Domestic Violence Law

Assaults against an unmarried person living with an offender “as a spouse” identifies a class of persons protected by Ohio domestic violence statutes and doesn’t create or recognize any legal relationship approximating marriage, the Ohio Supreme Court held Wednesday. ( Opinion and Court’s summary )

At issue was the question of whether a portion of Ohio’s domestic violence law which identifies persons living together as husband & wife, conflicted with a 2004 amendment to the state’s constitution which prohibits the “creation or recognition of a legal status for relationships of unmarried individuals that intends to approximate the design, qualities, significance or effect of marriage.” The majority opinion said it doesn’t.

Justice Judith Ann Lanzinger disagreed. “The constitutional problem does not arise because cohabitating unmarried persons are included as one of the several groups to whom the domestic violence statutes apply,” she said. “Instead, the problem is definitional: by using the term ‘living as a spouse’ to identify persons whom the statutes protect and against whom prosecution may be instituted, the General Assembly inherently equates cohabitating unmarried persons with those who are married and extends the domestic violence statutes to those persons because their relationship approximates the significance or effect of marriage.”



Meanwhile, a pilot program in New Jersey is being implemented under which domestic violence complaints are going to be able to be filed electronically, and temporary restraining orders obtained, at night and on weekends when some 40% of domestic violence cases occur according to court officials. (Press Release)

Funded by a grant from the federal STOP Violence Against Women Act, the pilot was first introduced in two townships in 2002; being expanded in 2003 and 2005. The New Jersey Supreme Court has now approved it statewide, though implementation could take about six months, according to a Law.com article yesterday morning. (See Court’s order and Notice to Bar)