briefing page seventeen this specific comment was that in a phone conversation immediately after one of the workers refused to give mr watts a copy of the policy memo which allegedly prevented him from knowing certain things and after that work i would not even tell him whether his daughter was still in california it just seems the department taunted mr wants to an exceptional degree here how could the department have control over this child if she wasn't in california it's a simple thing say to him yes she's in california but i can't tell you where they wouldn't even give me the courtesy of that kind of a response and what is your part what flows necessarily from that these workers who testified they were in fear and there is no question that they said that they  were not reasonably in fear and that's one of the five elements of callan one with a reasonable and fair because if you look at the case law which says a victim has to have certain knowledge about the person making the threats in order for the threat to be credible can himself to telephone conversations and letters and postcards to these people and nothing in his background nothing that they knew of his bomb and there was no basis for them to be here is it your argument basically that because he had not actually physically attacked anyone you know actually had not carried out these thoughts over the had not carried out these facts over that period of time that they should be upright that's part of m the flipside of that is i mean that they should basically know that he just threatens that he doesn't really act on them yes they should know he did not have the ability or even the intent to carry through on his threat there was some testimony by a number of these workers that us to redo what the district court is required to do what's the standard of review that we bring to those issues the standard you depends i know i'm doing a tail wagging the dog here but let us begin with a concept that this was potentially criminal threat in which case judge these looks to whether there is a preponderance of the evidence to sustain those allegations only view then this court looks to whether there was a well and if not then judge he's clearly erred in sustaining the allegations if so he did not and it's an abuse of discretion standard as to whether or not he should have reimposed a term of supervise release however if this was not a question of criminal threats if the elements of the state statute are not enough then everything else is protected and why aren't the elements of the states that should not matter because one of the five counts is not only that they were doing their job in such a way that even the district court noted they provoked him taunted mr watts in addition to which the court the first case i ever studied in torts in law school focused on words in a manner that comports with due process not to respond to government agency at any level by saying i will kill everybody at the agency you're are misusing with that we get off then into measuring how well the agency people were doing their job in order to determine whether the i will kill everybody no but on review when you consider the preponderance of the evidence this court has to look at the overall record and this too wants is aggressive behavior toward the you know there's no exception for validating criminal threats but again the question is whether this is a criminal threat or whether it was protected first amendment speech and it's a little bit different than that when you look at four twenty two it says he did not it's a question of the mindset of the victim the target was their fear reasonable in light of this overall ten year period and in light of what they knew about the case what they knew they were doing whether they were justified in correcting trying to two people rather than just mr morris but your honors when you look at the two of eleven i know it seems like splitting hairs but of those people who lost their jobs or became ill or died who were on that list of eleven that's the issue there isn't it what would what would a reasonable person think your honor most of these people have not even had a face to face contact with mr long and this is the only indication in the record that anyone has seen him in person was the incident when he jumped up from behind a plant hundred six these people are sitting in their offices and receiving letters and phone calls they'd rather not receive but they haven't been personally or physically threatened by mr wants so again how reasonable is their fear when they work in an office where tempers run high where you're dealing with people whose social system is so broken they can't take care of their own children first well doesn't that in a way and they're against mr watts in the sense that there isn't anything probably that's more important to most people than their children and so it's not uncommon for a parent i mean most parents would lay down their life for their child you know one whether they're good or they're bad parents so i think the underlying basis of this that doesn't fall the custody of a child or taking a child away from someone is precisely the type of situation that reasonable people feel is very volatile that when you are taking someone's child away i mean that you talk about the money you talk about the kids then anyone that's done family law court knows that that's one of the most explosive courts so isn't that reasonable people think that this this is the type of thing that you know people that would otherwise not become  otherwise not do certain things did take action on your i can't speak to that unfortunately there's nothing in the record from the d c fs workers as to how many people who threaten department actually follow through on  behavior then yes it was but he began to do whatever he could to get their attention to keep them from severing his parental rights and to this extent he succeeded so why are you asking because mr watts is still under a period of well at the moment he is free from custody but he is still subject to supervised release he's going to use the rendering himself again on april twelfth so to the extent the judge peace may have been incorrect in revoking supervised release and under any period of supervised re important when considering the fear of the victims and whether it's reasonable to look at the statements particularly in the context of the history of the parties turning to morris first if you look at the march thirtieth two thousand and call what cards of people who have opposed the defendants who says this is what happens to assholes who keep fathers and daughters apart but what about the argument that obviously if taken to an extreme let's say someone every day threaten to count you and then on after ten years of every day diminish you decide i'm going down to their place department and i want you know i want to fight for four twenty two well obviously there might be an argument at that point that you aren't reasonable and fair because the person has said it every day for the last ten years and they never did anything and you know that this is just the way they behave when they don't get their way counsel for mr watson is arguing that you know he's done this with some regularity over are in two thousand so it's a four year period of time and he said part of the threats that are at issue there were sixty eight for us so this is not an everyday occurrence i don't think it's gotten to the point of war this is just ridiculous and i think it's important to look at what the purpose of the statute is which is to protect people from fear and intimidation so i think your argument then that why you could make that argument and that could be one interpretation we're looking at it for substantial evidence i think that's what i meant there another interpretation of what you're saying i think it's simply one fact for the court to consider and awaiting all the evidence in the case and i don't think that is itself the size of it here there were a number of factors including the period of time involved the nature of the threats t escalating nature of the threats but i do think that's an important aspect of it in the hypothetical that you gave someone who gives what would appear to be some more threats all the time maybe over time that would dissipate somewhat  i think when you view that in the context that if you are opposing the find in the child custody matter he will take you out these threats take on a much more serious overtone because they are all in relation to the fun of being denied information i mean we treasure the march thirt two thousand threat the threat is made immediately after he's denied information about the whereabouts of his daughter it was an angry response that's why in the last few testified the entire conversation with every bit particularly the statement that was the threat again if you turn to the letters in june eighteenth two thousand that came after a child custody dispute dark child custody hearing for the record doesn't indicate exactly what happened at the hearing but the fed is letter to the judge indicates that he lost the petition that was filed that's when you get the letters that are started both to morris and eisner at that point which talk about opposing him i mean i think morris testified that what made him afraid is what this is this is what happens the assholes who keep fathers and the hearing and different more than one witness correct that's what evidence it's the evidence just individual to each count like that person said or is there evidence that can be considered as to other counts court coming to a conclusion well i think i think it's pretty miserable as the california court in a cadence stansfield when you're looking at for example morris to consider all of the threats as to morris to gather and weigh one threat against another because in that more fearful i think there was an evidence presented that you can look at the threats to morse and consider that prize winner or you can look at the the in that context except with one exception that eisner said that she went enough themselves the district court improperly consider the facts of those threats that mean that the really the only question is whether the find it was properly within the greater range and one violation well place of the fact that in the greater range used to be with seventy one point one small piece of just where