Patricia filed for Divorce in February of
2002. Between her filing and our Final Decree in December of 2004 we
averaged a hearing a month. We spent time in Family Court, Domestic
Violence, Civil, Bankruptcy and finally Criminal. The majority of hearings
were recorded and are public record.
June 16, 2003
Here is what I wrote in a blog in April of 2005
on this hearing
It is
June 2003 and my ex wife and I are in our first pro se hearing. She had
filed several motions and the expense to fight them totaled several
thousand dollars, so my attorney was now a luxury I could no longer
afford.
A month before, the psychologist made his second evaluation
report to the Court. Patricia expected to get the two youngest kids back,
although why she thought this is anyone’s guess. Instead, the psychologist
recommended making the arrangements since January permanent. I would have
effective custody and she would be restricted to two hours a week of
supervised visitation with the hope of eventually reaching seven hours a
week.
Patricia responded with another suicide gesture. She parked the
van in the garage and turned it on. When the policed found her, she was
semi conscious and the van was turned off. She claimed later that she
spent five days in ICU. The police report states that she told the police
that a mechanic friend told her that cars no longer vented carbon monoxide
and she turned the car on to listen to the music while cleaning the
garage.
I do not know if the gesture was over the kids or losing her
motions that would have cost us hundreds of thousands of dollars.
The kids had gone a month without hearing or talking to their
mother. A previous suicide gesture in January involved the kids (she had
called them with a final farewell) so the kids worried about their mother
a little. And I, fool that I was, still harbored hope for Patricia hope
that she could become a functional parent, a mother that placed her
children first.
I emailed her; court orders prohibited telephone calls, but no
luck. The only time she attempted to call was a time I had informed her
that the kids would not be there.
The night before the hearing, I talked to Jessica. She had just
turned ten. I told her that I would try and get her mother to call her
from the courtroom, but not to get her hopes up It was likely that her
mother would not even show up at the hearing. I also told her not to talk
to Montie and I gave her a cell phone.
The hearing began at 10:07 the next morning, since Patricia had
asked for the hearing, I did not get a chance to bring up the telephone
call until 10:29. Until 10:35, Patricia made excuses, stating that she
believed it was the kids’ responsibility to call her, that she had been on
vacation, and that she had been in ICU for five days. She then argued that
the telephone schedule was too restrictive. It was not until the Judge and
I asked her a second time and I restated that Jessica was awaiting her
call that she decided to make the call. She spent approximately ten
minutes on the telephone with the younger children.
At the time, I thought it was a breakthrough. For the next
several months, Patricia kept in touch with the kids, made the telephone
calls, and made visits. I thought the relationships improved, even with
our oldest child, Glen
I even scheduled her first unsupervised visit with Glen for
February 9, 2004.
This was the Monday after Patricia’s hit man was to have killed
me while the children were in the home.
