Legally Speaking by Cassandra Savoy, Esq. OP/ED
This is how the New Jersey Prevention of Domestic Violence Act works in New Jersey. One party, for our example, your girlfriend either shows up at the courthouse or at the local police station claiming that you two share a child and that you have abused her. The allegation is that you “grabbed her wrist” (simple assault) and “prevented her from leaving” (criminal restraint) after having followed her in your car for the past week (stalking) and sending her 300 text messages and leaving 100 voicemail messages during the week (harassment).
You finally caught up with her when you sneaked into her house from the deck, (criminal trespass) you stole her phone to prevent her from calling the police (criminal mischief) and you threatened to kill her if she refused to at least hear you out. (terroristic threats). She tells a judge about this sad sequence of events and he issues a temporary restraining order. So now what!
You say she’s off her rocker because when she alleges that all of these events were happening, you were home sick with a cold. You did not speak to anyone during the week, you were too sick to talk on the phone. You spent the week sipping hot tea and downing cough medicine. You don’t have any witnesses.
She tells the judge about all of the other times when you harassed her or stalked her or took possession of her phone to make her bend to your will. She cries and if you didn’t know better, you would have believed her.
The judge considers the six factors the statute requires: history of domestic violence, her immediate danger, the financial circumstances of the parties, and the best interest of the victim and the child. Thank goodness there are no prior restraining orders for him to consider.
At the end of the day, the judge believes her, particularly when she starts to cry and tell him how afraid she was when you threatened to kill her, and the judge issues a Final Restraining Order. We refer to the final restraining order as an “FRO”. You are 20, and she is 19 when all of this occurs. The baby is a year old.
The Penalties
Because she is “so very afraid of you,” the judge determines that to protect her and the child’s safety, girlfriend and the baby are allowed to relocate to California to live with grandma. Because there is an FRO, you are not provided an address where your child is located, but you do get a cell phone number, the right to Facetime every day between 4 and 7 PST (7 PM and 10 PM eastern standard time) to see the baby and to speak with her. You get two weeks every summer and Christmas when the baby is three years old.
This is bad. This is really bad. Your heart breaks. The judge could order a fine between $50 and $500, and because you have frightened girlfriend nearly to death, you get the high end. Your fine is $500. You pay up, and try to hope summer comes early.
Three months after she moves to California, the grandmother dies, she gets a new cell phone, moves to another location, and you lose all contact with her (not such a big deal) and the baby! Your heart is broken. You miss your daughter. Your parents miss their grandchild!
You plough on. You finish Essex County College, and then go on to Rutgers where you earn a decree and you are on your way to being a teacher and a fine upstanding member of society. . . or so you think.
A conviction under the New Jersey Prevention of Domestic Violence Act results in some of the harshest penalties in the country. Not only could your contact with your children be restricted or loss completely, but entry into the National domestic violence registry could have a devastating impact on your life.
Once a final restraining order is issued, you will be fingerprinted, your DNA taken, and your name recorded in the NATIONAL domestic violence registry. Many employers will check the registry as the do the background check before you are offered employment. Unfortunately, if your name appears in the registry, you are not likely to get the job, and you certainly are not likely to get a teaching job in New Jersey. And, oh! Did I mention that the registry is a “national” registry? This means that even if you move to Texas, you could be denied employment in Texas because the Texas employer can check the registry as well.
Did I mention the part about if your name gets into the registry, it is virtually impossible to remove it? Did I mention that an FRO in New Jersey do not expire? An FRO issued in New Jersey is valid and enforceable forever, at least until you die, and the only way to vacate a FRO is for the “victim” to come into court and ask the judge to vacate the order. She has to testify that circumstances have changed, and she no longer fears you.
In our case, you have not seen the girlfriend (nor your child) in years. You have no idea where she is, and to complicate matters there are federal laws on the books that prevent the post office from revealing her address. The problem is further complicated by the fact that you can’t even speak with her to see if she will vacate the order without violating the no contact order.
But you have indirectly heard from her when you got a notice from the court that girlfriend seeks child support, and the court orders you to pay $125 per week for the support of the child. The fact that you have no parenting time, the fact that you have not seen the child in years, nor the fact that none of this is fair because the whole thing is based on a lie will justify not paying child support.
The Moral of the Story
You have to make hard choices. If you don’t, the penalties can consume your entire life. The best time to fight a restraining order is at the beginning. Do not think that because she is lying, that the truth will come out, and the judge will see in an instant that this is all made up. It is a lot cheaper to put up a good legal fight early than to try to untangle the web later.
