Tales of the Crazy

by Charles L Cole

  I got a letter in the mail from my auto insurance stating that a new 2015 Ford Focus had been added to my policy. What the hell? I had put a lock on the account to prevent any changes. I immediately called the insurance company to see what had happened. Jess had somehow gotten through the account lock and added her new Focus to my policy. I immediately canceled the policy on her vehicle. The next day I told Ray what had happened, and he told me I had to put her car back on. I also found out that Jess traded in the old Focus and only got the $600 for it.

  His reasoning was that my actions had now caused her to drive illegally in Michigan without insurance, and I would be held liable. The only way this could be stopped was by scheduling a hearing for contempt of court to get her car taken off my policy. The problem with this was that paying him $200 per hour for a half day in court plus all his preparation time would be over $1,100 in legal fees. Ray said that because her only income was interim spousal support, the court would not award me attorney fees—even though her actions were a clear violation of the court order.

  The hearing to finalize the divorce was scheduled for November…only three months away. It made financial sense for Ray to talk with her attorney and get this car-insurance mess taken care of between them. The cost of my insurance rose $45 a month when she added her new car, so Ray was able to negotiate that she paid half of the difference. It was better for me financially to pay an additional $22.50 for three months versus $1,100 in legal fees, but it pissed me off to know she could willfully violate a court order with no repercussions. The reality is that people have to pay to get justice, and often they can’t afford it in these types of cases.

  My NVR security system was up and running with four IP cameras. Some of the cameras also had audio. I could see and hear what was going on at my house using an app on my cell phone. After I showed people the video stream on my phone, some called me paranoid. I simply told them that if they had gone through what I had, they would feel differently. Once they heard the details of what had happened to me, they all agreed it was a good idea. Some were convinced that if someone like me could be arrested and put through all that, it could happen to them, and they went out and got their own NVR systems installed.

  With the divorce proceedings moving along, I went to two different law firms to inquire about filing a civil lawsuit against Washtenaw County for malicious prosecution with the DV case. Both firms were surprised at what had been done to me, but they said that for me to win a civil suit, I had to prove the prosecutor had known I was innocent. They told me the prosecutor most likely knew the charges were bogus, but there was no way I could prove she’d known they were false. In addition, the county could use the argument that, because the court had dismissed the charges, the system had worked.

  So in the end, the authorities and prosecutors can turn your life upside down based on a lie, and by continuing that lie, they can create huge financial harm to you for their own professional gain. They know that, even if you are probably innocent, you have no recourse. Laws are for peasants.

  Sixteen

  The Embalmed Uterus

  When Ray and I filed the motion to get her removed from my house on July 8, I assumed Jess’s rage would cause her to go into full-blown psycho mode. I was right.

  Jess filed an ex parte personal protection order against me on July 13, 2015. An ex parte motion is a hearing or motion granted on the request of and for the benefit of one party only. With this type of motion, a person doesn’t need to be present to get a ruling against him or her, and Jess was hoping to get a ruling without me or my attorney being able to respond. Jess failed to do her legal homework, however. Most jurisdictions require due diligence to contact the other party’s attorney if that person has one, and Jess didn’t do this. She didn’t even tell her own attorney. In addition, the court knew we were already involved in bitter disputes, because I had filed the motion to get her out of my home before her PPO. This PPO raised a huge red flag for the court, and it revealed her vengeful intentions to get back at me.

  Even though her claims with this PPO were false, it was a serious legal matter. If the court granted her this PPO just to cover the court’s butt, it would have lifelong negative consequences for me because it was a criminal charge. Because Jess did this without her attorney’s knowledge, the court sent her attorney the paperwork she had filed. Her attorney faxed the paperwork to Ray on July 30. The crazy never ends with Jess. This was way beyond being malicious; it was pure evil and proved she was willing to make up anything to cause me harm.

  The only good news about her latest stunt was that the court immediately denied the ex parte, and there was a hearing scheduled for this PPO on September 3. This month-long delay showed that the court did not take her crazy accusations seriously, but unfortunately, the court was bound by law to follow through on this and schedule future hearings. Ray told me this would significantly delay the final divorce hearing. Damn. It also meant this would cost me thousands more in legal fees.

  Ray and I reviewed her two-page PPO statement together. It was pure madness and her claims of abuse were utterly false. I asked Ray what the court would think after reading it. He replied that since it was so far-out and the accusations were incredibly wild with no evidence whatsoever, the court would know something was wrong with her, especially because she had submitted this PPO after we’d presented solid evidence of her out-of-control behavior in the motion to get her removed from the home.

  The first page of the PPO statement she filed was as follows:

  I, Jess Cole, reside at **** **** Dr. Ypsilanti MI 48197 with Charles Cole and we do not have children in common. I’ve been married to Charles Cole since November 22, 2000. The abusiveness started as soon as we got married. Controlling me, what to say or do was his major joy. I behaved more less agreeable personality to please Charles, so he doesn’t get upset.

  The abuse mostly took place at the house, in our store, Formal Diva, with all windows and doors closed or in the car, or sometimes humiliating in the public. There were times that we argued and I wanted to leave the house in the truck (which he claimed to be his vehicle), he would push me very hard, so I couldn’t take the truck.

