Here is a relatively brief synopsis of the children's mother's background and behavior. This is just a sampling of the information that has been available to local law enforcement agencies, the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services, the children's mother's own attorney, and to the Whiteside County Court, which claims to have such a great interest in the "physical, mental, moral and emotional health" of my children. However, and in accordance with her attorney's strategy, the court has not allowed almost any of this information to ever be entered into record or even brought up in the court room - the reason most often cited: they've "already heard it all before."

The children's mother's abusive, alcoholic father abandoned the family in Tennessee when she was only a few years old. She was later sent to live with him in Texas, where according to her, she was locked in a closet for several days. She was eventually returned to her mother's care, where she, her brother and sister, step-sister, and the mother herself, suffered unbelievable physical and sexual torture at the hands of her step-father for over twenty years. She was often physically and emotionally abused by the her own mother, including at least one episode where she, at aged 7, was severely beaten for begging for protection from the sexual abuse of the mother's new husband. She has had at least one abortion after an alleged rape. She has, among many other things (and in no particular order):

-    threatened to murder the children on numerous occasions, including graphically describing to the children how she was going to drown them in the river, a swimming pool, and the ocean; throw them off a bridge, and drive them into a brick wall at 100 mph. She has also discussed the Jon Benet Ramsey case, as well as another Chicago child murder case with the children in very graphic terms, suggesting that she or I would kill  them in similar manners. Most recently, while we ate dinner with my girlfriend and her son, my children described how their mother had them sit down and watch an entire television show about two children that were murdered by their father and his girlfriend.

-    graphically described to the children on numerous occasions, their father having sex with other woman, and other men as well, once telling the children, "When your father says he's going to work in the morning, he's really going somewhere where he lets 12 guys fuck him up the ass. Go ahead, ask your dad what it's like to suck his own shit off a guy's dick." (It has recently been suggested to me that I point out that these claims of homosexual behavior on my part were not only false, but were most likely never even suspected by her - they merely comprised the most vile, disgusting, hurtful things she could dream up to say to the children.)

-    graphically described to the children on numerous occasions, herself having sex with other men. On two of these occasions, she did so right along side a heavily trafficked city street while tearing her own clothes off, exposing her breasts. Another time, she did so in front of most of one of our son's basketball team, in the middle of a game at the local YMCA.

- often times screamed out the door (sometimes throwing garden implements at the car) while I was leaving for the office or on a business trip, that she was either going kill the kids, or that she was "going to fuck every guy in town while you're gone."

-  manufactured, shipped, distributed, and consumed illegal drug at the marital residence. (Actually, the "shipping" was her mother sending drugs to the children's mother in boxes of hand-me-down clothes.) A Whiteside County Sheriff's Deputy was actually called to the home on one occasion and shown her drugs and drug paraphernalia. A voluntary statement was filled out, but I do not believe a report was ever written.

- picked up the children from daycare in such an inebriated and/or drug induced state that the day care teacher called me at work to warn me

- was fired from one part time job for allegedly being caught consuming illegal drugs while on the job. She was fired from two other jobs for allegedly fighting with other employees or her supervisor.

- consumed illegal drugs throughout her pregnancy of at least one, if not both of our children

- often took acquaintance's prescription tranquilizers

-  is an admitted alcoholic, and was arrested for possessing an open container of alcohol in the car

-  continually told the children that their father does not, and will never love them

-  threatened to leave the children forever on numerous occasions

-  beat me unconscious with what I later heard was a phone, when I dropped the kids off after my "visitation", kissed then good bye, and bent down to tie one of their shoes. When I woke up, one child was screaming and trying to pull her off of me, the other was trying to shield my head with his own body.

-  called one of her sons a "sick, disgusting faggot boy just like his dad" because she was upset with the short haircut he had been given ("like Michael Jordan") at his request.

-  jumped head-first out of a car at approximately 35-40 mph because she was upset after missing a softball game due to my having to work late

- tried almost successfully to commit suicide by overdosing on sleeping pills and alcohol, and asphyxiating herself in the garage

- physically attacked me close to 100 times (once with a hammer, and several times while I was sleeping) - almost always, in front of the children. She would then sit the children down and explain to them that "this is normal family life, and you need to know this...you need to see this...this is the way husbands and wives treat eachother...this is how your going to treat the woman in your lives when you get older...THIS IS NORMAL."

- threatened to kill me in my sleep, including at least once, with a gun she claimed to have acquired from a friend. Years later, the kids have told me about finding a hand gun and bullets on a dresser while playing over at one of her friend's houses (a woman who was not a friend of hers at the time, however).

- did over $78,000 in property damage, including, but in no way limited to: the doors, windows, and structure of the marital residence, garage, and my apartment; four cars (including one which was totaled by repeatedly ramming it with our SUV through the door of the garage where the children were often playing), two motorcycles, countless items of furniture and home furnishings, my clothes, recreational equipment and 18 telephones and fax machines.

