By Stacie Guevara
MERCED, CA – After being accused of striking his grandchildren without their parents’ consent, defendant Norman Tingle was issued a restraining order at the request of his daughter-in-law here in Merced County Superior Court late last week.
It’s going to be difficult, as Court Commissioner Donald Shaver said, because they all live in the same house.
Commissioner Donald Shaver gave Tingle the order Thursday morning in Merced Superior Court Department 4.
Tingle’s daughter-in-law requested that Tingle not attack, harass, strike or have any contact with her and her children along with a 100-yard stay-away order. She also asked that Tingle be ordered to move out of their shared residence.
The plaintiff stated Tingle and her husband (his son) bought the house together, to which Tingle firmly 
denied, saying, “Me and my son did not buy this house together. I have a mortgage paid for it showing I am the sole owner of this house.”
Because of this fact, Commissioner Shaver denied the move-out order. “If you ask for a move out order, it’s going to be a problem. I can’t order him to move out of his own house,” he said.
In May, Tingle was accused of striking his daughter-in-law’s children – his grandchildren – after she heard hitting noises and screaming from the other side of the house. Tingle admitted to the act, fully accepting it.
At the time, Tingle’s daughter-in-law didn’t confront him, but her husband did. She said she was consoling her children and when asked if she heard Tingle admit anything to her husband, she said, “All I remember at that time is my husband telling him (Tingle) he doesn’t have a right to hit them because he didn’t raise his own kids.”
She said she found welts on her children’s buttocks and on the back of their hands. She said her husband told Tingle he was going to call the police. The police were, in fact, never called.
Tingle said he only hit the children with his belt once on their buttocks, and said his daughter-in-law told her children they don’t have to do what Tingle says in his own house.
Upset at this, Tingle said he thought to himself at the time, “Okay, you (his daughter-in-law) want to start this. You want to use my grandkids against me.”
Tingle said he only hit the children one other time, about five months previously.
He said the children kept fighting, so he hit them on the back of their hands, saying, “They had been told by their mother – who constantly leaves them with me, the person that’s being accused of abuse now – to clean up, but they kept fighting.”
When asked if he had ever been given permission to hit the children, Tingle said, “No, I never had to have permission.”
Tingle continued lamenting to the commissioner, saying, “And it isn’t about child abuse, your honor. It’s about… when all of a sudden, all of these other charges were brought up against me. It’s about possession of a house that my son has no name on.”
“And also, no, I haven’t been back into the house because you (the court), yesterday, allowed my abusers (the plaintiff and her husband) to come back in there… So yes, things happened. But not in the way they’re portraying it,” Tingle said.
When making his decision, Commissioner Shaver said, “The bottom line is, there’s probably a basis for a restraining order, but at this point in time, it would not include a move-out order… But if you (the plaintiff) still want a no-contact order, I can do that, but it would only apply outside the house. If you choose to live in the house, then there would be no violation of him (Tingle) being in the house.”
Commissioner Shaver continued, “So, that’s kind of a weird situation where he (Tingle) would be around them (the children) when you’re living there, but he couldn’t be around them outside the house.”
The daughter-in-law also accused Tingle of harassing her, to which the commissioner told her she would have to file a separate request.
