In many criminal cases involving a victim, like Domestic Violence or Sexual Assault in Greeley, Erie, or Evans, a mandatory protection order will be entered preventing the defendant from having contact with the victim. Sometimes other restrictions are added to the protection order, like no contact with anyone under the age of 18 or no alcohol use. If any of these conditions are violated, then Violation of a Protection Order can be charged. A teacher is facing this crime after using social media to contact her foster child, with whom she was alleged to have a sexual relationship with when he was 15. It can be especially harmful to the underlying criminal case, when the person gets a new charge while the original case is pending and the new charge is related to the same victim.
Weld County Violation of a Protection Order Lawyer: Definition of Violation of a Protection Order
The Weld, Morgan, and Logan County, Colorado law definition of Violation of a Protection Order, as it relates to the case above – C.R.S. 18-6-803.5(1)(a) – is:
(a) Contacts, harasses, injures, intimidates, molests, threatens, or touches the protected person or protected property, including an animal, identified in the protection order or enters or remains on premises or comes within a specified distance of the protected person, protected property, including an animal, or premises or violates any other provision of the protection order to protect the protected person from imminent danger to life or health, and such conduct is prohibited by the protection order
Basically, if the protection order prohibits contact, it doesn’t matter if the contact is non-threatening. We have seen these charges stem from a defendant accidentally ‘friending’ a victim on Facebook, immediately removing the request, and the victim kept the notification and alerted the police. The problem in these situations is that the victim has all the power. They can reach out to you with no repercussion, but if you respond, you are opening yourself up to new potential charges.
If you or someone you love has been charged with Volation of a Protection Order, be smart, exercise your right to remain silent, and contact the best criminal defense attorneys from the O’Malley Law Office at 970-616-6009.
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