What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? CA
In brief, my husband obtained a temporary restraining order against his brother with the hearing in mid-October.
The background: the respondent has a long (over 30 years) history of mental illness. He was living (without paying rent nor utilities) in their parents house while working on his latest college degree. Their mother put the deed in the name of the family trust under my husband's name before she passed away. Since then, my husband has allowed him to reside there (we live about ten miles away). Last year he had started an eviction order against him due to some damage done to the house, but the brother finally took care of it and my husband stopped the order.
Last month, my husband went to the house to do the maintenance (gardening, checking on the condition of the house, etc) that he usually has been doing on a weekly basis. His brother admitted he had lost his job (a part time job teaching). A short time later, my husband was trying to finish up and his brother jumped him, shoving him in the chest, cursing at him. My brother finally was able to take control of him (he weighs a lot less but is in healthy shape, as opposed to his brother). He finally was able to grab his lunch box (after retrieving the contents after the brother threw it in a continuance of his fit of rage) and drove home. He had a bruise on his chest and had skimmed knuckles from being knocked on the concrete.
He started another eviction notice (the 30 days will be up later this week). The brother has since sent two emails -- one saying that he wants my husband to talk to his therapist, and the second one just last weekend was entitled "This isn't over" and saying that it's my husband who is in the wrong (and certainly no apologies for what he did or even to acknowledge that my brother has provided room and board ever since their mother's passing).
He was concerned about his brother's lack of impulse control so we went to court and file for the restraining order. The judge granted the temporary one without even meeting with my husband. We paid a process server to take care of the service (instead of waiting on the sheriff's office, which the clerk said might not happen until the week of the hearing).
We do have many questions.
We would like to obtain his police record. He has gotten into trouble for deliberately hitting a woman's car (my brother knows he had to perform community service as a result -- cleaning up the sides of freeways), and he had hit a motorcyclist on a freeway and then took off. Fortunately another driver witnessed it and drove after him, and he was detained by the police. We don't know the upshot of that, but we're guessing he somehow got the services of one of those "we'll fight your DUI,etc." firms to plea down the charges.
And the most egregious: About 12 years ago, he jumped on top of his mother, held her down and started punching her. She had to go to the ER and somehow the police got involved. He was put in a halfway house on a 5150 hold. Unfortunately his father had been enabling his behavior for years and was probably thinking he'll lose his son to suicide if he didn't allow him back into the house, so he did (against the wishes of his wife). He passed away within a year or two of that incident. We don't know if police charges were actually brought against my brother-in-law. But I would imagine this would be on the record that they responded.
Also, when I was nine months pregnant, 18 years ago, the brother was in the house (at that time, he didn't have his own Internet at his parents' house so he would use our computer) and got mouthy with my husband. My husband told him to leave, but he refused to and even threatened him. When my husband called the police, he left right away.
I will be writing "witness statements" about that last incident, about my mother-in-law's injuries (she took off her shirt and the bruises covered from the bottom of her collarbone to her belly button -- it was that bad), and about his injuries (the bruise wasn't that big -- he's guessing his brother was trying not to leave any signs of the attack; I had suggested at that time, that I take a photo of his chest and his hands, but he decided against that but is now regretting).
If we were able to get the police records of his arrests and any other police reports, it would be a slam dunk for getting the permanent r.o. This is public info. There are those sites that you can pay to obtain these record, but my husband doesn't feel he can trust them. Most likely he can hire a lawyer to get a subpoena, but he had been burned twice before with lawyers in a workers comp case and a civil case (the first lawyer had violated the state bar ethics code and the second was churning his account). Considering the police record should be public knowledge, would we be able to go in person and sign a form and be able to obtain at least the records for our county (he lived for a brief time in another county -- one of the above incidents occurred there) to add to the case? Somewhere I read that you can go to the county clerk, but when I tried looking up on the county website, I seemed to run into a dead end or just not be able to figure out where the info is.
Thanks in advance for reading this. I know it's long.
