Harassment by text message

[IanD]

Hi has anyone had any experience of harassment by text from an ex? my partner has an ex(Husband)who she shares a daughter with so they still have to communicate about her only he also sends texts that dont relate to this and are very derogative so she cant get away from reading them, how mant texts does it take before it becomes harassment?

Thanks...

It must count as harrassment straight away, surely?
Can she ask him politely to keep the texts civil and relating to their daughter? . Any thing derogatory will be passed on to the police.

It is harassment and a criminal offence. If she takes the phone to the police and shows them the texts they can give the XH a warning to desist, if he carries on they can and will arrest him.

Just one.

Save the text messages he sends, don't tell him, and inform the police.

Keep a log.

or insist he communicates only in writing, and when necessary - this is far easier to keep in a way, and he will know it's keepable before he writes it so might stop him a bit.

And change number.
Unless text is your preferred route of communication and easier for you, in wich case do as the others have said.

Under the protection from harassment act, it's harassment after two instances. But it's a difficult situation if there are some instances where they must communicate.

I'd suggest she changes her mobile number, and tells her XH to communicate via the landline

This will come under the Domestic Abuse unit. It has happened within my family and we very quickly got a restraining order. The police were brilliant - there have been too many cases of this sort of have escalated them for them to risk ignoring it.

Unfortunately it progressed into emails, phonecalls and fake Facebook accounts in our case and we're back in court shortly.

As everyone has said, keep records, call the police immediately.

Thank you for all your replies i think we'll keep a log for now if it doesnt stop in the near future i think informing the police is the next step, its so hard as she still needs to communicate with him, txt is the best option as landline calls nearly always end un in an argument..

i have been in this situation

i was told to tell him to stop contacting me about anything other than necessary child related arrangements, and then not to respond if he continued, but to log each incident with the police

initially if it doesnt stop they can give a verbal warning , then follow up with more severe penalties if that doesnt work

Thanks lou yes we are logging all incidents and most definately not responding, i'll give it a few weeks to see where we get.

thanks..

keep all texts emails etc, as well

mine went back years but i was told they could only take action from the date i complained, though they looked at all the other messages as a kind of background for the complaint

Texting is actually preferable to land line calls from the pov of keeping a record of what's said and how often the unwanted and unwarranted communication is attempted. Keep all the texts if possible, not just a written log of them.

You have to make a complaint and the clock starts running from that date.

if you run out of space on the phone, write them down, but get someone to witness the texts themselves first

Just an update on this the txts are also taking on a sort of bullying / mental harassment where by he is criticizing my partner on how she brings up their daughter, my partner is still ignoring these txts..

also might be worth getting a cheap P&G phone for him to harrass and her getting a new number - not ideal no but least she wouldn't be reading it all the time as she could switch it on when he has DD only and off at all other times? or work something out ie it's on for half hour a day or something?