  Breaking things, kicking the door down, throwing my clothes from the upstairs to the downstairs and shouting to get out or leave the house has been normal behavior of his.

  I lost count of the amount of times, he would throw my personal belongings that had to do with work and personal use that he felt it would hurt me.

  Since the divorce procedure started, he became more agitated and sending me threatening email and text messages stating do not come home, it is not your home and threatened to call the police if I returned. He filed a divorce while I was out of the country to take the opportunity to hurt me. He put it on Facebook to humiliate me, I had a serious anxiety attack after my sister saw it on Facebook on March 9, 2015.

  In 2014, I called the police because his abusiveness was out of control. After of all of the evidence the police saw in the house, Charles was arrested for Domestic Violence and went to jail for one night. My anxiety level went up thru the roof knowing that Charles would be very angry after he was released. I had been walking on egg shells for the past 14 years trying to keep peace in the house. Due to his arrest of Domestic Violence, Charles guns were taken away and he was very angry expressing his feeling that it was my fault. Charles and his father intimidated me to not show up for the court process. The case was dismissed.

  A few weeks ago in June of 2015, he hit me again.

  Thursday the 2nd of July, I was trying to go to my girlfriend house, he aggressively approaching me while I was in the truck and he forced his way in to open the hood, and pulled the pieces off the engine and the engine came to stop. The fear of him coming back into the car with his anger, I made a phone to 911. The office told me to stay inside of the car because he has guns.

  Two weeks ago, he got his guns back, he started flashing it to make sure that I saw it that he is carrying his gun around
the house. As the divorce became more intense his agitations have escalated to the point that I no longer feel safe around him.

  He sent message to my phone that if I don’t come home, he would give away my dog, a 2.5 lbs Yorkshire Terrier. We have two dogs, but he only mentioned giving away the one he refers to as “mommy’s little girl”. There were many times that he would break things, and I had to clean up glasses, sometimes I got cut from the little pieces of glass. I was afraid the glasses would cut my dogs paws, he would leave the house after breaking things.

  Ray shook his head in bewilderment after reading in her first paragraph that “Controlling me, what to say or do was his major joy.” No sane person would believe this level of craziness. Ray even said that this one sentence would cast doubt on her entire PPO statement. Her two-page rambling rants were pure insanity, revealing her complete descent to a delusional victim mentality with a need for vengeance. There was no evidence of her accusations with the PPO, because her wild stories of abuse had never happened. I told Ray I had been extremely careful in what I’d done prior to her being kicked out since I knew she would use anything against me. Ray said he knew I hadn’t done anything she claimed on this PPO.

  Over the next few days, I spent an incredible amount of time putting together a document for Ray to prove her accusations false. I had nine attachments as exhibits showing evidence for the court that she was a liar. I even included her own text messages and e-mails she had sent me that directly contradicted her statements. I also called Steve and Katrina and told them about Jess’s attempted PPO. They were very upset at hearing this and told me they would do anything to help me. Ray prepared subpoenas for them so they could take time off work if needed for the case. I also contacted other people, and they were glad to help.

  One woman at church refused, however. She said her husband wouldn’t let her. She even had the nerve to ask me a couple of days later in a Facebook chat message, “Please be sure my name is off any records. With my position at St. Paul **** ministry I have to keep confidentiality. Let me know that you have done this.”

  That really pissed me off. I never replied to her. She had known Jess for years and was fully aware of how many issues Jess had. She knew I was innocent, but she was willing to sit back and let this latest criminal charge ruin my life because of her church position. I thought back to all the times she and her husband had preached about helping others and doing the right thing during their classes, but now all their churchy preaching turned out to be only lip service. Others would stand up for me, regardless of their positions—they knew they had a moral obligation to defend an innocent against false charges.

  Jess’s second attorney withdrew from her case on August 12. It sure seemed like he’d had enough of her nonsense. I suspect that Jess’s filing this PPO behind his back was the last straw for him. There was no way any attorney could ethically defend her statements as true. This was also the one-year anniversary of Mom’s passing. It was a very sad day for me, remembering Mom and all the hell I had been going through with the DV charge, and now the psycho was attempting to slap me with a PPO. I talked with Dad about this, and he said the best thing that could happen for all of us would be for Jess to overdose and die. I agreed completely.

  During this PPO mess, Ray and I also had to deal with Jess’s violation of the court order to return my tax, vehicle, and medical records. She also didn’t return all the store equipment she had removed from the house. On August 18, we reviewed and submitted a contempt of court motion Ray had put together ordering Jess to show cause for why she had not complied with the court order.

  Jess’s third law firm, The Reed Law Group, worked on Jess’s case. One of the attorneys there, Jessica, gave a feeble response to Ray, writing, “Since I have not heard from you regarding a mutually agreed upon date/time for a property exchange, I believe my client is planning to drop everything off at our office for your pickup, as you previously suggested.”

  That was crap. The court had ordered Jess to return everything, not for her to make us go out of our way to get it. Ray replied, “Your client was obligated to return these documents to the house before she left. I would like your runner to bring them to my office since it is your client who did not comply with the court order.”

