A woman has secured a protection order against her ex-partner after he allegedly made death threats to her and claimed he would throw acid on her face and “peel your skin off”.
The woman, who made an application at Dublin district emergency domestic violence court, said the man shows up at her home a few days a week and that she is in fear of him.
Another woman, who said her former partner sent her text messages telling her to “remember how dangerous” he is, and threatened to kill her and any man he might see with her, also obtained a protection order.
She told Judge Gerard Furlong that her ex-partner had hit her in the past and put her in hospital.
“He says when he sees me, all he wants to do is shake and kill me,” she said.
The judge, who dealt with the cases separately, described the threats in both as “very serious” and said he had “no hesitation” in granting the orders sought.
The women were among several applicants for ex parte (one side only represented) orders under the Domestic Violence Act at the Dolphin House family court complex in Dublin on Friday.
Another woman secured interim barring orders against two adult sons, aged in their 30s, who she said have been drug addicts for years and use crack cocaine, cannabis and tablets.
She said she had to pay some €3,000 last October to drug dealers, that her home has been raided several times over drugs, and that she and her husband are “living in fear” and no longer want their sons in their home.
“It has really taken a toll on us,” she said.
The woman said one of her sons recently climbed on to the roof of her home to break into her bedroom via the window because she kept the door locked. She is rearing her sons’ children and is very concerned about the impact that witnessing their fathers’ behaviour will have on them, she said.
One son is “a good father in many ways” but when on drugs is “a different person” who “gets very angry and kicks things”. Neither son is making any contribution to the household, she said.
One grandson, whom she has reared since he was a young child, is now an adolescent who has completed his Leaving Cert, is working and “doing very well”, she said.
In another case, a woman attended court with her 19-year-old son against whom she last week obtained an interim barring order. He is a drug addict who is abusive and steals from her when on drugs, she said. When she previously got a protection order against her son, he promised to seek treatment but had not done so.
“I just want to live in peace in my own home,” she told the judge.
Another family member has agreed to have her son stay in his apartment for a time on condition that he go for addiction treatment, she said. Her son had signed up for treatment beginning next week and she would “110 per cent” support him. She is willing to have him back if he completes his treatment and is a “productive member of society”, she added.
The judge said, in the circumstances, he would discharge the interim barring order and replace it with a protection order. The court did not often hear “good news stories” of people who were prepared to take up treatment for addiction issues and he wished the man and his mother the very best.
A divorced man who said his ex-wife has had him followed by a private investigator over months, and that her behaviour is putting himself and their children in fear, also obtained a protection order. He and his ex-wife have joint custody but when the children are with him, they are afraid to go outside his house, he said.
The woman has blocked his driveway on some occasions and he believed she was behind anonymous letters sent to his workplace containing personal information about him.
“She is very much trying to destroy my life,” he said.
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