[Solved] Ex sold a gift I've given to my son

Hi there

I guess you could use the small claims court, but there are charges and no guarantee of success. Did you ask her if she used the money to purchase a replacement? I’m assuming she thought you would be able to track that particilar ipad.

Hopefully the court will rescind the NMO, but don't be surprised if the court ask you to take an undertaking, without admitting guilt. They may also say that if it goes to a contested hearing this could take as long as the NMO would be in place for, and it would remain in place whilst the case progresses. If that happens, you can ask for a cross undertaking, which would apply to you both, but its a suck it and see situation unfortunately, it will all revolve around the calibre of judge on the day.

Best of luck

Completely forget about getting the money back from the iPad, it’s not going to happen and that’s not your biggest problem.

Yours is not the first case I come across where a woman alleges controlling behaviour by being tracked via technology, that may be because these women are being coached ( but don’t say that in court, you can’t prove it ).

The magistrates/judge are likely to pressure you to give an undertaking. You can respond by saying that the mother’s application has no merit and you are happy to agree to a consent order where she withdraws her application and recitals can be added to the order to address whatever concerns the mother has.

Given an undertaking will cast a shadow of doubt that you’ll never get yourself rid of. It may save you time in the short term, but you’ll have to live with it forever. Conversely, if things go full trial, it will take a long time and be incredibly stressful.

If you can get away with a consent order for the application to be withdrawn and issues addressed by recital, life will be easier in the future.

Hi superprouddad!

Thank you for that, it helped a lot!

Excuse me for being so clueless but could you tell me the difference between undertakings and consent order? And is the consent order enforceable? Not that I would ever intend breach it but just for my peace of mind.

Thank you

So you start with your ex accusing you of having done something horrible, and asks the court for a non molestation order to make you stop doing the “thing”.

When you give an undertaking, you’re basically saying you promise you will not do the “thing”, without admiting guilt. If you then do the “thing”, you can be found in contempt of court and be penalised for that.

If your ex agrees to a consent order, she is basically saying, never mind, I don’t want to pursue this anymore, and you promise you won’t do the “thing” and that gets recorded in a recital, which is not enforceable, so if later on you do the “thing” you would not be in contempt of court.

The difficulty here is, a consent order can only be made if both parties agree, and there’s a good chance she won’t agree, but nevertheless, this is still a weapon you can use if the judge pressures you to give an undertaking just to get things over with.

You can say, look judge, this case has no merit, I don’t want to waste the courts time, but please understand that if I give an undertaking there will always be a shadow of doubt over me, I’m an honourable man, a caring loving father, I have great respect for the great job the mother does with respect to our child and it is not my wish to go through lengthy proceedings which are likely to do more harm than good, especially regarding our child’s wellbeing, therefore I suggest that you record in a recital that I will not do the “thing” and this application can be withdrawn by consent.

When I faced a non-mol application I refused to give an undertaking and was ready to go to full trial. I was lucky and she agreed to withdraw.

Now that I’m going through enforcement and she is trying to resurrect the allegations that she withdrew then, instead of saying I gave an undertaking I can say, I never did it, I wanted a full trial and she is the one who withdrew. Big difference.

If she doesn’t agree to withdraw, you have a difficult choice to make. Full proceedings can drag on for a long time and it will be very difficult for you.

At the same time, if later on she decides to use it against you, it will be difficult anyway.

In my case it was very simple, I hadn’t done it, and to my mind the ex was ( and still is ) being controlling and I didn’t trust her to give her an undertaking that I knew would later be used against me.

Best of luck