Inconvenient statistics have been cited in support of restraining order reform for many years, statistics like 8 in 10 restraining orders are obtained either on dubious grounds or downright fraudulent ones. This stat, drawn from a West Virginia study, was formerly cited on Wikipedia but has since been quashed. Unnecessarily, probably. Restraining order injustice is hardly a topic of broad public concern. Statistics like this are mainly cited among its victims—and to little or no effect.
Bruiting stats of this kind is sort of like throwing rocks at a tank.
The restraining order process has, over the last three decades, spawned a behemoth institution that spans not only the United States but much of the globe. Entire cottage industries have evolved around it. Restraining order administration entails not only court officers and staff but police, social workers, employees of women’s shelters, attorneys and their retinues, therapists, and many others. Livelihoods have come to depend on its perpetuation. And the volume of restraining orders issued ensures that public funds (in the billions in this country alone) continue to be dedicated to raising social awareness and sensitizing authorities and judges to violence against women. These funds go to sustaining additional swathes of Justice Department employees and advocacy groups and further guarantee that the number of restraining orders issued continues to grow, despite the fact that violence is seldom alleged on restraining order applications at all.
Critics of restraining orders are ragtag revolutionaries, often with very divergent motives. Some oppose reverse discrimination, some advocate for fathers’ rights or preservation of the family, some denounce violations of civil liberties.
Those most dramatically impacted by restraining order abuse, its victims, are typically only heard to peep and grumble here and there.
It’s their stories, though, that speak most persuasively to the need for restraining order reform. Pointing out the inconsistency, illogic, unfairness, and indecency of how restraining orders are administered is of limited value, because no one who hasn’t been victimized by the process has any urgent cause to care. And legislative interest is only aroused when a majority of constituents recognize a need for change and clamor for it.
Since I began this blog in the summer of 2011, I’ve learned a good deal about the manifold ways people prey on and injure one another. And having been collegiately trained as an analyst, I’ve noted and could reveal to you any number of themes that run through abuses of restraining orders.
Far more compelling, though, are the individual stories that respondents to this blog have shared. Here are some of them in digest form:
- a man whose ex-wife is an attorney is serially pelted with restraining orders, because he’s remarrying, and his ex-wife jealously doesn’t want their kids to attend the ceremony and hopes, besides, to drive off the fiancée;
- a young, female attorney’s career ambitions are derailed when she’s served an emergency restraining order by an older, male colleague who seduced her while concealing he was married and didn’t want the fact getting back to his missus;
- a daughter is served a restraining order to deny her access to her paralyzed and dying mother by her father, an attorney, who verbally tormented her for decades and turned a blind eye to her brothers’ physically abusing her for the same period;
- a former city official (a vegetarian single mom) is accused of domestic violence by a high school boyfriend she briefly renewed a Platonic friendship with decades later who had a very jealous wife;
- a man is forced to dismantle his entire life, following his being charged with battery after he caught his wife texting her lover, and the two wrestled for possession of the phone for an hour;
- a young woman is served with restraining orders petitioned from two separate jurisdictions by her ex-boyfriend in retaliation for her dumping him;
- a grandma is served a restraining order by her former daughter-in-law because the latter is jealous of her sons’ affections for their nana;
- a 20-year-old college student is served an emergency restraining order by her counselor, alleging stalking and danger, because the girl encountered her a few times in public (in a town of 2,000 residents) and said hi.
And that’s just a handful off the top of my head. (Browse this online petition for thousands more.)
What should be evident from these accounts is that the popular paradigm of restraining orders being issued to men who chronically beat their wives while in a drunken haze is a disco-era cardboard caricature badly warped with age that’s only rescued from crumpling by the vast number of people with an investment in preserving an outdated impression.
Beneath all the statistics and all legal and Constitutional arguments aside, the restraining order process cries for reform, because the lives of ordinary, decent people are being unjustly destroyed by it.
It’s really that simple.
Copyright © 2013 RestrainingOrderAbuse.com
TALKING BACK to restraining orders 
Not sure if you’ve heard this one before; I have not and I am a paralegal with many years/tears in domestic relations matters. Sorry, this is long, but I am looking for some advice/case authority/research help so I figure all the facts would be best.
