Tonia obviously had some redirect examination since she’d not asked about Mike previously. I don’t show that we took any recess between Rose’s cross-examination and Tonia’s redirect-examination, so I’m guessing if Tonia really didn’t know about Mike, she was taking a big risk asking questions she didn’t know the answers to.
REDIRECT-EXAMINATION BY MS TORQUATO
Q. What does Mike do for a living? I actually just forgot to ask about… So what does he do for a living?
A. He’s a team leader for Ford Motor Company.
Q. And how long have you known Mike?
A. I’ve known him since second grade, so most of my life.
Q. And how long have the children known him?
A. They recently met him last summer.
Q. And you were asked if you were requesting this relocation because of Mike; do you recall that?
A. Yes, I recall that.
Q. Is it your intent to move in with Mike?
A. No.
At this point I’m really not sure what her intent was but at the next hearing two-and-a-half years later she made it very clear that she planned to move in with Mike. Although at that point she had married him.
Q. On this two-year plan that you’ve got in your head of moving out with — or, moving out of your sister’s place, is that two-year plan so you can marry Mike and move in with him?
A. We haven’t discussed those things. I don’t know if I ever want to get remarried honestly.
As you’ll learn later, she obviously decided that getting remarried was what she wanted. I have no idea how that marriage is going, but I sincerely hope it’s going well for the sake of my kids. However, I have to wonder. Mike had never been married, to my knowledge, and does not have any children. Thus, to have a wife and three kids move into his house must have been a huge adjustment. While the kids had stayed there in the past and he had spent time with them, living with them is a very different thing.
Q. What’s your primary motivation for moving back to Michigan?
A. It’s been the same for years, and it’s what I’ve asked for ten years ago, to help us, to save us was to move.
Q. Why?
A. My family is there. We have help there. We have had help there for years. They can’t come anymore.
Rose then had some recross-examination questions, which Tonia objected to. Rose withdrew the question but then asked it anyway. This was the heart of the inconsistency of claiming I was mentally ill and unfit to have the kids and agreeing to allow me to have them for a significant time. She then withdrew the questions again, saying it was rhetorical anyway.
RECROSS-EXAMINATION BY MS. KAUFFMAN:
Q. If Mr. Mockensturm is as mentally ill —
MS. TORQUATO: Your Honor, I’m going to object if her questions don’t center around my Redirect.
MS. KAUFFMAN: I’ll withdraw that. No, because here’s the question.
BY MS. KAUFFMAN:
Q. If he’s as mentally ill as you believe him to be, how do you expect — and if he can’t care for the children, as you believe he can’t, and you’re in Michigan, he’s going to have significant time with the children, and when you first proposed relocation January 3rd, your proposal was that he would have Christmas break, the entire Christmas break, he would have — when she proposed this in January. She proposed he would have Thanksgiving break for the entire break. He would have Christmas break for the entire break. He would have spring break for the entire break. He could also travel to Michigan whenever he wanted, and you would share summer break on a two-week on, two-week off arrangement.
A. That was an agreement —
MS. TORQUATO: Wait a second. I still have an objection there, Your Honor, and she already asked — I already asked these questions, and she answered them. She answered the questions. She answered that she wanted to ease into a graduated schedule to see how he does, to go into these chunks of time.
MS. KAUFFMAN: That’s not what I’m seeing here on what she’s filed.
THE COURT: I’ll overrule the objection.
MS. TORQUATO: Well, my objection — that wasn’t my objection.
THE COURT: Well, I don’t know what it is. What is it?
MS. TORQUATO: My original objection was that she was asking questions that were not based upon my Redirect, and that was my original objection, and that never got ruled on. She just kept talking.
MS. KAUFFMAN: Your Redirect included what she was proposing in terms of going to Michigan.
MS. TORQUATO: No, that was my Direct, and then you Crossed-Examined her, and then I had Redirect, and then you –
MS. KAUFFMAN: I’ll withdraw that question. It’s rhetorical.
MS. TORQUATO: I have nothing further.
THE COURT: Do you have any more questions?
MS. KAUFFMAN: No.
THE COURT: Does Mike have a criminal record, since no one is asking that?
MS. MOCKENSTURM: No, he does not.
THE COURT: Do you know that for sure?
MS. MOCKENSTURM: Yes, I do. Mike’s an ex-police officer.
THE COURT: That doesn’t mean he doesn’t have a criminal record.
MS. MOCKENSTURM: He does not have one. I can get you that information if you’d like it.
THE COURT: Okay. Thank you. You may stand down.
I love this last bit where Judge Ruest asked Rita if Mike had a criminal record, and Rita said she was sure he did not because he was an ex-police officer, and then Judge Ruest says, “That doesn’t mean he doesn’t have a criminal record.” Mike’s former career as a police officer suggests a lot about what likely happened in later situations. While I have no idea how long Mike was a police officer, he had knowledge of police procedures and the police’s power over people’s lives. I suspect that Rita would call Mike and ask about calling the police whenever something happened that might be a PFA violation. I also guess that Mike spoke with the Ferguson Township Police off the record and told them I was a terrible person tormenting Rita. He probably thought I was since the only information he was getting was from Rita. Unfortunately, he probably had no idea it was simply Rita’s paranoia that was torturing her. I had nothing to do with it.
I have no idea if she ever submitted a background check on Mike, but by the time she finally did move to Michigan, it was a moot point.
My dad was the next witness, and there wasn’t much interesting about his testimony. He testified that he lived in Everett in the summer and Florida in the winter and would be willing to visit the kids regularly and help with them when he was in Pennsylvania. Tonia tried to imply that he was actually in Michigan with his girlfriend most of the summer, but he said, truthfully, that that wasn’t true. His girlfriend spent a lot of time in Michigan, but he did not. Tonia also asked him about my depression issues trying to make them sound much worse than they were. He described that it was more anxiety than depression from what he saw.
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