My ex and his mom are threatening my kids and I

Dear Mrs Macaulay, 

I have been living with my common-law husband for over 15 years and we have two children together. He decided to move out and live with another woman; however, he and his mother (who doesn’t live on the premises) are threatening me, telling me to move out of the house with my children or they will become violent. I have been living there and paying all the bills while supporting the children all by myself for over eight years. I would like to know what are my rights and what steps I need to take to prevent me and children becoming homeless.

This situation is very serious. You must go to the police and make a report about their threats to become violent against you if you and your children do not move out of the house, and on the same day you must go to the Family Court of your parish and make an application under the Domestic Violence Act for protection, occupation and ancillary orders permitting you to use all the furniture and appliances in the home. These are the first and immediate actions you should take as they are for your protection and that of your children. Then you must also, which you should have done as soon as he stopped providing for the children, apply for maintenance for the children. In addition, you should also apply for a declaration that you and he had lived in a common-law union for over five years and so you may apply for your legal share in the home premises and any and all of his assets. I strongly suggest that you obtain the services of a lawyer to prepare all the legal applications you should make and without delay, because your partner and his mother mean to harm you and your children and they should not be allowed to get away with their illegal behaviours.

I have suggested that you make a report to the police who, upon your report, should seek out your ex and his mother and take action against them or at least warn them to desist from threatening you. They must know that the law has its eyes on them if anything happens to you or either of your children. Or, you can go to the parish court in your parish dealing with criminal matters and take out a summons against them for their threats.

I have also suggested that you apply on the same day under the Domestic Violence Act for the orders I have stated above, because the orders were put in the Act to make sure that when a woman finds herself in circumstances of threatened or actual violence against her and her children, that she can go to the Family Court and get legal protection as quickly as possible. In this case, if your partner and/or his mother breaks the protection orders made, the police can arrest them without a warrant and take them before the court where if they cannot convince the judge that they did not mean any harm, the heavy arm of the law would descend on them.

Protection orders will restrain them from coming within certain distances of you and the children wherever you are, and from entering the premises or from molesting you and the children, which means that they cannot watch you all, beset the household, your place of work or education, waylay any of you, or make persistent phone calls, or use abusive language to any of you, or behave in any other manner towards you and/or the children which is of such nature or degree to cause you or the children annoyance, or which results in ill-treatment of you and/or the children. So you see, they can be restrained from doing any of these to you and/or your children.

Then the occupation order is for you and your children to have the legal right to remain and occupy the home premises and your ex-spouse and his mother by this order are excluded from the premises, while you and your children can continue to occupy it for the period the judge decides. You should also apply for ancillary orders so that you and your children are entitled to use all or any of the furniture, household appliances and household effects of your household premises to which the occupation order relates, and for the same period as the occupation order itself. The court must be informed that you have or are soon filing an application under the Property (Rights of Spouses) Act after you application for a declaration that you and the father of your children had been in a common-law relationship for over five years, even though as you left things for eight years, you may have jeopardised the success of your claim.

You should get a lawyer, then you can give them more facts and they can better advise you about your chances regarding your claim to share as a spouse. But you as an ex-spouse are entitled to make all the other applications I have mentioned, without question.

Please also at the time you make those applications I have stated above, also make the maintenance application for you children. Remember that since it is the three of you, all the household expenses, including utility charges, food for the household, cost of cleaning materials, etc, should be added and the total is what you would claim for each child and make sure that you have them itemised and totalled. And in addition, you should add the claim for one-half educational, medical, dental and optical expenses.

If you choose to go on your own to the Family Court, let the clerk assist you to prepare these applications. Please make a list of each and all of the applications I have suggested that you must proceed with in order to protect yourself and your children and ultimately obtain your legal share as a former spouse, if possible. By having the list you can make sure that all of them are actually done because believe me, they must all be done.

You must act immediately as you have delayed already to make these applications as you say that you and your children were living at the home and you have been supporting the children and paying the bills for the last eight years. This delay does not affect your right to apply under the Domestic Violence Act and for maintenance of your children.

I wish you and your children the very best and I hope that I have clarified the position for you.

Margarette May Macaulay is an attorney-at-law, Supreme Court mediator, notary public, and women’s and children’s rights advocate. Send questions via e-mail to allwoman@jamaicaobserver.com; or write to All Woman, 40-42 1/2 Beechwood Avenue, Kingston 5. All responses are published. Mrs Macaulay cannot provide personal responses.

DISCLAIMER:

The contents of this article are for informational purposes only, and must not be relied upon as an alternative to legal advice from your own attorney.