BACKGROUND —
Amy – 21 year old virgin born and raised in Oklahoma. She was homeschooled with her 4 siblings by staunch Christian parents until she went to college at age 18. Amy graduated from Grand Canyon University (a Christian college in Arizona), with a Bachelor of Science, major in Kinesiology with emphasis on health science and a minor in physical education.
Following graduation Amy heads to Virginia on an invitation from her older sister to work as a coach over the summer. Amy moves in with her sister and brother-in-law and starts her coaching job. One day Amy’s sister and brother-in-law introduced her to a friend, a 6’4″ Marine who is active duty, stationed there in Virginia. Amy thinks he’s nice as he pays her some attention. Curiously, both her sister and her brother-in-law warn her NOT to get involved with this Marine as he has been married twice, has children from both unions and is a womanizer. (Why this turd is a “friend” is a mystery, but I digress). Our young virgin, never having been in a serious relationship, is smitten by said Marine. (I’m convinced it’s the dress blues, they’re sharp!). You already know where it’s going, right? Ya, well as you guessed, being very naïve and hearing the time worn, sure to get in a woman’s pants mantra- “I love you baby,” allows the Marine to have his way. He does nothing to insure pregnancy is avoided. Soon enough Amy is knocked up and quickly kicked to the curb, very nearly literally. Amy moves back in with sissy and her hubby and tries desperately to prove them all wrong, asserting he is a stand-up guy. By the 8th month reality sets in and her father (an American Airlines employee), arranges for a flight back to Oklahoma because the Marine is not going to help with birth costs or have anything to do with her or his child.
Following the birth, Amy cannot stop herself, nor will she listen to her family and friends and initiates contact with baby daddy. She texts a few pics of the cute baby boy and asks “don’t you want to be a family, a father to your son?” After a few months he tells her to come back, saying he’s come to Jesus (his daddy is a pastor), and wants to do right. She tells no one, and says she simply wants to go back to Virginia. She stays with her sister and brother-in-law again, texting and talking to her repentant Marine who insists they not move in together and states he has a male roommate. She explains she’s broke and he says he will pay her to write his college papers as he’s too busy to do his homework. She does his papers, he does not pay her, she’s upset. He stops responding to texts and calls and Amy is totally mystified and scared, having heard nothing for weeks, so she goes by his house and finds the Marine’s roommate and asks where her man is? She finds him hiding in his room. She confronts him, tells him she’s broke and what about the relationship, the baby? He orders her to leave. She leaves, crying, confused, frustrated and abandoned. The next day, late in the afternoon, she receives a text from her Marine telling her he’s arranged for a job interview for her and that she should take it. What he doesn’t tell her is that following the confrontation the day before he ran down to the Juvenile and Domestic Relations Court (General Dist Court, a court not of record), and fills out an affidavit saying he’s “afraid.” The judge asks if he’s afraid of her. He says “I’m not afraid of her (she’s 5’4″ he’s 6’4″), but afraid of what she might do.” Good enough, the judge issues a Preliminary Restraining Order.
After his text to Amy about the job opportunity, the following morning a cop comes to Amy’s sister’s place and serves the Summons and Prelim. Protective Order. I mentioned she was blonde, right? Well, she fails to read that it says “NO CONTACT OF ANY KIND” but remember, he had contacted her the day after he obtained the Prelim. Protective Order so she, being really young and dumb and confused and broke and abandoned and…. really, really upset, sent a text to him and asked “What is this about?” There was literally five brief text messages where she questioned the allegations he had made in his affidavit, that’s it. The Marine (I’m really embarrassed to print “Marine” at this point), runs straight over to the courthouse and told the Commonwealth’s attorney about the text messages. The Commonwealth’s attorney immediately filed criminal charges alleging “violation of terms of preliminary protective order,” referring to that provision “NO contact of any kind.” The next morning Amy is arrested, taken to jail, finger printed, mug shot taken and made to post a bond. Remember I mentioned, she ‘s broke and he won’t help her at all with the child. In fact, he has never helped with costs: not for the prenatal care, birth/hospital costs or any aspect of the welfare of his child – not a dime – EVER! So Amy calls on her family and tells them all the sordid details she so desperately kept silent about, not wanting to be lectured to. Amy just wanted to be married and have the ideal happy ever after tale. Ya, well what a wake up call, right!?
