Mobile home feud to go before jury Mobile home feud to go before jury (May 07, 2004)

Betty Galin moves out but sues another neighbor

By Grace Rauh

The ongoing battle between two longtime adversaries at the Sahara Village Mobile Home Park may finally come to a close when the case goes before a jury on Oct. 18.

Betty Galin, 75, has pleaded not guilty to charges of battery, vandalism, and restraining order violations against another park resident, 85-year-old Al Stuetzle. Galin requested a jury trial.

Galin is accused of hitting Stuetzle with a rock and metal flashlight, damaging his car, spray-painting "KILLER" on the side of his mobile home and violating a restraining order three times. The friction started in 2001 when Stuetzle began trapping feral cats in the mobile park, he said. Galin allegedly tried to intervene and abscond with the cage Stuetzle was using to trap the cats, according to police reports.

"I'm tickled to death that we've finally arrived at a date when this thing will be settled," said Steutzle, following the pretrial conference at the Palo Alto Superior Court on April 30. "It will be over with, and it will be settled, and it will put a stop to any future violence, I think."

But Stuetzle may have spoken too soon. On Tuesday morning, he woke to find all four tires on his car slashed.

Stuetzle has long said he doesn't want to see Galin behind bars; he just wants her out of the mobile home park so he and his wife can live in peace. But this latest act of vandalism has prompted him to consider moving out of the park, if Galin isn't booted first.

According to Geoffrey Carr, Galin's criminal attorney, his client has already moved out of the park and is living with her niece.

"She would characterize it as 'driven out of the park,'" Carr said.

Galin denied committing the alleged crimes against Stuetzle in a previous interview, and she refused to provide further comment on the case when discussing it at the courthouse last week.

"We don't have to tell you anything," Galin said. "I don't want anything in the Voice ."

Galin recently filed a lawsuit against Petra Ebangi for defamation, negligence, and intentional infliction of emotional distress, according to a letter obtained by the Voice . Ebangi, who also lives in Sahara Village, had written a letter to the editor defending Stuetzle. It was published in the Voice on April 9.

Galin demanded Ebangi retract the letter "to the whole mobilehome (sic) park as well as the circulation of the Voice."

E-mail Grace Rauh at grauh@mv-voice.com

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