Content Includes Descriptions of Relationship Abuse
DRAFT
After my DVRO request was denied by Judge Howard and following my suicide attempt on October 24, 2021, as I was staying at a hotel, I became excited beyond belief at the prospect of picking up the bunnies from the marital home! I had my cat Lumi and was planning on picking up the bunnies on October 31, 2021. I hadn’t seen them in two and half weeks!
On the following dates, I sent text messages and an email to Mr. Roberts confirming my plans, believing that three days was sufficient notice for me to come to the marital home and take them off of his hands. I provided 90% of their care on a daily basis, and in my absence, texted Mr. Roberts with daily care instructions.
Text messages sent:
10/28/21, 2:48 p.m. re: picking up the bunnies
10/28/21, 5:21 p.m. re: picking up the bunnies
10/30/21, 8:55 a.m. re: picking up the bunnies
10/31/21, 3:37 p.m. re: picking up the bunnies
Email sent:
“10/30/21, 11:16 p.m.
INSTRUCTIONS: Either unlock the front door remotely and disarm the alarm if you’re not home so I can collect the below items, or have my things from this list ready for me to pick up out front. The rabbits and their supplies are the priority.
As stated in my last text message to you, I can call Martinez PD for a civil standby, and a locksmith to let me in, if necessary.
RABBITS & SUPPLIES INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE FOLLOWING:
1. Rabbits
2. Water bottles
3. Water bowls
4. Pellets
5. Hay
6. Oats groats
7. Treats
8. First Aid Supplies
9. Doll beds
10. Tunnels
11. Nail clippers
12. Vinyl runners
13. Blankets
14. Grass hideaway
15. Litter boxes
16. Kitty Litter
17. Scrub brush
This will require multiple trips to the house due to my physical limitations.”
<End of Email>
Mr. Roberts did not respond to any of my communications about picking up the rabbits. He did, however, leave two very hostile, accusatory, defensive, and resentful letters at the house on the front door for me. Additionally, he had left the house, and the front door had a new lock on it.
In spite of my having the legal right to be in the marital home, in one of the letters, Mr. Roberts stated, as follows:
“Do NOT attempt to enter my house. You moved out of my personal home in Martinez, California that I solely acquired prior to our marriage in 2018 when you vacated it when you separated from me on July 27, 2021 and moved into a hotel therefore giving you no legal right to enter. You then had me served with a DVRO on August 20, 2021. Since the courts denied your DVRO at the hearing on October 13, 2021, I consider you a squatter during those eight weeks and not maintaining a residence at my home. Any attempt to enter my house will be treated as breaking and entering. This applies to you or anyone you bring, including a locksmith. I will consider them to be accomplices and state same to authorities.
When I returned to my home on October 13, 2021, where you had been staying (due to the DVRO) for eight weeks, I found all six animals to be without water, without food, living in squalor, and with litterboxes that obviously hadn’t been cleaned in weeks. I am caring for the animals as they should be cared for. I provide them with food and water daily, regularly clean their litterboxes, and play with them daily. I cannot in good conscience, allow you to move them into a small hotel room with the lack of daily care that you have demonstrated. That would be tantamount to animal cruelty which I will not be a party to. If you do enter and take the animals without my permission, I will resort to notifying the authorities of your inability to properly care for the animals. Furthermore, your email dated October 30, 2021 at 11:17 PM is insufficient notice even if I was to allow you to pick up the animals.”
Reality check:
While the rabbits were in my care in the marital home, I had them living in large habitats, complete with tunnels, chew huts, and Ikea doll beds which they slept on. I never abused any of my animals, and if any part of his claims were true, certainly Mr. Roberts would have reported it to Animal Services in Martinez and presented it as evidence at the ex parte hearing on December 3, 2021.