In brief, my husband obtained a temporary restraining order against his brother with the hearing in mid-October.
The background: the respondent has a long (over 30 years) history of mental illness. He was living (without paying rent nor utilities) in their parents house while working on his latest college degree. Their mother put the deed in the name of the family trust under my husband's name before she passed away. Since then, my husband has allowed him to reside there (we live about ten miles away). Last year he had started an eviction order against him due to some damage done to the house, but the brother finally took care of it and my husband stopped the order.
Last month, my husband went to the house to do the maintenance (gardening, checking on the condition of the house, etc) that he usually has been doing on a weekly basis. His brother admitted he had lost his job (a part time job teaching). A short time later, my husband was trying to finish up and his brother jumped him, shoving him in the chest, cursing at him. My brother finally was able to take control of him (he weighs a lot less but is in healthy shape, as opposed to his brother). He finally was able to grab his lunch box (after retrieving the contents after the brother threw it in a continuance of his fit of rage) and drove home. He had a bruise on his chest and had skimmed knuckles from being knocked on the concrete.
He started another eviction notice (the 30 days will be up later this week). The brother has since sent two emails -- one saying that he wants my husband to talk to his therapist, and the second one just last weekend was entitled "This isn't over" and saying that it's my husband who is in the wrong (and certainly no apologies for what he did or even to acknowledge that my brother has provided room and board ever since their mother's passing).
He was concerned about his brother's lack of impulse control so we went to court and file for the restraining order. The judge granted the temporary one without even meeting with my husband. We paid a process server to take care of the service (instead of waiting on the sheriff's office, which the clerk said might not happen until the week of the hearing).
We do have many questions.
We would like to obtain his police record. He has gotten into trouble for deliberately hitting a woman's car (my brother knows he had to perform community service as a result -- cleaning up the sides of freeways), and he had hit a motorcyclist on a freeway and then took off. Fortunately another driver witnessed it and drove after him, and he was detained by the police. We don't know the upshot of that, but we're guessing he somehow got the services of one of those "we'll fight your DUI,etc." firms to plea down the charges.
And the most egregious: About 12 years ago, he jumped on top of his mother, held her down and started punching her. She had to go to the ER and somehow the police got involved. He was put in a halfway house on a 5150 hold. Unfortunately his father had been enabling his behavior for years and was probably thinking he'll lose his son to suicide if he didn't allow him back into the house, so he did (against the wishes of his wife). He passed away within a year or two of that incident. We don't know if police charges were actually brought against my brother-in-law. But I would imagine this would be on the record that they responded.
Also, when I was nine months pregnant, 18 years ago, the brother was in the house (at that time, he didn't have his own Internet at his parents' house so he would use our computer) and got mouthy with my husband. My husband told him to leave, but he refused to and even threatened him. When my husband called the police, he left right away.
I will be writing "witness statements" about that last incident, about my mother-in-law's injuries (she took off her shirt and the bruises covered from the bottom of her collarbone to her belly button -- it was that bad), and about his injuries (the bruise wasn't that big -- he's guessing his brother was trying not to leave any signs of the attack; I had suggested at that time, that I take a photo of his chest and his hands, but he decided against that but is now regretting).
If we were able to get the police records of his arrests and any other police reports, it would be a slam dunk for getting the permanent r.o. This is public info. There are those sites that you can pay to obtain these record, but my husband doesn't feel he can trust them. Most likely he can hire a lawyer to get a subpoena, but he had been burned twice before with lawyers in a workers comp case and a civil case (the first lawyer had violated the state bar ethics code and the second was churning his account). Considering the police record should be public knowledge, would we be able to go in person and sign a form and be able to obtain at least the records for our county (he lived for a brief time in another county -- one of the above incidents occurred there) to add to the case? Somewhere I read that you can go to the county clerk, but when I tried looking up on the county website, I seemed to run into a dead end or just not be able to figure out where the info is.
Thanks in advance for reading this. I know it's long.
