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.
recovering – and she has a husband who is supporting her i suspect. least that’s the rumour. i think i may have met him as one of the shadowy figures in the background. ewwwww.
Dear Kathy, I am in fact living and working in a “European German speaking country”, but not in Germany.
In fact we, my colleague and I agreed verbally several times on said partnership, and the word means a lot in our country (most of the deals farmers do are done by handshake, and these are fully valid contracts).
But as I am completely new to this field, my colleague, so I think, wants to “protect” me first from the gusty winds he already encountered in his lone years, but, at least he told me so, he wants me to take responsibility later, as he stated “the chances are there that I will be gone sooner than you and then things have to go on, and you must know them by then” (he is 7 years my senior).
I do not think that my colleague is a N/S/P, but his father seems to be the same breed as my father is, and the colleague and his wife are also kind of NC with them, and they also have boundary issues with his parents (I felt very much at home with them in that respect, and I do not think it is any mirroring in play there, just coincidence). He is very openminded and wears his heart on his tongue, he has a great family and I at once felt home there. Can’t explain why. Maybe the upbringing, maybe the interests, maybe the relaxed attitude.
But I will be careful, and watch out!!
I know from my father (S after all!!) who has done businesses years ago with Corporate America that it was the most gruesome shark’s pond he ever had to swim in, with lots of dirty tricks and the like; and he also had to deal with the German Democratic Republic (and did well there!), Western Germany and Great Britain as a Lawyer for international corporate laws.
All the more I appreciate your sound and very helpful advice! It is not always a good thing to ask relatives about personal matters….
Well things are not too bad for women these days (there is in fact an article in my Sunday news about men feeling set back by women who always get first…) Another fact is that professions where women take over lose their prestige, so it is no big deal in Medicine anymore. In my case an MD is not as highly rated as it used to be, the “Semi”-God-like status has vanished (fortunately)! And with Angela Merkel who is doing a great job as German Chancelor giving all her alpha-males who want to devour her just enough rope to strangle themselves and exits all the battles even stronger; they learn to fear the females!
I wish you a very nice evening, and appreciate your advice tremendously (it kind of validates my inner gut feeling I had when he told me about the employment; I sensed that I have to be on yellow alert at least!) Kindest regards! Libelle
Wow, one-step. Your place sounds like the neighborhood where I bought my first condo. I had three sets of neighbors evicted for noise, but not before my life was threatened and my cat was stolen (she eventually turned up in a park). The smell of “incense” that wasn’t really incense wafted through the floorboards from my downstairs neighbor’s condo. And I could hear his alarm go off every morning at 5:00 am. It was set on the radio and I could hear the newscaster’s voice and could almost make out the words. Delightful experience it was. To add pleasure to the experience, I used to find syringes in the stairwell, and had one lady high as a kite wander into my condo as the carpet guy was laying carpet. She says to the guy, “That your truck?” He says, “yes”. “Can you help me move?” (walking right in on my brand new carpet without an invitation.) Teenagers I didn’t know would knock on my door regularly and ask for money, and one sociopathic kid used to fling dog poop into the pool from his upstairs window. Good times!
My place now is much quieter and a little more upscale, but the guy upstairs (nice as he is) is very large. When he walks, the floorboards creek, and I sometimes wonder about their integrity. The pool noise in the summer makes me want to just pierce my ear drums and be done with it, cause I live near the pool.
There are a lot of young middle-classed 20-something-y.o.’s on my reptile site who pretend they are ghetto. They talk the talk and act real tough. They talk about “purple drank” (well I can assure you I lived in the ghetto for 5 years and never saw anything resembling purple drank) and have ghetto usernames. If they ever had to spend one day in the actual ghetto, they’d probably go running home to their mommies and daddies (who support them). They cry poverty but they always seem to have enough money for new snakes and enclosures. Those things ain’t cheap–none of it. When I was in my 20’s, I was usually either homeless, moving, or close to homeless, and wondering how to get enough money for food.
Wow, I really went off on a tangent there……there was no point whatsoever to my post.
one_step_, about your comment, “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…i suspect the tedium of writing is not something she could possibly endure.”
You are funny!
star – my new place isn’t bad. the last one sucked big time.
thank you for the, yes there was a point post. 🙂 and it is that being really ppor sucks and that people suck too. sometimes.
unless they are spath – then they suck all of the time even when acting pretty. CAUSE ITS NOT REAL.
RECOVERING: 😉
I am not disordered and i can barely stand it.
One step,
If your place is not as bad as mine, you will only get a minor chapter in my book on living in the hood….ha ha Just kidding of course–you can co-write it with me. You know I’ve taken some good things away from my past of intense poverty, and it is to be grateful for even the smallest thing someone gives me. I take care of what little I have. And also, when I’ve traveled to very poor countries, I was able to blend without too much discomfort or sacrifice. 🙂
one step,
I just wanted to add that I see you as a writer.
Star – ty 🙂
right this moment i am anxious one. 🙂
my last place sucked – but mostly because of the intense privilege enacted by the neighbouring students and landlord. still meant no sleep and no peace. ever.
I have spent time in central america. not in the countries with the most violence, but still.
okay – must get to work.
Keep writing, dudette. Write about the sucky neighbors, the lack of sleep, the cigarette smoke wafting through the walls…. I kept a journal during a trip to the Caribbean with a very selfish boyfriend many years ago. The story blended my feelings at being constantly dismissed by him and wanting to break up with him but feeling unable, with the beauty and wonder of the Caribbean island. A great read. For whom, I’m not sure. lol