Legal Question in Criminal Law in New York

I have been dealing with a man who has been harassing me for around 7 months now. I have only met him once and there was no physical contact whatsoever, just an exchange of numbers. He texted me a few times and I would always decline his invites. The texts stopped for a few weeks and then i began to receive threatening facebook messages.

I asked him to leave me alone on numerous occasions but then he would text me, sometimes up 50 times in the span of a few hours. After asking him to leave me alone again and not getting results, I told him that I would involve the police in the matter. This however had the opposite effect and he increased his attempts to contact me. I changed my phone number, blocked any and all personal information about myself possible and moved about 5 hours away from where he lived.

He then began contacting my friends and family as well as me, with threats and delusions. Finally, i did contact my local police department and filed an incident report, and gave them a stack of messages he had sent me. I also contacted the police in his hometown, but with little response. Most of the time it was brushed off because the contact was done electronically, but one officer from his hometown did actually go over to his residence and asked him to leave me and everyone else he had been bothering alone. However, this did not work either and the messages began again two days later. I advised my friends and family to file complaints if there was an issue, and my cousin did so.

It had been a few weeks until just yesterday he called my husbands phone. We went to the local police again, but since the call, along with the voicemails and following texts were no threatening, they sent us home with no real help.

Now that you have an idea of the situation i was hoping you could help me decide on what action i should take to get this to stop. I'm not sure if i can get an order of protection since there hasn't been an arrest made, and this isn't a family court issue. Is there a way to petition for an HRO in New York? If not what other actions can I take? I don't want to keep changing my number, and the embarassment of having to tell friends and family about this situation is awful.

I also have a 3 year old daughter, and should this guy show up on my doorstep I wouldn't know what to do. I also have reason to believe that he is trying to take the steps to move closer to me as he has family about an hour away from my residence.

I hope this explanation isn't too long! But i felt it necessary to give all the information I could to help you. Also, he lives in monroe county and i now live in westchester county. I have saved emails and text messages and phone records as well as my friends.

Thanks so much!


Asked on 1/11/11, 7:42 am

1 Answer from Attorneys
Joel Salinger Law Office of Joel R. Salinger

You have several choices but non are perfect.

First, based upon a change in the law you can file in Family Court for an Order of Protection. Saying that, you will have to word your petition very carefully and you should consider getting an attorney who concentrates in family and criminal law to assist you in writing the petition.

Second, you can contact the District Attorney's office directly for assistance. They might look at the totality of the circumstances in deciding to file charges against this person. Again, I recommend getting an attorney to assist you in putting together a presentation for the D.A.'s office or police.

Lastly, you can consider finding an attorney who concentrates in tort law to file a civil action for harassment and possibly for Intentional Infliction of Emotional Distress. Once these are filed, you can request a temporary restraining order against this person. The only problem with this choice of action is it is going to be expensive. No attorney will take this case on a contingent fee basis, therefore you will have to pay for the litigation out of pocket and that can get very pricey.

If you would like a free consultation, you can contact my office at 516.746.4747 or [email protected].

Joel R. Salinger

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Answered on 1/16/11, 11:44 am


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