On Monday,14 October my husband went with me to the Police Station and I talked to the officer on duty. After briefly telling her my story and her reading what I had written, she spoke with another officer (this one male) and it was decided that there was nothing they could do. Since he did not physically touch or threaten me, he did not break any laws. The best advice she could give me was to get a restraining order and if he violates that, then it would be considered a crime. For now, their hands are tied.

Back in the mid-aughts, I had to go through this process of securing a restraining order because an ex-boyfriend would not stop calling me and was leaving threatening messages. I turned off my cell phone, but he just called my landline, which was my business number, so I couldn’t turn it off. It was rather a pain to get the order and when I did, the Maricopa County (he was in Arizona, I in California) Sheriff’s Office did not handle it very well. When they went to serve him, he wasn’t home and they proceeded to leave a note that said something to the effect of – We were here to serve you a restraining order, but since you were not home, we will be back tomorrow to try again. The order was never served because he avoided it, and there is no law that says to have to answer the door and if it is not handed to you directly, it doesn’t go into effect, it doesn’t count. Let’s just say that after a while the cost of continuing to try to get him served was too much and I had to give up. Luckily, though, he never attempted to contact me again. Thank goodness for small favors! Anyway, I don’t think that I’d have the same problem with this situation. It’s really a matter of whether I want to pursue it or not. I am already not walking by or anywhere near his condo, and the only place that he might see me is if he is driving in or out of the neighborhood, and I just happen to be where he is at that exact moment. I also have a slight fear that because his wife is on the HOA board, that I could be kicked out of the complex. I don’t think this is possible, but honestly I don’t know. For now, I am going to not do anything and see how it plays out.

Have any of you found yourself in a similar situation? If any of you have found yourself in a similar situation, I’d love to hear what you did about it.