A full hearing was had on the Preliminary Protective Order. Our little momma has no attorney and not familiar at all with what to do or say and shows up with the baby. On the basis of this Marine’s affidavit that he’s ‘afraid of what she might do,’ the judge gives him a Protective Order and tells the Marine to seek custody. NO KIDDING!
She calls her folks and they have her go straight to the clerk’s office and file an appeal to the Circuit Court. A few weeks later she obtains a lawyer 1) to help with the criminal charge of violating a provision of the preliminary protective order and 2) help with the civil appeal of the granting of a protective order. A month later the civil appeal is called but the big ol’ Marine doesn’t show for the appeal, knowing full well his text messages show he was just luring his victim from Oklahoma back to Virginia with promises of marriage and wanting a family and that would prove he was really using the system to gain custody, as he did not want to pay child support, let alone marry his victim. No sir, getting custody was his mission, just as the judge in the juvenile and domestic relations court suggested he should do. (We’re not sure if he has an in there, but it’s certainly suspicious, don’t you think?). Accordingly, the Circuit Court (a court of record) ordered the protective order dissolved because he failed to show.
Amy then goes to court on the criminal (misdemeanor) charge of violating a provision of a preliminary protective order. The court does give a directive (jury instruction) to the jury that although he contacted her after obtaining the preliminary order this voids his petition by such action. Indeed, the Commonwealth argued it does not matter he contacted her after obtaining the preliminary protective order, it only matters that she contacted him and that was provision applied to her, not to him! The court agreed with this line of reasoning. She was found guilty and given one (1) day in jail. This verdict is on appeal.
EPILOGUE–
So here’s the thing: one can obtain a protective order without having to prove the veracity of the allegations used in the Petition. Catch this invidious twist to the law in Virginia —-
Though the initial (civil) protective order be dissolved on appeal, if guilty of the criminal charge of violating a condition of a preliminary protective order, by law the “violation” not the “allegations” work to create a protective order that lasts a full two (2) years without respect to the fact the initial protective order was ultimately dissolved!!!! (SEE: § 16.1-253.2 Violation of provisions of protective orders; penalty: “Upon conviction, the court shall, in addition to the sentence imposed, enter a protective order pursuant to § 16.1-279.1 for a specified period not exceeding two years from the date of conviction.”).
Hello….. so all one needs to do to get a target charged criminally and gain a protective order is to trick your target (be it wife, husband, neighbor), into violating a provision of a preliminary protective order. Here’s how it works: You call the prospective target the day/evening before the preliminary protective order is served, or have a friend call and tell the target to text you (texts are a record you can show). If they do BAM – you are on a fast track to an automatic protective order without having to prove any aspect of the initial affidavit and claims that precipitated the ex parte hearing where you were granted the preliminary protective order. This is much better if you’re looking to get revenge. Now your victim is a criminal, cannot have a gun in Virginia, has a record that affects her/him for life, and helps a ton if you’re looking to gain custody, or say a divorce proceeding.
The law in Virginia is a prime example of American Jurisprudence in the crapper!
If anybody on the blog has a case citation addressing this or similar to it, I would dearly love to have the citation.
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What a story. And you tell it very compellingly.
I have cousins who were reared exactly like this girl and who could be this girl. Did anyone talk to this guy’s “pastor” daddy? What denomination, incidentally? I used to at least expect human decency from Protestant pastors, deacons, and their ilk. My adult experiences, though, lead me to think priority one, at least among Southern Protestants, is image.
And this kind of sh*t could have caused that girl to miscarry, and there’s no question its effects are going to harm the baby’s development. If there were any justice, this guy, the district attorney, and the judge would have a whipping coming to them.
What kind of commonalities were you looking for, Craig? Here is a recent comment from an Ohio man who was baited into violating a restraining order. Is this what you meant?