- chased me and the children through city streets, eventually pinning us at a stop light and repeatedly ramming my car (with the 2 and 4 year old children inside) with our SUV

- broke into my home, cut up clothes and priceless photos, scattering them about the house, then stole the title to our SUV. She forged my name on the title signing sole possession of the vehicle over to her, took out a loan using the vehicle as collateral, defaulted on the loan, and got my completely paid for, $25,000 vehicle repossessed.

- shattered the front door of my home smashing several object within the house, attacked my girlfriend who was holding her 3 year old son in her arms at the time, set a blanket on fire and threw it across the living room. During the same incident, she also damaged my and my girlfriends car, and my garage. All of this was in front of our children, as well.

- verbally abused on countless occasions, and beat up on numerous occasions, her own 11 year old step-sister - twice by beating her with a phone, another punching her in the face and knocking her down a flight of stairs. On one occasion, she violently attacked me for refusing to wake up the "little slut" and throw her and all of her belongings out of the house at around 2:00 AM.

- consumed illegal drugs, on separate occasions, with two different 11 year old children.

- abandoned our own children - aged 2 and 4 at the time - in the middle of a country road, at night, in 40 degree whether, during a thunder, lightning and hail storm, where they were almost hit and killed by a car.

- left her own step-sister at aged 9, and then again at age 12, alone in a wet swimming suit in Daytona Beach  (680 miles from home) and drove all the way back to Illinois.

- left her brother, and her sister's 6 year old son who was in his care, in Daytona Beach, drove to Tennessee, and got into a physical fight with the child's mother.

- left our young children alone with my mother - 65 lbs. and weeks away from dying of cancer - in retaliation for my refusal to give her her "child support" early so she could use it to take her boyfriend to Florida.

- has been diagnosed as having severe dissociative disorder, bi-polar disorder, post traumatic stress syndrome, and possible multiple personalities. One of the court ordered evaluators used the term "child predator" to describe her.

- forced our 6 1/2 year old son to wear diapers, and then chastised him in public about it.

- for as long as I have known her, been unable or unwilling to use the bathroom in her own home, insisting instead, to use the public rest rooms in grocery stores, apartment complex clubhouses, restaurants, etc.

- drove past my house with the children in the vehicle at about 55 mph backwards, screaming profanity at me, and almost running over and killing a 5 year old neighbor.

- has for years, made literally 30-50 harassing, profanity filled phone calls per day to me at home and to my place of employment - most often in front of the children. She has done the same to every woman I have dated since our divorce, and has threatened almost every woman I come into contact with at work.

- she has barged into my place of employment, screaming at me and destroying my office

- has struck at least one of our children in the face and shaken them so violently that two different concerned witnesses thought it necessary to bring these facts to my attention, and to the attention of two court ordered evaluators

- has, in flagrant violation of the joint parenting agreement, kept at least 5 different men as over night guests in the house with our children. She has recently given birth to a child presumably fathered by one of these men.

- has kept me from having the children during my court appointed "visitation" times on roughly 55 occasions. She has also kept me from even speaking on the phone to my children for about 2 1/2 years now.

- continually tells the staff at the children's school that there are new court orders giving her full custody of the children, and that they are not to release the children, or any information regarding them or their school activities to me

- has numerous times kept me from getting the children needed medical attention. One of our children had warts all over his body. She refused to administer or allow me to administer his prescribed medicine, told the dermatologist's office that she had full custody of the children and that they were not to communicate with me in any manner, and insisted that the doctor told her to just pick the warts of with her fingernails - which she did for over a year. On another occasion, my other child had had a severe earache, and his prescription medicine was at the children's mother's residence. The illness flared up again, and the child was in severe pain, but the mother refused to give the medicine to either myself or our other son. It became necessary for me to take the child, in agony, to the emergency room of the hospital later that night. This same child later needed to have a cyst removed from his face. The mother refused to let a doctor do the procedure, claiming the doctor was wrong - it wasn't a cyst, but a piece of gravel - and that she was going to dig it out with a needle herself. In yet a further incident, it was necessary for me to spend thousands of dollars in legal fees trying to get a judge to order the children's mother to either take, or allow me to take, one of our children to the dentist to have a large number of cavities, which were giving him considerable discomfort, filled. I lost in court, but then took him any way.

- refuses to take the children to any of their sports practices or games, or to allow me to do so on her days to have the children

- in spite of the fact that she has been given over $200,000 in " support" and has found no need to have ever sought steady employment, she has the children call me on numerous occasions and tell me that they are starving and haven't eaten in days, and ask me to either take them to dinner, take them food, or bring the $1.20 necessary for them to eat at school.