Domestic Silence

I had a 71 year old man today who was charged with stalking a 28 year old woman. It was an awful case. The man is very hard of hearing, but he doesn't look like he is 71 years old at all. He looks like he is 171 years old. He and the "victim" in this case entered into a friendship. I have no idea what sort of bodily fluids may or may not have been exchanged at any point during this time, but suffice it to say that at some point my client believed he was engaged to this woman. Within a month of him believing to be engaged, she apparently married someone else. That is just something that can't be particularly common.

Anyway, this is a sort of variation on the old-rich-guy hot-young-girl situation. The difference here is that the old rich guy is not very rich. And the hot young girl is not very hot. So Oldie gets her a cell phone. I think he lets her use his car, too. I am sure he buys her a couple of dinners. Oldie is living a couple hours away. When he comes down to visit her, she does what any girl who just lied to a guy by telling him she will marry him so that he will give her some stuff would do: she calls the cops and has him arrested.

I was really looking forward to trying this case. He had cell phone records showing that she called him dozens of times after he allegedly stalked her. He also brought a witness who was going to testify that she had told the witness (she often communicated through this witness because Oldie couldn't hear a damn thing) that she was willing to drop the charges in exchange for some money. Unfortunately, the "victim" did not show up for court, and the case was dismissed. I can't say I was too surprised.

I subscribe to Pavlov's theory when it comes to people making jokes. I don't laugh at them unless they are funny. Why? Because if I laugh at a person who is not funny, then that person is going to believe that he is funny and continue making jokes. I hope that by not laughing, it might deter the person from making jokes.

My standing exception to this is really old people. Oldie is one of those old people who runs around making jokes all the time. Of course, the fact that he can't hear the jokes he is telling makes me wonder if he would still tell them if he knew what they sounded like. So when a guy who looks 171 years old cracks a joke, I do my fake laugh (I have a terrible fake laugh). I figure it may literally be the last time the guy ever gets to tell a joke, and I would hate for his last joke to have been met with silence.