the cops. i put up with that shit at my last place for way too long. not now. this is a residential neighborhood – quiet quiet. nope, not putting up with that. and fuck them, I have my pepper spray.
okay – well, staying away from the day isn’t going to make it any easier – i gotta get to it. first a walk in the beautiful outdoors.
one step