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Thank you for the response. Ya, the babby daddy’s daddy was contacted. Gramps is, as I mentioned, a pastor – Southern Baptist in Arkansas. Both he and his wife (grandma) said “Oh dear. Well he’s our son, so we will stand by him on whatever he says.” Truth be damned in this household, obviously. Monikers, I’ve found mean nothing…judge, attorney, auto mechanic, pastor… humans are subject to human nature and lying and covering and that whole “blood is thicker than water” bit is seen in every walk of life. Cops have that “thin blue line” BS and attorney’s … well the whole of the national populace agrees this “class” are master thieves and liars and that goes for the legal system. “Justice” (courts) are a joke. I have been playing in the legal litter box for 15 years. It’s never been cleaned. Oh sure, there are a few exceptions, but precious few in my opinion.
I have two issues in this case:
1) Case authority (preferably in Virginia, but I’ll take anything), which address misuse of the protective order procedure: like where a Petitioner obtains a preliminary protective order in an ex parte hearing and before it is served, contacts the Respondent, and whether this conduct voids a preliminary protective order. The trial court in this case did not hold that the Petitioner’s conduct vitiates the prelim. order. I just don’t see how this is the law.
SUMMATION OF THE ARGUMENT:
When the Petitioner obtained a preliminary protective order in an ex parte hearing, and that order states “no contact of any kind,” and whereas the Petitioner’s text constitutes “contact” that action must therefore render the legitimate aims and goals of orders of protection of none effect and void. The legislature did not contrive the law to give an unfair advantage to the party who makes it to the courthouse before the other party s/he is bickering with. In sum and substance, if the “no contact of any kind” is not unilateral and a Petitioner, as in this case, has the ability to create a crime by contacting the other party, this is an unreasonable use of the law and works an injustice relative to the purpose of the protective order law, namely, to stop crime.
2) Then there is the second issue: how is it that an action BEFORE A HEARING ON THE MERRITS, which action (texting messages that contain absolutely no threats of bodily harm or damage to property, etc), automatically becomes a full blown protective order? In Virginia, even if the protective order is dissolved in a full hearing on the merits (as is the case here), the simple act of texting a non-threatening message creates a protective order that lasts for two years– really? The court’s need to use commonsense reasoning in such cases, otherwise we’re going to have a nation of criminals if all states adopt these draconian protective order laws such as Virginia has enacted!
I need some ammo — and I’ve just started my research.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Craig
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This is a really sympathetic situation, Craig, and I’ll certainly see if I can scrape something up. My informed opinion, though, is that you’re unlikely to find the kind of precedent you’re after. This process is hermetically sealed. My investigations and the secondhand knowledge I’ve gleaned from those who’ve been abused by restraining orders confirm exactly what you’re appalled by: that statutes place no restrictions upon plaintiff’s conduct (because these decades-old laws presume plaintiffs are victims and want nothing to do with their “abusers”). It’s something I’ve remarked in my writing. Plaintiffs can not only bait defendants into violating restraining orders but can repeatedly call, email, or text them; show up at their residences or places of work; or follow them around (in effect, stalk them—and with total immunity from censure). Complaints about this roll in regularly—or queries from plaintiffs about whether they’re “in trouble” for violating their own restraining orders. One recent respondent—the one whose comment I directed you to—reports being coerced into violating a restraining order (“Gotcha!”) whereupon the plaintiff used her leverage to embezzle money from his business and then abscond with it.
Your arguments are excellent ones, and the appeals court—I know this from just consulting my states’ appeals process info—will hear arguments that take the laws themselves to task.
Regarding the phrase “protective order,” it may be the case there as it’s the case here in Arizona that this is just the form of restraining order that’s entered when there’s a familial or domestic tie between the parties. The phrase is an inflammatory one and suggests grave danger, but it may have been the most applicable order in light of the parties’ history and their sharing parenthood of a child. Since the public is clueless to this fact, though, someone’s having a “protection order” issued to him or her makes that person sound like a public menace. It’s a disgrace and a moral outrage. When you consider the toll on a young mother and by extension her baby, this is nothing short of state-sponsored child abuse. The state is in effect doing what the restraining order was conceived to prevent: battering a mother and child.
