Legal Blog - Domestic Violence

Increased Domestic Abuse during the Covid-19 (Coronavirus) crisis is a concern and support groups and the Massachusetts Probate and Family Court are available to those in need.…

Abuse Prevention orders (209A) have serious impacts on divorce proceedings. A 209A is a civil protective order requested by one party against another pursuant to Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 209A. A violation of a 209A is a criminal offense. Once it is ordered, vacating this orders (209A) is no small feat. M…

Anti-Abuse Advertising – Kids are abused every day. Unfortunately, sometimes the abuser is a family member or another adult that convinces the child to keep his or her silence. Whether the child’s parents are going through a divorce, caught in the middle of a parenting dispute or being abuse…

The recent shooting of police officer Kevin Ambrose in Springfield, MA draws attention to the unpredictability of domestic violence or abusive relationship. The officer was shot responding to a domestic incident between a boyfriend and girlfriend. The shooter was a corrections officer on Rikers Isla…

This post concludes the three-part series on Massachusetts Harassment Prevention Orders. In Liew v. Stansfield, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court focused on the type of speech involved and whether or not that type of speech was exempt from the harassment definition . A different Massachusetts…