From the Sarasota Herald Tribune’s Anthony Cormier :

The estranged wife of former NBA referee Tim Donaghy (above, middle), who admitted to betting on games he officiated, has asked a local judge to issue a restraining order against her husband.The request accuses Donaghy of striking their children, breaking into her e-mail account and threatening to harm her.

Donaghy could not be reached for comment Wednesday. His attorney’s office declined comment.

The allegations against Donaghy surfaced in the middle of the couple’s divorce proceedings as the couple fight over custody of their four young children and their $1.1 million home in the Lakewood Ranch Country Club community in Manatee County.

In court papers, Kim Donaghy says her husband used her AOL password to steal e-mail messages about the divorce. On March 14, she says, she asked for the e-mails and other paperwork, and Donaghy threatened her in front of their children. The police were called.

A Manatee County Sheriff’s Office report on the episode said the fight was not physical. Kim Donaghy said in court documents that Tim Donaghy has hit the children in the past.

“He is going to snap,” she wrote.

At the risk of making light of a family tragedy, this cannot be what Kim Donaghy’s parents had in mind when they wanted their daughter “to find a man like Mendy Rudolph”.