domestic violence restraining order

[iamn00n3]

My name is Eric and I live in the state of new Hampshire. I am married with two children, both of whom i had with my wife. My wife left the marital homestead this summer, leaving me to care for our two children.

During this time my wife had several affairs, which i have direct witness evidence and hard evidence of. Upon learning this, I filed an ex-parte motion to keep the children in my home, which was granted, and I filed for a fault ground divorce.

Four days after being served the divorce papers, my wife convinced me to let her back into my home and my family's life by signing legal and physical custody of our children to me. This all happened July of this year.

This November, I withdrew my petition for divorce. Upon receiving notice of the orders, my wife returned to her old pattern of behavior, and less than two weeks after receiving notice of the orders, took my two children to her parents home in Vermont, convinced them that I was abusing both her and the children, then returned to New Hampshire.

She checked herself into a battered womens shelter. She filed a petition for a domestic violence restraining order, which was granted, and she petitioned for divorce.She took my children with her of course.

Upon receiving the restraining order, i immediately retained counsel, and filed to advance the dvp final hearing. However, i was not aware of how she planned to prove the domestic violence issue, or the child abuse issue, since i hadn't done anything to abuse any of them.

At the dvp final hearing, she implicated our marraige counselour, by stating she had witnessed bruises on my wife and instructed my wife to file the dvp, She also implicated the teacher of my son, by stating that he had made outbursts, and had drawn a picture with the schools guidance counselour.

I brought six family freinds and family members, all of whom we saw on a daily basis as witnesses to the fact that noone ever saw any signs of what my wife was claiming.

Somehow I lost the hearing and the judge has made the determination that i have commited or attempted to commit assault or reckless conduct, and criminally threatened my wife.

After the hearing I interviewed both the principal of my sons school and the marraige counselour. They had no knowledge whatsoever of my wifes allegations and are prepared to come with me to court to prove that my wife lied on the stand.

However, I have exhausted all of my financial assets, and no longer retain counsel. The ten day period to file a motion for reconsideration is up this tuesday, Jan 3rd.

my questions for you are as follows

1. do I have grounds to file a motion for reconsideration?
2. Should the motion include a perjury accusation?
3. If I don't file to reconsider will the domestic violence restraining order hurt me during the divorce and custody hearings?
4. I have been told my attorney did a very poor job at the hearing, can I do better representing myself?

Please respond to my questions, I am so terribly afraid. I know that I was a fool to beleive my wife, but surely there has to be some recourse. I know you hear this all the time but I loved my wife and children so very much, these accusations are not true, and there has to be a way to defend myself.

[socrateaser]

>my questions for you are as follows
>
>1. do I have grounds to file a motion for reconsideration?

Reconsideration is based on newly discovered evidence that was not known at trial and which could not be obtained by reasonable use of the legal discovery process.

If the statements by your wife re the marriage counselor were what caused the judge to find against you, and you did not know that the judge would have admitted this hearsay evidence at trial, then your interviewing this witness after the fact could be a ground for reconsideration.

Ordinarily, I don't know why the judge would have let the marriage counselor's statements in as hearsay, but that won't matter if the judge's ultimate findings were not based on this hearsay evidence, but rather on some other evidence obtained during the hearing, then your motion will be denied, because your evidence will be deemed irrelevant.

Same answers for the school principal.

>2. Should the motion include a perjury accusation?

Perjury is for the court to prefer to the county prosecutor, your allegation is materially falsifying testimony to the court. Once again, however, if the court didn't consider the testimony that you are now trying to impeach, then your motion will be denied because the evidence you seek to offer will be irrelevant to the final outcome.

>3. If I don't file to reconsider will the domestic violence
>restraining order hurt me during the divorce and custody
>hearings?

Probably, but I really don't have sufficient facts. It doesn't surprise me that the judge ruled against you, because it happens all the time with these stupid domestic violence orders -- the burden of prove is so low and the stakes are very high. If I had been representing you, my advice would have been for you to offer to submit to a polygraph exam on each and every allegation of your spouse. Judges know that no one can beat the machine, and just by your offering to do this, you would probably have won, unless your spouse agreed to reciprocate in kind.

But, it's too late for that, because that is evidence that you could have offerred at the hearing and you failed to do so, thus no reconsideration.

>4. I have been told my attorney did a very poor job at the
>hearing, can I do better representing myself?

I have no idea. I wasn't there, and I know nothing about your legal skills.

>
>Please respond to my questions, I am so terribly afraid. I
>know that I was a fool to beleive my wife, but surely there
>has to be some recourse. I know you hear this all the time but
>I loved my wife and children so very much, these accusations
>are not true, and there has to be a way to defend myself.

I have heared this story 1,000 times. Your spouse may be a paranoid/borderline personality, which means that she will flip her personality at a moment's notice to obtain whatever result she wishes to achieve, as necessary to protect what she believes is in her interest. She may even be a true disassociated identity (multiple personality), and you may just never have noticed it until now).

These people exist everywhere, not just in movies, and they can be incredibly convincing unless you (and this includes the judge) is aware of what's going on.

You need to squash every last vestage of feeling for your spouse, because she is your worst enemy, and she has proven it by her actions. She may have legs up to heaven and an ass as tight as a Scotchman's wallet, but when you go to court, she is Satan incaranate, and you need to deal with her just like you would anyone else who had just tried to cut your throat while you slept. If you don't, then she'll keep exploiting your emotions and you will continue to lose.