  On August 25, a runner dropped off some items at Ray’s office, but much was missing. Jess had made copies of my entire medical, job, and vehicle records and returned only the copies. She even copied all my original immunization records from when I was a baby and in the navy. She kept all the originals. I had many color photographs from old projects I had worked on at Ford; now I had only low-quality, black-and-white copies. Jess’s motives were very clear: she was going to intentionally cause problems for me.

  The contempt of court motion was going to proceed. Jessica then had the nerve to ask on Jess’s behalf that she be allowed to keep all the store equipment she had removed from the house. Had Jess followed the court order, not been a vindictive she-devil, and given me back my original documents instead of copies, I would have agreed to let her keep the equipment. Not now. She could go screw herself.

  Ray continued working on our response to Jess’s PPO for the September 3 hearing. We were looking for anything we could use to show her mental instability. I informed Ray that she’d had her Yorkie Sasi designated as an emotional support and medical assist service dog in September 2010. This was great evidence, and I sent Ray a screenshot of Sasi’s entry into the National Service Dog Registry.

  The day of the PPO hearing finally arrived. Jessica brought in the rest of my original documents that Jess had taken and asked Ray if our contempt of court motion could be dropped. The hearing for this contempt motion was scheduled for a later date. I was opposed to this—I was pissed off about all the crap Jess was still pulling—but Ray was able to calm me down.

  He bluntly told me that Jess would be held in contempt, but I would be out over $1,000 in legal fees for him to be in court for another half day. He also said that because I had all my documents back, if we dropped this contempt motion, I would look even better to the court, as I wouldn’t appear to be vindictive. Let Jess be the bad one in the eyes in the court, he suggested. I agreed with his reasoning. This was one of Ray’s great qualities: he knew how to present his clients to the court to get favorable rulings and calm down people like me in the middle of emotionally charged events by explaining the reality of how the courts viewed actions.

  The PPO hearing was brutal. Jessica spoke first on behalf of Jess and tore into me. She described me as a hateful, controlling person who had ruined Jess’s life. It was extremely hard to take all these shots in court. My heart was racing, and I felt nauseated as I listened to all the false accusations being hurled at me. She even accused me of rape.

  Jess had a friend from church with her at the hearing, and the friend gave me a look like I was the spawn of Satan. Jess probably had her convinced that I was pure evil. Jessica continued, hurling out more incredibly false accusations, and then claimed that Jess was in such fear for her life that she had stayed in a safe house from July 26 to August 12. Her being in fear for her life was completely false, and we would be requesting proof of my actions to verify their claims. It was possible that she had stayed in a safe house as part of a calculated strategy to discredit me.

  It’s hard to describe the feelings I had during this. This was a court of law, and here was Jess’s attorney falsely accusing me of truly horrific felonious acts. As an innocent man, I found it deeply troubling, and I knew much of what she said could not be defended with evidence because it had never happened. I was shaking and felt nauseated by the intensity of the savage accusations. I was extremely worried about how I was going to counter all this.

  Ray got up to testify and stumbled with his response a bit at first. The sheer level of craziness and amount of false accusations within Jessica’s ranting had thrown him off; however, he recovered and plainly stated the facts. Ray was hoping to get this PPO thrown out today, but I had a bad feel
ing it was not going to happen.

  The judge spoke up. My heart was racing, and I was extremely worried that the PPO was going to be granted based on the horrific accusations Jessica had made. Ray also had a look of concern on his face. Then the judge said he was requiring an evidentiary hearing brief. Jess was required to put together an exhibit list of evidence to prove what was presented in court was true. All parties involved were allowed to conduct discovery and see evidence the other had.

  Ray leaned over and told me this showed that the court did not believe her; he said this was a great ruling for me. The burden of proof was now on Jess, and all the evidence I had gathered showing her to be a liar would be considered. It was an incredible relief, but there was still a long road ahead to clear my name. The evidentiary hearing was scheduled for November 6, two months from now. This long time also showed that the court did not take her accusations seriously, but it also further delayed the divorce proceedings. Damn.

  On September 10, Jessica sent Ray an amended attachment to the petition for a PPO. Ray sent me an e-mail with this and asked me to review and put together statements refuting the allegations. I read through it, and the amended attachment was six pages of more ranting lunacy with no evidence to support Jess’s claims of abuse. I spent the next two weeks putting together another extremely detailed nine-page document with eleven more multipage exhibits of evidence that clearly showed her accusations were complete fabrications.

  However, Jess’s amendment was brutal to read. We had been married for fifteen years, and Jess knew all my fears, faults, and insecurities. She used all her intimate knowledge of me to fabricate half-truths and vicious false accusations, which she used to portray me as a truly horrible person.

  Ray and I met at his office to review what I had put together and go over Jess’s latest statements. Paragraph eight on Jess’s PPO amendment was one of the more outrageous false accusations: “Starting in 2000, the year the parties were married, Petitioner became pregnant and Respondent was upset with her. Respondent would not take the Petitioner to the hospital when she was spotting, and she ultimately had a miscarriage.”