peace orders | TALKING BACK to restraining orders

What’s legal when it comes to a restraining order against me? Can I send her flowers, legally?”

—Recent search term leading to this blog

The answer to the latter question is no. Sending flowers is a violation of a restraining order and grounds for arrest. “I Did Time for Calling FTD” would, however, be a great title for a feature story.

What these questions highlight are two very important facts, both of which are absurd and expose how mindlessly automated the restraining order process has become.

The first of these important facts is that the nanny state issues restraining orders carelessly, tactlessly, and callously. Their recipients are completely bewildered, and no one actually explains to them what a restraining order signifies, what its specific prohibitions are, or anything else. If a cop is involved, s/he may impress upon a restraining order recipient that the court’s order should be “taken very seriously.” (“What should be taken very seriously?” “The court’s order!”) That’s it. Not one person involved even inquires, for example, whether the restraining order recipient is sighted (as opposed to stone blind), mentally competent, or knows how to read. Restraining orders are casually dispensed (millions of them, each year) and then, unless they’re violated intentionally or accidentally (and motive doesn’t matter; the cops swoop in, regardless), they’re dispensed with: “NEXT!” “NEXT!” “NEXT!” It’s a revolving-door process that’s administered by conveyor belt but enforced with rigorous menace. That’s the first important fact.

The second important fact is that someone can be jailed (incarcerated, locked up, put away) for sending flowers.

The answer to this question is yes, which doesn’t mean the answer is a simple yes. Laws, which vary from state to state, may disallow mutual orders. What mutual means is that both parties’ restraining orders would issue under the same case number. Even though mutual orders may be prohibited in your state, provisions exist enabling you to obtain a restraining order against your accuser under a separate petition (that is, a separate action with a different case number).

This applies irrespective of whether your state refers to the instrument you seek as a “protection order,” “injunction against harassment,” “peace order,” etc.

Cross-petitioners who meet with resistance must be assertive. More than one resident of Illinois, for example, has reported having to really put his foot down to be afforded consideration by the court (consult the cited statute below to see why). If you’ve been wrongly accused by the actual harasser, abuser, stalker, or “dangerous party” in a relationship, you must make it clear in bald and urgent terms that that party is out to ruin you and that you daily fear for your safety.

Statutory specifics relevant to mutual orders are listed below state by state. This chart, reduced to fit the strictures of this space, was assembled by the American Bar Association in 2009 and can be found here in its original size as a downloadable PDF.

TALKING BACK to restraining orders

THEY’RE NOT JUST ABUSED BUT ABUSIVE

Tag peace orders

“You Don’t Send Me Flowers Anymore”: About the Revolving-Door Policy of the Restraining Order Process, Its Administration by Conveyor Belt, and Its Being Arguably Ridiculous

“Can I Get a Restraining Order against the Same Person Who Got One on Me?”