In Mr. Roberts own DVRO, he stated that he had no intention to keep any of my pets, and during the ex parte hearing, when asked by my attorney if he had any problem with my picking up the bunnies, Mr. Roberts said, “No, not at all.” Twice in December, I gave a two-week notice for picking up the bunnies--once on December 15, 2021, and once on December 28, 2021--both requests went unanswered, with no word on their health and well-being either. I had finally received my delinquent spousal support payment wired into my bank account on December 10, 2021, and I was staying in a 500-square-foot hotel room with plenty of space for the rabbits and my cat Lumi. The weight limit for pets was 40 pounds. Lumi and the bunnies totaled less than 20 pounds.
Mr. Roberts subsequently failed to make his January spousal support payment, which was due on January 1, 2022. As no funds were received, I found myself homeless once more, residing in my Toyota Highlander in Pacifica. The vehicle’s radiator later cracked, leaving me stranded and under the protective eyes of my homeless community, who looked out for me and my cat, Lumi, and shared BBQ with me. We also drank chamomile tea and made s’mores while hanging out, enjoying the million-dollar ocean view. But I still didn’t know the status of the bunnies. Were they alive? Were they being cared for properly? I had spent years coaching Mr. Roberts on their care. Did he retain any of it? No one would tell me anything, and I fretted over it daily.
This pattern of not updating me on the bunnies was something Mr. Roberts and his attorney, Mr. Conrad, repeated for approximately one year. Meanwhile, Mr. Roberts filed a temporary domestic violence restraining order (DVRO) against me, adding to my daily struggle to cope with his legal maneuvers to sabotage my right just to simply exist.
On January 20, 2022, although Mr. Roberts was represented by counsel, at 2:16 p.m., he sent an email directly to my former attorney, Lisa Mumford, advising her that I could pick up the rabbits on January 22, 2022, and that he would mail a check to me at my PO Box in Martinez for the spousal support which was due on January 1, 2022.
However, this was after I sent Mr. Conrad an email at 11:16 a.m., stating that I was stranded due to expired registration and vehicle mechanical failure, which I was now living in for the second time, due to Mr. Roberts’ spousal support payment being delinquent again.
If Mr. Roberts had indeed planned on my picking up the rabbits on January 22, then mailing the delinquent spousal support payment would be counterintuitive, plus I would have nowhere to put the rabbits.
Therefore, it was my assertion that not only was Mr. Roberts a master manipulator, but also a very clever and prolific fabricator, and that he knew I was stranded and unable to pick up the rabbits when he sent that email; thus making a cruel gesture out of mailing the delinquent spousal support payment to my PO Box in Martinez 46 miles away.
It was no surprise that, on January 20, 2022, three hours after Mr. Conrad was notified by email that I was stranded due to mechanical failure, Mr. Roberts would then declare his intention to mail his 20-day late payment to me in the form of an online check without a tracking number. It would have been appropriate to either deposit the money into my bank account when he asked Lisa for my banking information that morning, rather than later emailing Lisa about his plans to send an online check, which takes the bank two weeks to process.
Thus, my odyssey for survival continued, as did my concern over my rabbits. I had been attempting to reunite with them steadily since before I filed for the DVRO when I was first staying at a hotel. I had even consulted with an attorney and with House Rabbit Society, where I had a membership and had been checking on their boarding services beginning in August 2021. They were not boarding rabbits due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Mr. Roberts’ track record for lying and talking a good game was worthy of breaking a Guinness World Record, as he had demonstrated time and time again over a lengthy period.
For example, on October 21, 2022, through his attorney, Mr. Roberts submitted an invoice to me for $29,520 for boarding the rabbits at House Rabbit Society (HRS) in Richmond for 369 days at $80 per day. Well, first he said Humane Society. Then he changed it to HRS. However, as mentioned elsewhere, HRS did not start boarding bunnies again until September 2022, due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Additionally, no reputable rabbit organization would have boarded the bunnies for any amount of money without the rabbits being current on their RHDV2 vaccinations. My rabbits were not vaccinated while in Mr. Roberts' care or even taken to the vet.
Upon their return to my care, they were immediately taken to the vet for a wellness check and vaccinations.