I’ve also remarked, exactly as you rightly have, that entitlement to state protection really boils down to who reaches the courthouse steps first. Ridiculous, but completely true. You might scan through some of what I’ve written in the last few months to see if any of the arguments are ones that could help you or prompt ideas of your own. Plagiarize at will.
Facts and truth get eclipsed by loud words like “harassment,” “danger,” and “protection order.” Rhetoric rules, and unless you vigorously attack these things at the onset, that eclipse becomes total. If these things are allowed to set, the court won’t even listen to the original facts. Most people fail to pour everything they have into this at the beginning (because they’re naturally floored by it and totally at sea), and are then barred by “claim preclusion” (res judicata) from even having the court assess whether the germinal facts warranted state interference in the first place.
This system is basically a lock. There are huge political investments in maintaining the status quo, judges are complacent and obsequious, and the court has no problem glossing over details or force-fitting conclusions onto the facts to preserve the façade of doing righteous good works and keeping civil order.
Even appeals to the family, which you’d expect to be heeded in a situation where the father is a church leader, prove fruitless. Everyone’s glad for a persuasive lie to piggyback on, and something like this goes a long way toward exculpating the pastor’s boy from the damning finger of blame: “It’s not his fault the girl is crazy.” I’ve never known anything like this process to make human vulgarity more pronounced. The liberal folks on NPR—love ‘em as I do—imagine these kinds of judicial travesties only occur in Russia. And imagine, too, that the people who decry them are cranks.
Anyway, Craig, you’re the one doing God’s work. I’m not a religious person, but I don’t hesitate to say bless you for doing it (and to add that if the pastor has his cosmogony right, he and his son will have plenty of opportunity to reflect on their conduct in heaven’s basement).
I should have some time next week—I’ve been tied up helping a friend who’s going back to school after a 25-year absence—and I’ll do what I can to propose some arguments you might use even if I can’t find any legal cases that might support you. The budgetary constraints of the last six years have made it so even the local law library doesn’t have access to Westlaw. And the Internet is a total crapshoot.
Hang tough.
Todd
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I hope you’ve had better luck trying to pull up some precedents to cite, Craig, than I have. I gave it a go, and I’ll let you know if something presents itself. What I would like to extend is any help I can give you with document preparation. My background is in English and literature. You’re obviously much more experienced and knowledgeable than I am about the law, but if I can help at all with niggling writerly tasks like proofreading or grammar, please don’t hesitate to ask. Your endeavor is a noble one. If you click the hyperlink at the bottom of any of the posts on this blog, you can email me privately. I wish you every success in your efforts. Best,
Todd
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Look for your state at Judgepedia.
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My ex-husband got a Restrasining Order served on me only because I knocked on his door and asked about bank records…..I did not even ENTER the premises…..I WAS NOT A THREAT — and there was NO domestic violence whatsoever…..THIS IS A RIDICULOUS ABUSE OF THE LAW, Right?? He’s trying to hang onto property that he SHOULD NOT have….After 14 years of marriage, all I got from him was a kick in the pants and the GRAND THEFT of all of my Property….
KARIN
Paralegal/Writer & Teacher
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The outrages of this process are so numerous. You try to act civilly, and you’re subject to attack by the court. What should you have done, sued your ex-husband to recover your property instead of asking for it? There are seriously still people out there who defend this process who don’t know that greed and malice are among the most common motives of its applicants.
You’re a paralegal, and I’ve been contacted by more than one attorney who’s been abused by this process and whose credentials and legal expertise were worthless, because proof isn’t required of the plaintiff, and most of what supports a restraining order isn’t capable of being substantiated, anyway: “She was threatening. I was afraid for my life.” And you will seriously hear actual sitting judges parrot the words of plaintiffs as if because they’re the words of restraining order plaintiffs they must be true. These judges have been trained to assume that’s the case (and then defend their assumption, even when it’s shown to be obviously wrong).
The court seems to follow this screwball syllogism:
Women are angels.
Most restraining order applicants are women.
Therefore most restraining order applicants are angels.
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Visit this online petition, Karin, and consider signing it:
Stop False Allegations of Domestic Violence
And pass it along, too. This isn’t a petition I started, but it’s one I found when I began this blog two years ago. It had fewer than 3,000 signatures then. That number has grown by over 400% in 24 months.
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