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Orders of Protection--also referred to as Restraining Orders or Stay Away Orders. They can be obtained in criminal court or Family, Juvenile or other courts having jurisdiction over family issues. In criminal court the victim is represented by the prosecutor. A temporary order is generally issued when charges are brought and a permanent order comes after a conviction or guilty plea. In Family and similar courts, the woman can represent herself or retain an attorney. If she has limited resources she may be entitled to an appointed lawyer, but she needs to ask. To get an Order of Protection, women must claim that a family member (this is defined differently in each state but certainly includes spouses and parents with a child in common.) has committed a criminal act. This does not require bruises, broken bones, serious injury or even physical assault. Any nonconsensual touching, threats of bodily harm, harassment like yelling, screaming and cursing, throwing objects at her or other similar offensive conduct is sufficient. Since it is not a criminal case, the charges do not have to be proven. beyond a reasonable doubt. The testimony of the victim is usually sufficient. The order tells the abuser what behaviors he must avoid. These behaviors cannot be waived by the other party. If the order requires the man to stay away from the home or his partner, he must do so even if she invites him. Orders requiring the abuser to leave the home are important because it takes domestic violence seriously and without such provision innocent women and children are often forced to leave for their own safety. A standard abuser tactic is to seek mutual orders of protection. If he violates the order he tells the police that she violated his order and the police give her the choice of them arresting both or neither. Women and courts must resist attempts to obtain mutual orders of protection.
Custody--Even in cases where there are all sorts of charges and countercharges about horrible behavior, when it comes to deciding custody, the basic issue is who is the primary parent. This is usually the mother and it is important for her to inform the court about the routine child care activities like; cooking, feeding, dressing, teaching, reading, playing, discipline, participating in activities and caring for a child who is sick. The father may have done some of this, but usually the mother is much more involved. A standard abuser tactic is for him to tell the mother she will lose custody if she leaves because of some real or imagined charge. Too often, women stay with
an abuser because she is afraid she will lose custody over an issue that he can't prove or is not important. A court should not listen to a man saying he should have custody because his wife is unfit if he regularly leaves the children to her care. In such cases, his actions speak louder then his words. Another common abuser tactic is seeking joint custody. Such a request seems benign (too often to the courts), but is often misunderstood. Joint custody is not about visitation. A father can have normal visitation without custody. Instead, it is used to control his ex-partner. Joint custody is generally a bad idea and should never be considered where the father has been abusive. Many decisions affect the parent living with the children more, but joint custody requires equal rights in decision-making. The father may prefer a particular doctor or school, but the mother has to spend the time and money doing the extra traveling. Even worse, if the parties cannot agree, the mother must accept the father's decision or face the expense and delay of going to court. Many issues require a decision before a court could possibly make one. Joint custody can only work if both parties are on good terms (which is rare after a divorce) and can cooperate regarding the children. If this is the case, the father's ideas will be strongly considered in the best interests of the children. If the father is abusive, however, joint custody will continue the nightmare. Abusers often ask for custody as a tactic in order to gain a better financial deal. Too often mothers have been placed in a position of trading money for custody. Often the fathers had little interest or involvement with the children before the divorce. Attorneys for mothers in such cases should make the courts aware that the abuser is playing the "custody card" rather than having a sincere interest in the children. Good judges have many tools available to thwart such tactics.
Visitation--Until recently most courts considered domestic violence (meaning fathers' abuse against mothers) to be irrelevant. States have made various degrees of progress in changing their response to domestic violence. Most states have at least decided that domestic violence must be considered in deciding custody and visitation. Some states have gone further and created a rebuttable presumption that abusers should not have custody. No states have thus far treated domestic violence as a form of child abuse which it is. Fathers are generally treated as having a right to visitation even if they committed the must heinous abuse to the children. Such visitation will be supervised but usually the children will be forced to come for the visitation even if it is harmful to them. In order to limit visitation to supervised, the mother must show that the father is not a fit parent. Usually this would involve serious physical abuse or substance abuse. Abusers often use visitation exchanges to continue their abuse. Courts usually don't pay sufficient attention to protecting women and children during the exchanges. Some supervised visitation programs also have supervised exchanges. Alternatively a court can mandate exchanges at a police station, public place or at the very least require the father to stay in the car while the children walk to and from their home. Visitation can vary based on availability or other circumstances. "Normal visitation" tends to be something like every other weekend, possibly one day during the week for a few hours, at least two weeks of summer vacation and sharing holidays.
Support----Each state has its own formula for child support usually based on a percentage of the non-custodial parent's income. Usually the court will also require that medical insurance for the children be continued and that the parents share any child care or unreimbursed medical expenses proportionally based upon the parties' income. Where the father is a salaried employee, the support is relatively straight-forward. When he has his own business and particularly a cash business men are often successful in hiding income and assets. Sometimes you can prove income by showing the past expenses. A parent cannot avoid the child support obligation by quitting a job or deliberately taking a lower paying job. Abusers often threaten that they will pay no support if she leaves, but often the court can make him pay. Maintenance or alimony can be awarded where one party has little or no income especially in a long term marriage or where the mother was staying home with young children. Such awards are less by formula and more based on the court's belief of what is fair. The court will consider factors like income of the parties; ability of wife to work; duration of the marriage, health of the parties and the need to care for young children. Gradually more tools are available to enforce support orders. When possible, an income execution order is particularly helpful against abusers because it takes away his choice about paying. If an abuser refuses to pay court ordered support, application can be made to attach tax returns or other govt. payments; take away drivers or professional licenses; attach assets and hold him in contempt. Federal law makes it illegal to cross state lines to avoid child support.
Marital Property--Most states have a system to divide marital property based either on community property or equitable distribution. Under community property the assets of both parties are divided equally regardless of when or how they were acquired. Under equitable distribution the parties would divide the property and debts obtained during the marriage. Usually assets obtained by gift, inheritance or personal injury lawsuit are not part of the marital property to be divided. The property will be divided regardless of whose name the property is in. Do not forget property such as pensions, licenses and businesses. As with support, abusers often seek to hide assets particularly from cash businesses. Although equitable distribution usually means dividing property equally it is sometimes possible to have a different percentage division of property.
Criminal Prosecution--There was a time not that long ago when only murders or something very close to murder was prosecuted when the offense was committed against a spouse. Gradually this has changed in law and then in practice. Furthermore, since 1993 marital rape and sexual abuse are crimes in every state. Accordingly any assault or other non-consensual touching is a crime. There are also crimes that do not require something physical such as threats, harassment and stalking. Men commit domestic violence in part because they have learned there are no significant consequences to them for committing acts of domestic violence. By prosecuting men for domestic violence crimes, society is telling the men that this behavior is not acceptable. Some states still use counseling or anger management classes as a method of responding to domestic violence crimes. This is a mistake because men do not commit the crimes because of mental health or anger reasons. Using such methods sends the wrong message by suggesting men are not responsible for their own behavior.