Woman Recieves Order for Protection Against Facebook Stalker

Tennessee case summary on stalking and protective orders.

Shayla Nicole Purifoy v. Devine Mafa

The petitioner in this Shelby County, Tennessee, order for protection case was a legal services attorney who had testified in an unrelated order for protection case in 2013.  A few months later, she received a Facebook friend request from the respondent in that case, using a false name.  She later learned that he had been posting videos regarding her.  She eventually asked him to stop doing this, and when he refused, she obtained a temporary restraining order.

The court papers were mailed to him by certified mail, but she was unable to have him served in person, either by the sheriff’s department or a private process server.

After extensive proceedings in the lower court, a hearing was finally held, and a permanent order for protection was issued.  The respondent then appealed to the Tennessee Court of Appeals, alleging numerous procedural shortcomings in the process.

He first argued that two of the judges who heard the case should have recused themselves.  But the Court of Appeals held that these arguments had no merit.  He next argued that service of the petition had been improper.  He specifically pointed to the fact that one of the documents had the wrong docket number.  But the appeals court found that this error had been properly corrected, and that no harm had resulted.

Next, he turned to the substance of the case.  He first argued that his Facebook videos did not constitute “contact” within the meaning of the statute.  He argued that this was so because they were never posted on her personal Facebook page.  But the appeals court noted that a “course of conduct” was all that was required to constitute contact, and in this case, the repeated videos had a purpose of making contact with the petitioner.  It also pointed out that some of the posts were posted publicly, and addressed the petitioner as “you.”  For this reason, the court held that they constituted contact with the petitioner.

The Court of Appeals carefully reviewed the extensive evidence in the case and agreed with the lower court that the respondent’s conduct amounted to stalking within the meaning of the order for protection statute.

The respondent made more arguments in his appeal, which the higher court considered in detail.  It held that nothing that had happened in the lower court had deprived him of due process.  Therefore, it affirmed the lower court’s judgment.  It also awarded the petitioner her attorney fees for the appeal, and remanded the case for the lower court to compute the amount.

No. W2015-00102-COA-R3-CV (Tenn. Ct. App. Sep. 28, 2017).

See original opinion for exact language.  Legal citations omitted.

To learn more, see Domestic Violence in Tennessee.