I wont go into the long story of it all but for many months I have been being stalked and harassed by a homeless individual who mistook my generosity for the odd notion that I owed him a living. The harassment reached a point of physical danger and when I moved he found my new home and it continued. I was finally forced to take action by getting a restraining order. This is the saga of that process, in case you readers ever find yourself in a similar situation, because it wasn’t easy and ultimately it’s hard to say if it was even slightly worth it.
It was late January and at the behest of a police officer responding to a call about a disturbance created by the stalker in front of the building where I live, I was advised to get a restraining order. This process begins at the Hall of Justice. I was directed to a room where I was told I could pick up all necessary forms for a temporary restraining order. The room was long and full of people waiting in line to talk to a clerk behind glass. Against the outer wall were several wooden structures with many form-sized compartments, each filled with a form for every imaginable court ordered process in existence. There wasn’t much of any guide or indication as far as where which forms were stored so one literally had to comb each of 200 plus slots to try to find the ones needed. The clerks were behind glass and only approachable by waiting in line and being called to the glass one at a time. I spent about two hours looking for the forms I thought I needed, then I waited in line, got to the clerk and stated my purpose in being there. That’s when the clerk gave me an entire prepared package of all the forms necessary, printed instructional pages, in short everything I needed for a restraining order. Just a simple sign on the wall would have saved me hours of searching, but I learned from this point on, there will be no help from anyone who works here, they will admonish you for the smallest of mistakes like a hole-punched in the wrong spot, and if they do direct you to the next step, the directions will be wrong. I took home the forms and properly filled them out. I was told these forms could be turned in up until 4:30 pm so I returned the next day at 4:00 and was told by security that those offices closed at 4:00.
I returned yet again, this time early in the day. I waited in line, had my completed forms signed by the clerk and was directed to a room number upstairs where I was to turn them in for review and signature by a judge and then a court date would be assigned. I went to the numbered room and it was a courtroom full of official looking people. It really created a certain type of frustration and nervousness as I stood there not knowing what to do and not having anyone available to ask and not getting anything but vague directions at every step of the way. I finally walked in and sat down in the room, surrounded by men in suits who stared at me like I was in the wrong place. Court wasn’t actually in session and a woman sat at a desk busy with paperwork, looking up occasionally at me with that same “what are you doing here?” look. The men in suits were talking about ski trips to Vale Colorado. Finally the woman at the desk asked if anyone was submitting any pre-court date papers. I went up and gave mine to her and she looked them over quickly and rolled her eyes, and said “There has to be actual dates listed in here…. oh I guess there are, let me see if they’ll accept this,” and she left in a huff, returned and told me to come get the order the following day after 1:30 pm.
I returned for the papers the next day and was told to come back in an hour twice and finally another clerk emerged with the papers and explained the next part of the process, serving the defendant. They said I could have anyone over the age of 18 serve the papers for me as I could not do it myself, or I could turn them over to the sheriffs department and have them do it. I told her that the person I was serving was homeless and she assured me that the police had lots of experience serving papers to even the homeless. I suspected I’d have better luck. After that I set about having someone serve him, and of course he was suddenly nowhere to be found. This eventually forced me to file for an extension and a new court date and this time I decided to hand the matter over to the sheriff as was urged by the county clerk as the best possible way of handling it.
I went to city hall the next day and filled out the papers necessary and the person behind the counter said, “We cant serve this without an address,” and I said the defendant was homeless and she laughed and told me they didn’t have the man-power to serve a person without an address. I told her that the county clerks office had assured me repeatedly that they could and she insisted that wasn’t the case. I suggested someone send a memo or something so as to stop wasting people’s time. I was back to the task of figuring a way to serve him myself but by this point I was seriously ready to say fuck it and forget the whole thing. I casually left copies of the papers needing to be served with a friend who was likely to see the defendant and luckily he did and served them and filled out the proof of service form and returned it to me. I was set for the court date.
By the time that date rolled around I’d received a few threatening phone calls from him but hadn’t seen him. He failed to appear in court and the judge granted the restraining order, returning it to me to have served upon him again. It was my understanding that the order was official, and that if he were to bother me again I was to call the police and the order would show up on the computers and the authorities called could serve him if I hadn’t yet had the opportunity, which I hadn’t when the stalker started calling me as many as 25 times a day, threatening me with physical violence and screaming outside of the building where I live so I phoned the police. They asked me for the names on the restraining order and told me that nothing came up on the computer for it but they would send officers over soon. They called me when the officers were outside of the building and I went out front with my copies of the order and the officers took it from me and immediately tried to sift through its contents to find anything that would make it invalid. They questioned me about the original date of the order being so long ago, accusing me of using the order and their services at my convenience. They gingerly commanded me to sit down on the front steps with a slight shove and proceeded to badger me like I was lying about the whole thing, not like a person who has been stalked and harassed by someone for months. Then one of the cops very loudly started asking me if I had been having sex with the defendant, saying “Answer me yes or no, yes or no,” and telling me that a restraining order had to be served by, get this, a sheriff! I tried to explain that the sheriff’s office told me otherwise but was told to shut up while they radioed in another cop to ascertain if the order was indeed valid while telling me they should arrest me too. The defendant denied ever being served and was telling all sorts of lies, which they seemed more interested in than anything I said. They asked me if I had proof of service form, which I did and they asked me to get it. I returned with the form and they verified that the order must be honored. They begrudgingly, and apologetically to him, placed the defendant under arrest assuring him that it would only be a misdemeanor charge and that he’d be released that night then turned back to me with nothing but attitude like I’d fucked up their whole day. I felt like from beginning to end of this whole restraining order process I was treated like someone the system was trying to deter from getting what they wanted. The way the officers responded to the situation in front of the defendant pretty much negated the order. This isn’t protection. I was treated like a criminal, given the sidelong glance of suspicion, and blamed for putting the officers out too close to quitting time or something. It’s a good thing I wasn’t carrying any take out food at the moment. It was all one big lesson, and what did I learn from it? Oh maybe to never rely on or trust the American Judicial System or the Police for a single thing ever again. They aren’t here to help. At least not someone who couldn’t just hire a lawyer to take care of it for them, especially not a gay male trying to protect himself and his home from a threatening individual. Not in these days of the American Patriot.