[iamn00n3]

Thank you for your response. I have witnesses that were not available for the hearing, due to the time constraints. One can directly testify to the fact that my wife had this course of action planned before she attempted to reconcile.

I intend to fight this restraining order to the fullest extent that i can, even if my motions are denied. I intend to file a motion for reconsideration based on the testimony of my wife, and I will include the new witnesses as well.

New questions if you would be so kind:

1. How do I go about filing the perjury motion?
2. My wife filed for divorce based on irreconcilable differences, presumably the domestic violence issue, does that help with the former question of whether or not the restraining order will hurt my case when it comes to the divorce and custody hearings?
3. Should I assume that my wife will try to use the domestic violence issue in the divorce and custody hearings?
4. I imagine that I should prepare for it anyway, how do I do that?

I can provide any information or court paperwork you need if you would be willing to help me further. I am studying this issue as hard and fast as I can. Most information available is in the interest of filing first and staying ahead of the game, which clearly I have not done. So I suppose my next question would be:

5. Can you point me in the direction of self help sources for someone in my situation?

Again thank you for your help thus far. It is better to hear bad news given truthfully than the words of encouragement, given in the interest of my spirit. I will not give up whatever I have to go through. I have been the only stable parent in my children's lives. I believe I can prove that much.

[socrateaser]

>Thank you for your response. I have witnesses that were not
>available for the hearing, due to the time constraints. One
>can directly testify to the fact that my wife had this course
>of action planned before she attempted to reconcile.
>
>I intend to fight this restraining order to the fullest extent
>that i can, even if my motions are denied. I intend to file a
>motion for reconsideration based on the testimony of my wife,
>and I will include the new witnesses as well.

If you knew that the person had evidence that would advance your case before the original hearing, and you failed to subpoena that person, then you have waived your right to reconsideration on that testimony, because it was available to you via the court's subpoena powers.

You can't tell the court that you allowed a favorable witness to not testify just because you were being nice about their situation. The court will just laugh and tell you that's great, but not the court's problem.

So, if you didn't know that this witness had evidence and you had no reasonable means of discovering this fact, then you could use reconsideration as a means of offering the new evidence. But, if you tell the court that you knew of the evidence before the final hearing, then your motion for reconsideration will be denied, and it doesn't matter how damaging your witness' testimony may be.

>
>New questions if you would be so kind:
>
>1. How do I go about filing the perjury motion?

You're not listening. You have no action for perjury. Perjury is preferred by the judge to the local prosecutor to be acted upon under the criminal law enforcement system. You cannot directly claim or enforce a perjury action.

>2. My wife filed for divorce based on irreconcilable
>differences, presumably the domestic violence issue, does that
>help with the former question of whether or not the
>restraining order will hurt my case when it comes to the
>divorce and custody hearings?

The restraining order is only relevant as proof of your fitness to parent the children, and in some jurisdictions, as a rationale for the court to impose greater spousal support than would otherwise be permitted.

>3. Should I assume that my wife will try to use the domestic
>violence issue in the divorce and custody hearings?

At the custody hearing, absolutely. At a spousal support hearing, possibly. If this is an "at fault" divorce action, then absolutely as proof of fault.

Otherwise, it's irrelevant.

>4. I imagine that I should prepare for it anyway, how do I do
>that?

You have already been found liable on a final order based on allegation of domestic abuse. The court's judgment is conclusively presumed true, thus as long as the order is not set aside by the court on reconsideration or appeal, your spouse can submit it as evidence and you will NOT be permitted to contest the judgment of the court with any evidence -- PERIOD!

So, there is no way to prepare to fight this allegation later. You must either find evidence of fraud by the other parent that you could not have known about prior to the original hearing, and get it before the court, or you're toast -- game over.

>I can provide any information or court paperwork you need if
>you would be willing to help me further. I am studying this
>issue as hard and fast as I can. Most information available is
>in the interest of filing first and staying ahead of the game,
>which clearly I have not done. So I suppose my next question
>would be:

I'm sorry, but I don't have time to research your paperwork at the moment, and I can absolutely guarantee you that my fees are twice as high as any family law attorney from your local jurisdiction.

>5. Can you point me in the direction of self help sources for
>someone in my situation?

Your case is very difficult. You need to prove that your spouse is a sociopathic borderline personality. In order to do this you will need a rationale to have her ordered to submit to a psychological evalulation. Absent some credible proof of extremely antisocial behavior, such as a friend of your spouse's or blood family member of your spouse, who will testify to your spouse actually stating her intent to contrive circumstances that would give her grounds to trump up a domestic abuse allegation, you're not going to get the court to order her evaluated.

However, if you contest custody and the court orders a home evaluation of both parents, by appointment of a psychologist or GAL, then it's possible that you may be able to convince that person to ask the court to have your spouse further evaluated, if the preliminary finding of the appointed psychologist or GAL is that there is some credible evidence of sociopathic behavior that impacts your spouse's fitness as a parent.

This is not easy to do, because neutral custody evaluators are very suspect of parent claims that the other parent is trying to screw them. Obviously, everyone believes that their spouse is the parent from hell, while the divorce is pending.

Your very best strategy would be to convince your ex to reconcile and voluntarily set the abuse order aside. Then you could turn the tables back on her again, and file for divorce. This obviously will be a very difficult thing to do, because she has apparently been planning to destroy you for a very long time. But, it is, nevertheless, a possible outcome, so I'm suggesting it.