Intervention Orders

[Aussie JJ]

OK,

I started with my solicitor saying we have to let her escalate and let her think she has an ability to manipulate everything.  He has set up counselling etc and really been ontop of everything.  She started to loose control of the counselling session earlier in the week and now has put in a application for an intervention order against me and included our son on it.  

People who have been through this before, I sort of knew it would be coming the whole having to keep control of everything dynamic that exists and she cant control me any more, what a releif that is.  What are your recommendations, I can shoot a lot of her claims down very easily.  I will have to spend money on it however, really getting annoyed by the legal fees however know that I have to just pay them.  

Any advice from previous experience please chime in.  So far the police wont give me a copy of her statement or any other evidence.  I have the solicitor following that up tomorrow and he will get it all from them.  From the look of it it is very dramatic, the summary is laugh.  100 % projection and one part that is pure made up fantasy.  


AJJ.  

[Matt]

I'm afraid I don't really know what an "intervention order" is, or how the process works.  (I'm in the US.)

It sounds like you're taking the first step, which is to find out exactly what she told the police (or whoever) that led to the order.  If you can prove that each specific accusation is false, that must be a good move.

Here, what helped me fight false accusations was depositions:  I filed a motion to depose my wife - have her questioned by my attorney under oath.  4 hours of questions my attorney and I had carefully prepared - lots of details - to get her whole story on the record.  Then I went through the transcript and highlighted every statement I knew for sure was false - more than 40 false statements and accusations.

The next step was for my attorney to talk to my wife's attorney, and tell her that if we went to trial, her client would be put on the witness stand, and confronted with evidence which would prove she had lied under oath.  (We couldn't prove all 40 of those statements were false, but quite a few.)  My wife's attorney had to advise her client to quit fighting and settle peacefully, because if we went to trial she could be convicted of a crime:  making false statements under oath.

In your case, I don't know if depositions are an option - your solicitor should know.  I think it's important not just to get the intervention order dropped, but also to use this as an opportunity to prove that your ex is making false accusations in court - that must be illegal in every country I think.

[ForeverDad]

She started to loose control of the counseling session earlier in the week and now has put in a application for an intervention order against me and included our son on it.

This is the real purpose behind her application, by including your son she's really trying to block your parenting.  That simply cannot be allowed to go uncontested.  I'm sure your solicitor or attorney knows that it is a top priority if not The Top Priority.

If this was a brand new case and none of the officials and experts were familiar with the case then you would likely face supervised visitation until some evaluations and assessments could be made and reported to court.  (That happened to me and my county's CPS (Children's Protective Services) did a phone interview and then appeared in court to state their office had "no concerns" about me.  It was all done rather quickly, at the first hearing, so I was never subjected to supervised visitation.  Sadly, CPS was asked to investigate me and not "us", so they never ventured to voice an opinion of my newly separated stbEx who had a pending case in another court for threatening me.)

Since this case has been ongoing for a while you should be able to appear in court - perhaps not seeing your son until then unless the pending action states otherwise? - with various professional who can confidently state that there is no indication of any issue with you or your parenting.

Ignoring whether your documentation and testimonies may sway the court to view your favorably... .  Be aware that court may still allow her an intervention order to keep you away from her since they want to avoid risks of future incidents - and if that happens then you can step in and state you want a reciprocal order against her so it applies equally to both of you, but you should get son excluded from the order and thus still get time with your child.  If that happens then you will probably be unable to do exchanges at either of your homes but instead do it in neutral areas such as a police station, sheriff's office or similar location.

What may help your case is for your attorney to voice the policy of most courts, to handle adult behaviors (between the parents) as separate from parenting behaviors (the parenting and time with the children).  As I mentioned above, my ex and I had various protection orders against each other in the first year or so of our separation/divorce but somehow I managed to keep our preschooler out of them.  By doing so I was able to keep from looking like a bad father who was restricted from parenting or who needed supervision.  On the other hand, they scrutinized me more and ignored her so for a long time her poor parenting behaviors were not addressed.