Friends Become Family

I called up a lot of friends yesterday to help my friend in need.  I called all sorts of friends from the past that had knowledge to help.

We had to disable a tracking device on my friend’s car.  This is how her husband and his family kept tracking her down when she was trying to seek safety away from them.

She is in fear for herself and her child.  And meanwhile she is the suspect and was arrested and needs to get a lawyer to protect herself from her husband.  If that all sounds backwards to you, it’s because it is.  A law made to protect women was used against her.

Thanks for the many of you that well wished for the situation yesterday.  She was immediately bailed out and back with her child 3 hours after the arrest.

I knew this woman when she was just 8 years old.  Her family fed me and my Mormon missionary companion each Sunday for almost a year when I was in Milan, year 2000

I sponsored her coming to this country 7 years and watched her learn English, get married, work and study all to able to provide for husband and child.

She is such an example of goodness and bravery to my 3 daughters. I am so glad one of my daughters got to watched her stand strong as she was cuffed and taken away.

We all knew the arrest was unjustified but it was also police doing what they have to do when accusers are using the system with deceit. I am actually happy to see how responsive the law enforcement can be.

This woman is basically family and it doesn’t matter how strong you think you are, when 5 large men take a small girl away you feel helpless and broken.  Her mother was present and I had to use my broken Italian to console her through my own tears.  She was holding her heart as if was going to fail her and I didn’t know what to do.

That’s when friends always come to help.  One friend provided a safe home that served as an embassy and sanctuary for the grandmother and baby, while another friend helped us find lawyers and another, who also knew her from Milan as a young man, drove down to bail her out of country jail.

We all gathered and hugged when she got back to her mom and child.  We were even able to make some jokes and laugh in all those hard emotions.

It’s not over.  Friends will continue to help her get on her feet as a newly single mother of a 3 year old boy in a foreign land.

She is strong, withstood 5 years of mental abuse and emotional abuse, all while studying, graduation, and working many jobs to support her little family.

Friends become family and show up when you need them the most.

We still need help, so if you have a place to rent, or good contacts in this type of legal situation, please reply.

Love you friends!

Scott Paul