A TRUE STORY OF A FRUM JEWISH FATHER’S EXPERIENCES DURING HIS DIVORCE PROCESS:
“My wife and I had an argument. During the course of the argument she locked herself in her bedroom and I kicked the door open. No one was touched, no threats were made, the children were not present…She called the police, I was arrested for criminal mischief…This is the first and only time I have been arrested or charged with a crime…She filed a Family Offense petition against me and requested an order of protection against me for herself and on behalf of our children. The order was granted ex parte. A full court hearing was scheduled for a few days later. I was unable to attend due to being hospitalized for depression… No adjournment was scheduled. At that time I had no idea of my legal rights because I was without legal counsel for a couple of more months…
For almost four months I was permitted no contact with my children…I have since discovered that my son suffered a mental breakdown during those months due to the trauma of being separated from me. He suffers from depression…He and I are extremely close…I have been permitted a 50 minute supervised visit on the average of once every two weeks…Consider the trauma my children have and are going through at this formative age.
Consider the endless dollars spent on attorneys, psychologists, court reporters, judges, etc etc and there is no end in sight!…And this is all being done merely to cater to the whim of one angry, vindictive woman…There are no black eyes, no broken noses, no actual abuse or violence of any kind…We have a system of secret tribunals, catering to crazy women, abusing children, harassing men and accountable to no one. And supported of course by our taxes…Stalin would have been impressed…
The real purpose of family court is not to prevent wife beating, it is to destroy the traditional patriarchal family…What my ex-wife is doing is simply what she should be doing from the point of view of a modern, secular Western woman. Of course, from the point of view of Orthodox Judaism, this is a horrific sin, as well as doing untold damage to our children. With no permission from a rav or Bais din, she has evicted me from my home and separated me from my children. However she doesn’t care.”