A “restraining order” is a Court order issued to prevent the recurrence of acts of abuse by a batterer. According to the Domestic Violence Prevention Act of the State of California, abuse is defined as any of the following:

• Intentionally or recklessly causing or attempting to cause bodily injury.
• Sexual assault.
• Placing a person in reasonable apprehension of imminent serious bodily injury to that person or to another.
• Engaging in any behavior that has been or could be enjoined such as molesting, attacking, striking, stalking, threatening, battering, harassing, telephoning, destroying personal property, contacting the other by mail or otherwise, disturbing the peace of the other party.

The act(s) of abuse/violence must be recent, within thirty days, and the batterer must be a spouse, ex-spouse, boyfriend/girlfriend, ex-boyfriend/ex-girlfriend, someone with whom the victim has or has had a dating relationship, an immediate family member (mother, father, in-laws, siblings, adult children), or a person with whom a party has a child(ren) together. A victim that is a target of abuse but does not have the necessary relationship to the batterer may file a civil harassment restraining order, discussed below.

A party may request an order for custody and visitation through a restraining order. The family law court may issue a Temporary Domestic Violence Restraining Order if the family law court finds that reasonable grounds have been asserted to believe that an immediate and present danger of domestic violence exists as defined above or that a child is in immediate and present danger of abuse or abduction and that an emergency protective order is necessary to prevent the occurrence or reoccurrence of domestic violence, child abuse or child abduction.

The restraining order can include the following: restraints on personal conduct by the batterer; orders for the batterer to stay-away from the victim's home/work and/or children's school; orders for the batterer to be removed from the residence; child custody and visitation and support orders and other miscellaneous orders.