Currey v. Currey – NJ Appellate Division – No Harassment

Here, the judge only found that defendant disabled the motor­cycle, “took a garment she was wear­ing and demanded the car keys.” The judge further found that defendant “was expressing his anger and frus­tration and did it with the purpose to annoy, in retaliation for the wrongs he felt that happened to him.” These findings are patently insufficient to support the issuance of the FRO.

The judge did not find that defendant engaged in a “course of alarming conduct or of repeatedly committed acts” as required by N.J.S.A. 2C:33-4(c). He did not find that it was defendant’s purpose to seriously annoy plaintiff, finding only that he expressed “his anger and frustration and did it with the purpose to annoy,” an insufficient finding under N.J.S.A. 2C:33-4(c). See Hoffman, supra, 149 N.J. at 581. He did not find a previous history of domestic violence, nor did he find the existence of any immediate danger to plaintiff, two important factors to con­sider under N.J.S.A. 2C:25-29(a)(1) and (2). Peranio, supra, 280 N.J. Super. at 54. We are satisfied that the evidence established no more than the “ordinary domestic contretemps,” id. at 57, that one might expect when a spouse believes that he or she has discovered direct evidence of the other spouse’s infidelity.

Find it here:  Curry v. Currey App. Div, January 20, 2009 http://lawlibrary.rutgers.edu/decisions/appellate/a2612-07.opn.html