Domestic violence
restraining orders.
If you or your children are in immediate danger, call 911 first. Then read this.
Getting protected
Emergency protective orders are available 24/7.
Law enforcement can obtain an EPO from an on-call judge at any hour. It lasts only a handful of days — long enough to get to court and ask for a temporary restraining order yourself.
A temporary order can issue the same day you ask.
A TRO is decided on your written request, often without the other party present, and stays in place until a hearing — typically within about three weeks. That hearing is where a longer order, up to five years, is decided.
A DVRO does more than order someone to stay away.
It can require an abuser to move out of a shared home, set temporary custody and visitation, order support, grant use of a vehicle or pet, and require the surrender of firearms.
What matters at the hearing
Specific incidents beat general fear.
Dates, what was said, what was done, who saw it, what you did afterward. Abuse includes threats, harassment, stalking, and coercive control — not only physical violence — but it has to be described concretely.
Evidence you already have.
Photographs, texts and voicemails, medical records, police report numbers, and witnesses. Preserve messages rather than deleting them, however much you want them gone.
The custody consequences are significant.
A DV finding creates a presumption against awarding custody to the restrained parent, and weighs against them on spousal support. This is why these hearings are contested hard, and why the presentation matters.
If an order is sought against you
Do not ignore it, and do not violate it.
A restraining order against you can cost you your home, your firearms, your custody, and — if you are licensed or hold certain jobs — your livelihood. Violating it is a separate crime, even if the protected person invited the contact.
You have a right to be heard.
The hearing is your opportunity to respond with evidence, not just denials. Requests are sometimes brought for tactical advantage in a custody case; showing that takes preparation, not indignation.
When a restraining order and criminal charges run together
The same incident can produce a family-court restraining order and a criminal prosecution at the same time. They are separate cases, on separate calendars, with separate judges — and what you do in one can decide the other.
Two orders, two courts.
The criminal court will usually issue its own protective order at arraignment. It is not the same document as the family-court DVRO, and it may have different terms — a no-contact criminal order can be stricter than a family order that allows peaceful contact for custody exchanges. When the two conflict, the more restrictive one controls. You are expected to comply with both.
Anything you say in family court can be used against you.
Your responsive declaration, your testimony at the DVRO hearing, and your statements in mediation are all available to the prosecutor. Testifying to defend your family case can hand the district attorney the admission it lacked. This is the central tension of a parallel case, and it is why the two matters have to be strategized as one.
Continuances, and why they are sometimes right.
Where the Fifth Amendment problem is real, the restrained party can ask the family court to continue the hearing until the criminal case resolves, with the temporary order remaining in place. Judges often grant it. The cost is living under the temporary order longer; the benefit is not testifying while charges are pending.
A criminal conviction changes the custody analysis.
A domestic violence conviction within the last five years triggers a statutory presumption against awarding custody to the convicted parent. A DVRO finding does the same. Either one can also mean a batterer's intervention program, firearms relinquishment, and immigration consequences that outlast both cases.
If you are the protected party.
You do not control the criminal case — the district attorney does, and it can proceed even if you ask that it not. Your family case is where you have standing: custody, support, exclusive use of the home, and the terms of the order itself. Dropping the DVRO does not drop the charges.
The criminal side is covered in our domestic violence guide.
Who pays the attorney fees
Restraining order cases are one of the few places in family law where winning shifts your fees to the other side. Family Code § 6344 was rewritten effective January 1, 2023, and the rule is deliberately asymmetrical.
A prevailing petitioner is entitled to fees.
On request, after notice and a hearing, the court shall order the restrained party to pay a prevailing petitioner's attorney fees and costs. This is no longer discretionary and no longer need-based — the petitioner does not have to show that they cannot afford their own lawyer. The only gate is that the court must first find under § 270 that the party ordered to pay has, or is reasonably likely to have, the ability to pay.
A prevailing respondent has a much harder road.
Defeating a request does not, by itself, entitle you to fees. The court may award them only if the respondent proves by a preponderance of the evidence that the petition was frivolous or solely intended to abuse, intimidate, or cause unnecessary delay — and the petitioner must also have the ability to pay. The Legislature did not want the risk of a fee award deterring people from seeking protection.
The general family-law fee statutes still apply.
Where the parties are also in a divorce, parentage, or custody case, need-based fees under §§ 2030 and 7605 and sanctions under § 271 are separately available. A respondent who cannot meet the frivolousness standard may still have a need-based claim in the underlying case.
You still have to ask.
The statute is mandatory only "upon request." A request in writing is best, but made orally at the hearing it counts. Support it with a declaration of hours and rates and with income information for the other side, since ability to pay has to be found before anything is ordered. Fee awards are routinely lost by parties who won the hearing and never asked.
The Domestic Violence Prevention Act, and the cases that define how these hearings are actually run.
Authorities current as of 2026. Case law changes; nothing here is a substitute for advice on your own facts.
Get answers about your situation.
This guide is general information — a consultation is where it becomes advice.
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