Archive for January, 2013

The crime of perjury doesn’t really exist

Saturday, January 26th, 2013

My ex’s psycho wife was the surprise witness on Thursday. My ex’s attorney ambushed me with her. In her testimony, she made clear that her husband had lied. Then she went and did some lying of her own. My witness, unfortunately, was injured on the job and was in the hospital on Thursday, so I had only a police “incident summary” to back up the facts.

The judge refused to view any of the written evidence (which confirmed the ex and his wife to be lying) and ignored my testimony (for reasons unknown to me). As a result of discarding the evidence and my testimony, the judge claimed that there was “no evidence” of any misbehavior on my ex’s part, and dismissed my petition to get my belongings returned to me.

I’ve done some research, and have learned that there is, in practical terms, no penalty for providing perjured testimony. Government officials (like state’s attorneys, etc) don’t prosecute it, and the injured parties are barred by law (or custom) from seeking any redress.

I’d long been disgusted by how often my ex’s contradictions and lies succeeded. I’d had no idea that his conduct was actually supported by law and practice. No wonder I’ve been losing: I’ve been playing by the rules, telling the truth, and thinking that the evidence had some relevance. Go figger.

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I “lost” today

Thursday, January 24th, 2013

I lost all three of my motions today at court.

The two child-support motions were always long shots. “The” verdict, when I ran this by various attorneys, seemed to vary with the person. Losing this hurts financially, but it was child support that I wasn’t likely ever to have received anyway. And, on the plus side, I did get the ex to admit, in a sworn filing, that he had owed the amounts.

I’d really thought I’d had a chance on the motion to get my non-marital property back. But my witness was injured at work and is in the hospital today, and the ex’s attorney was allowed to spring a surprise witness on me, who of course lied through her teeth. I should have had the sense to subpoena the police officers who’d been present because, contrary to what the lead officer had told me, the report he’d written was not accepted as “evidence” by the presiding judge.

Live and learn.

As my sister pointed out, my ex hadn’t gotten the second “industrial-strength” shredder as part of the decor; he’d locked himself into his private home office and shredded documents by the hour because he’d been destroying documents. Of course my documents don’t exist any more! And the ex had told me, in early 2009, that he was “making piles of” my stuff to donate for the tax deduction. Of course my stuff isn’t there any more! He’s donated our child’s things, too: all the clothes, toys, cell phones, school supplies, etc, that I’d paid for and supplied to the ex for when our son was over there.

Now I’m stuck providing a list of things to the ex’s attorney (that is, giving him an itemized list of things to destroy) to pass along to the ex, in hopes that the ex will suddenly “find” my things and return them.

He escaped the contempt finding by claiming he’s been holding my things for years. Whaddaya wanna bet he escapes returning any of our things by claiming (again) that none of my things were ever over there?

*sigh*

But my sister is right. Nothing “real” changed today. The ex is continuing not to support his child, and to get away with it. That’s nothing new. And the ex is getting away with having destroyed my things. I was lucky to get out with as much as I did.

Now I need to start composing a Motion to Compel. The ex has done almost nothing he agreed to do in the divorce decree, and now, due to his own successful claim, he can no longer make excuses based on stuff from before that decree was entered.

Time to get to work. And, hey, I wasn’t heard for three and a half years when I had attorneys. Sure, I lost today, but I was finally heard! And it only took me four months.

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How much bigger can he get?

Wednesday, January 23rd, 2013

My son is now wearing men’s size-14 shoes. I told him that Noah could have used his shoes as pontoons on the Ark.

Thank Heaven the store had one pair of sneakers in the size he needed. His “nice” shoes still fit him, he says, and he’s worn his riding boots (size 13) frequently enough that I think they’ve kind of “grown” with him. But what on earth am I going to do when he needs to replace them?

The boy already outweighs me, he can lift me, and he likes to tell people that he’s “five foot twelve”. Just how much bigger can he get?

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First time ever

Friday, January 11th, 2013

This past holiday season was unusual for me, in that it was enjoyable. I had a lovely time with family and friends, and my boyfriend surprised me with a beautiful sparkly necklace.

Nobody ever gave me jewelry before.

Sometimes “new” can be very, very nice.

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This isn’t that…

Friday, January 4th, 2013

I just did a Google search (how dated will that term be in ten or twenty years?) and discovered that there is another “braden bryce”.

Wow, is this “braden bryce” not that one! Sorry, but if you’re looking for graphic non-hetero, um, “activities”, you’re in the wrong place! *blush*

Just for the record, “Braden” is my grandmother’s maiden name, and “Bryce” is my son’s middle name. I’d read it somewhere, and had liked it. When we had trouble coming up with a name for our pre-born baby, I remembered the name.

“Braden Bryce” was originally going to be a web-publishing company. Back fifteen to twenty years ago, making websites was still a big deal, and I figured I’d have lots of free time on my hands, because “how hard can it be” to raise a child, right? Ha! Anyway, I had the domain name, and now it’s been re-purposed.

Just not re-purposed that way for that subject.

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Looking forward to court on the 24th

Friday, January 4th, 2013

I am actually looking forward to court later this month. Last month, I was startled to discover that my ex’s lies were being used by his attorney as their legal strategy! Maybe they’re thinking that, because we now have a new judge (the previous judge having retired), they can make claims that won’t be checked.

Thankfully, my court reporter became ill. Not that I wish her any harm, but it cut things short, giving me time to realize what was going on. (Yes, I actually stuck to my guns and insisted on my right to have a reporter present, despite my ex’s attorney hammering on my supposed “craziness” for wanting to document what he and my ex say.)

My ex begged off coming to court this month, on the grounds that it was a “hardship” for him to come because he’d have to leave his job that he’d “just started…yesterday”, being December nineteenth. But he’d told others about it on the fifth of December, and he sent me a letter, dated the nineteenth but postmarked the twenty-first, saying that he’d started on the seventeenth — a Monday, which makes much more sense. Then he sent me an e-mail this month, claiming that he’d lost the job on the twenty-sixth. Riiiiiiiiight.

Back to the “strategy”: My ex’s attorney is actually claiming that, as part of the divorce settlement, I agreed to “forgive” my ex’s tens of thousands of dollars in withheld child support in return for his “forgiving” me the hundreds of thousands (or millions; it depends when you ask them) that I’d owed him under the court order of March 27, 2009.

Unfortunately for them, I have a legible copy of that order. And in one of my ex’s rambling “she a bitch-whore from the pits of hell” screeds, he specified that the 2009 order is the one they mean when they claim that I owed the ex any portion of the income from my business (that they claim the previous judge had declared was a partnership).

I have little idea what I’m doing in court, but I have to say that, with the help of a program I found online (and these years of experience), I’m actually doing better now without an attorney than I ever did with one. How shameful is that?

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