May 01, 2018. By William Kroger.

Time's Up for Domestic Violence - Time's Up for Keeping Silent

The #MeToo and Time's Up movements have roused society's conscious needle to reach the floodmark line.

Long before there was a #MeToo and Time's Up movement, California took Domestic Violence very seriously. In the court rooms of California, the trauma and emotional shock to victims of abuse has always been seen as a black eye on our communities.

Surviving an abusive relationship can leave you with lifelong emotional scars. Domestic Violence charges include along with physically harm, sexual abuse, intimidation, and threats to deprive, or the deprivation of access to your normal customary level of comfort and routine as you go about your daily life.

According to the California Partnership to End Domestic Violence, 40% of women in California experience some form of domestic violence. Nationwide statistics indicate every minute nearly 20 people suffer physical violence at the hands of a loved one. That figure adds up to over 10 million people annually affected by domestic violence.

Cancer.org tracking shows the number of new cancer cases and cancer deaths each year. On a national basis, the risk of being diagnosed with cancer at some point during one's lifetime is substantially smaller than the risk is of being injured or wounded by an intimate partner.

To press charges against your assailant you do not need to have sustained life-threatening wounds, and you need not be a spouse. Your legal rights extend to any close and intimate relationship. You can be a former spouse, a cohabitant or former cohabitant, a past or present girlfriend, boyfriend, or fiancé.

If circumstances necessitate you getting a restraining order, know that you need only to prove that there has been a threat made to harm you and/or your minor child to file for the petition. California also allows partners or family members to petition judges to remove firearms from those individuals who pose a threat.

But California domestic violence laws are of no use if victims of battery are too frightened and intimated to say Time's Up and hire a lawyer. Do not fear if you inflicted injuries in self-defense. As your criminal attorney, my job is to ensure you cannot be convicted. As your criminal attorney, my job is to make sure your rights are protected.

If you've been domestically abused, you need a domestic violence criminal lawyer to defend and protect you and your dignity.

Contact our law office today to confidentially discuss your case.