Restraining Orders

In general, a person who is subject to a protection order (the “respondent”) has to obey all of the terms of the order as they relate to the petitioner and any other protected parties. Therefore, an additional protected party doesn’t necessarily need his/her own order to be protected. However, one issue that may arise is if the respondent violates the order against the additional protected party. If the police are called, it’s possible that the police would take a police report from the additional protected party and make an arrest based on a violation of the order against him/her.

However, if the police do not act (or if a person doesn’t feel comfortable going to the police), normally the petitioner has the option to file a contempt motion (violation petition) in court. Since the additional protected person is not a “party” in the protection order case, it may mean that the petitioner would need to be the one to file a violation petition and to seek contempt for a violation against the additional protected party – and it’s possible that the petitioner may not want to do that. In legal terms, the additional protected party likely may not have legal “standing” (the legal right) to file a violation petition in court. However, one way to get around that might be if the additional protected party files something called a “motion to intervene,” which basically means the person is asking for permission to join the case. If that motion is granted, then the additional protected party may be able to file his/her own violation petition.

Therefore, as you can see, there could be pros and cons in the decision whether an additional protected party would want to file his/her own order. A pro for filing is that the person may more easily be able to report a violation of the order. A con is all of the time, effort, and possible expense that comes with starting a new case. Also, one thing to consider is that there is a chance that the additional protected person wouldn’t meet the relationship requirements with the abuser to qualify for his/her own order. It’s also possible that the abuser may not have committed an “act of abuse” directly against the additional protected party so s/he may not meet the legal grounds for getting an order. You can read about the legal grounds and the relationship requirements for getting a domestic violence restraining order (and other types of orders) [HYPERLINK] on our website.

For legal advice specific to your situation, you may want to consult with a lawyer. We link to free legal services organizations [HYPERLINK] on our website.