This began in 2014 and roughly speaking ended in 2018.
**EDIT: The legalese is a bit complicated, but that’s why we pay lawyers.**
***** TL/DR: my ex stole my dog with dog with a restraining order and the others involved got burned alive for it*****
Some four years ago I left my ex, out of the blue. I just vanished and moved out of the area. She was a diagnosed sociopath, but given what follows that much will become obvious. I moved to another city with just my dog and an inch thick stack of notes she’d kept on me over the previous four years. She was a grad student and a week after I left Student Legal Services emailed me threatening suit over my dog which they claimed I stole. This was odd because it’s outside of their State Bar plan, but the ex could be persuasive and they probably just sent the email to shut her up.
I lawyered up, sent them proof of ownership and told them to beat it. A few weeks after that she drove an hour and a half and showed up at my job with a date. I was working at a bar at the time, and everyone there knew the both of us. I got fired for that - they knew what was going on and that she’d be back.
I moved back to where I left needing a job. She found me immediately, and when I rebuffed her advances she filed a small claims suit for my dog followed by a restraining order. A sheriff’s deputy took my dog upon serving me with the restraining order. My dog license, everything I had didn’t mean jack. I’d have to sue to get my dog back.
She took the dog having used the small claims filing as evidence of ownership. That filing prevented me from filing separate action myself under Rule 57. She had filed the small claims specifically to block me from going to court to prove ownership, and filed continuances on it til after the restraining order was litigated. She never intended to argue over the dog.
When I showed up to court, I recognized her date. Her date at the bar months earlier was a married legal aid attorney. State Bar allows legal aids to practice law (i.e. - make certain filings, etc) but forbids them from being IN court because they work for free. In other words they can bankrupt you.
He hit me with a sledgehammer, making the situation all the more obvious to our (former divorce attorney) Judge. The guy used a legal loophole to steal my dog, as a favor to his girlfriend/my ex, and after being ordered to litigate ownership in small claims waited out the 10 day statute of limitations on the restraining order and dropped the small claims action. She took my dog claiming ownership without ever litigating ownership. Domestic Violence court can grant possession of property, but CANNOT determine ownership. There’s good reason for this but obviously it’s a slippery slope.
With the small claims now off the table, I filed a suit myself under Rule 57 (declaratory judgment). If I win, Green Eyes McBlowjob goes to jail for two felonies and three misdemeanors. That’s no joke, a sheriff’s investigator was watching the case like a hawk. Just like when my dog was taken, my paperwork didn’t mean diddly. I would have to win my lawsuit before the DA would file criminal charges.
On top, I’d be due treble damages - which eventually amounted to upwards of $90,000 and would probably be billed to the university seeing as they weren’t allowed in court to begin with. Blowjob was apt to make a stink to the man’s wife not to mention the State Bar. The Judge was aware of all this, even subtly acknowledged it into the court recorder several times.
After papers were filed, the lawyer dropped her as a client to help her evade service. Papers had to be refiled and we had to chase her down. When she got served, he resumed representation.
“If you lose, I’ll tell.”
The same Judge as before yanked my suit off of another Judge’s docket and stuck it on his calendar (which is forbidden by Judicial Standards - you’ll lose your seat on the bench for that), and watched me and this guy beat the holy hell out of each other for over a year and a half like a couple rock em sock em robots. He filed motion after motion, memorandum after memorandum to avoid trial and tire me out. Everything he filed - for free mind you - cost me $1000-$1500 per to respond to. While the Judge watched. Voyeuristically. Harder than a diamond at sub zero. My feeling at the time was, “No one will listen to ME, hell I’m a domestic abuser. And who's Captain Dipshit gonna tell? What’s he gonna tell them?”
We ended up the longest pet custody suit on record, in the entire country. In number two the defendant was a billionaire heiress.
When the guy realized no one was going to squeal on him, he was a complete asshole. It became increasingly and embarrassingly obvious to everyone that this was a big dick contest.
I made it to trial $200 from bankruptcy. The Judge laughs at the lawyer, because he’d claimed both that my dog was a gift and the subject of a contract (stating that I’d traded her for some shirts, having just spent enough on litigation to buy a new car), which “you do realize concedes his ownership and we can all just go home.”
The Judge then asked me a series of questions that amounted to “How much money ya got?” He knew that Hardon Esquire would appeal the decision, and wanted to know if I could afford to fight it. Not that he cared, he just didn’t want his decision overturned. When he figured out I was broke, he stuck Blowjob on the stand and called trial without cross examination. So the Order - written by her boyfriend/attorney - listed every claim I’d made and submitted tangible evidence to prove as being the exact opposite. In other words the Findings of Fact were the exact opposite of what was attached as evidence. Total mindfuck.
My attorney never knew about the relationship. I couldn’t tell him because he’d be bound to tell (Rule 8.3) and it would endanger his career because it would amount to throwing a law school (who didn’t even know the legal aid was in court) under the bus. God bless him, he just thought the other attorney was a moron, which is not untrue.
After the Order was signed, I emailed the Judge with the other lawyer cc’d, and matter of factly explained the situation, that there was a witness willing to go on record that the two had been dating, and that I was about to bury everyone.
The Judge flipped switch, and retired before the story made the news. I kept out the juiciest bit because I didn’t want the man’s wife to hear about it on TV with 2 million other people. The State Bar surprisingly investigated it until it made the news. Two days after air, they abruptly ended the investigation.
I couldn’t tell the man’s wife directly because of the restraining order with the ex. To save his own hide, Hardon Esquire would argue that I’d violated it, and the Judge would play along just to keep me from making trouble.
Turned out we ended up in the textbook. They teach us in every family law class in the state now. I didn’t need the State Bar - the story alone ruined the man’s career. Virtually every lawyer already knew who we were. He will never get another job outside of that legal aid position. If (when, rather) he loses that job, he will never work in law again. The university owns him like an Andy Dufresne - a good, talented employee who works for dirt cheap, forever - a six figure lawyer making 38 grand. Good deal.
The news story made me something of a local celebrity. I was the Tiananmen Square guy who took on a law school over his dog.
I waited until the restraining order expired - three years all told. I put a lot of thought into handling it calmly and tactfully, and when the Order expired I handed a two inch thick manila envelope to the university Provost and to the man’s wife.
The contents of that envelope would give a divorce attorney a migraine. It amounts to the house in the divorce, his law license and therefore his job, and one hell of a judgment for Alienation of Affection against the ex. His wife owns him until the day Jesus takes him home.
So in the cast we have me, Judge Ratched, Engelbert HardDick, The Holes, and Mrs. HardDick. Like I said you be the Judge, far as who can squeeze a pair of balls the hardest.
***** TL/DR: my ex stole my dog with dog with a restraining order and the others involved got burned alive for it*****