Brody Dalle has been found guilty of contempt during her ongoing custody battle with ex-husband Josh Homme. Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Lawrence Riff ruled that the Distillers singer “willfully” kept her 5-year-old son away from a court-mandated visit with Homme on Sept. 3, Rolling Stone reports. Dalle was dismissed on another contempt charge involving her 10-year-old son, who the judge said made the choice not to see his father under his own volition. He also dismissed charges that Dalle had prevented the Queens of the Stone Age frontman from speaking with his sons on video calls.
The verdict comes after Dalle pleaded “not guilty” to contempt last month, claiming she “demanded” her sons go to their dad’s but they “refused.”
“I demanded they go and I pleaded with them,” Dalle told the court on Nov. 4. “I told them there was a court order, and if they didn’t go, that I could go to jail.”
Brody Dalle’s sentencing will be held on Nov. 30, and it’s possible that she’ll serve jail time.
“I followed every single order you gave. Why did I do that?” Homme told the court during the hearing.
“I know how disappointed you are, and I know you think this system has let you down,” Judge Riff responded. “Everybody here has gotten a serious tutorial in criminal law. Criminal law is not the answer to a family’s problems. What you really need to be focusing on is how in this current fractured environment you’ll be able to co-parent. And you’re going to need help. You’re going to need third parties involved. If you can get there, you’re going to heal this family. But doing it through contempt proceedings and DV [domestic violence restraining order] proceedings probably is not the answer.”
It was learned in court on Nov. 9 that Dalle’s boyfriend Gunner Foxx was the one who took her 15-year-old daughter Camille to file restraining orders against Homme on behalf of the three children. On Nov. 15, Homme filed a request for a civil restraining order against Foxx on behalf of himself and his two sons. The document accuses Foxx of stalking, surveillance, assaultive conduct, and extreme restrictive gatekeeping, “most probably at the direction of [Homme’s] ex-wife.”
