GLASTONBURY, CONNECTICUT · FAMILY LAW + FAMILY-VIOLENCE DEFENSE
You will be in court the next business day. That is how Connecticut handles family violence arrests, and it is faster than almost anything else in the criminal system.
National Domestic Violence Hotline: 1-800-799-7233
CT Safe Connect: (888) 774-2900 — 24/7, by call, text, chat, or email
Do not contact the protected person. Not to apologize, not to explain, not through a friend or a relative, not through your children. If a protective order enters tomorrow, contact becomes a new criminal charge — and that is the most common way a manageable case turns into a serious one.
Do not go back to the house until you know what the order says.
Do not post about it. Anything you write can end up in two different courtrooms.
Write down what happened while it is fresh, for your lawyer only. Not a statement to anyone else.
Say less than you want to. The urge to explain yourself is overwhelming and it is almost always the wrong instinct.
Connecticut police must make an arrest where they have probable cause to believe a family violence crime occurred. The complaining person cannot call it off, and the case does not end because they ask it to. The decision belongs to the State.
Where both people made allegations, officers are directed to identify the dominant aggressor rather than arrest both.
The court’s Family Violence Intervention Unit interviews both people and prepares a report with a recommendation for the judge. This happens quickly, usually the morning of arraignment.
That interview matters. It is not a casual conversation, and what you say becomes part of what the judge reads.
The court sets conditions of release and decides whether to enter a criminal protective order. Orders come in tiers — some bar contact entirely, some bar you from the residence, some are narrower.
An order can keep you out of a home you own or rent, and can restrict contact with your children, before anything has been proven.
If a protective order is entered and you disagree with it, you can ask for a hearing. That hearing is frequently the most consequential thing available early in a case, and people routinely waive it without knowing it existed.
The case proceeds on the family violence docket. Depending on the charge and your record, the Family Violence Education Program may be available — a diversionary program that ends in dismissal on satisfactory completion.
If you also have a divorce or custody case, the two will run at once, in different courthouses, affecting each other.
What a Connecticut criminal protective order restricts, how it differs from a standing criminal protective order, and how to contest one.
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Connecticut’s pretrial diversionary program for family violence cases. Who is eligible, what it requires, and how dismissal actually works.
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An arrest during a separation creates two cases on two schedules. How a protective order affects custody, and why the two cases cannot be handled in isolation.
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The charges Connecticut brings after a domestic incident, what each one is, and how they are classified. Assault, threatening, disorderly conduct, and more.
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The 24-hour surrender rule, what a family violence conviction means for firearm rights under state and federal law, and the consequences that outlast the case.
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Arrested for a family violence offense in Connecticut? What happens at arraignment, what a protective order does, and how the Family Violence Education Program works.
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Every case starts with a conversation about what you’re facing and what it would take to handle it.
