Join us on The Best of Johnston County Podcast for a vital discussion on domestic violence with insights from 24 years of family law experience. This episode dives deep into the complexities of domestic violence, its impact on child custody, and the legal protections available to victims.
Gain understanding and discover resources that can offer help in challenging times. Listen to hear how community and law interplay to support and protect those affected by domestic violence.
Jonathan Breeden: Domestic violence, there are technical answers to that and there are common sense answers to that. And a lot of stuff can be what is domestic violence? To me, it's any act of aggression, whether it be verbal or physical between two partners, whether they are same sex, heterosexual, whatever.
And it can also be among family members as well. And I think people sort of
lose track of that, whether it's father-son, mother-child, sister-brother sister, sister, you know, but most commonly you think of acts of aggression between either spouses or people that have been in a romantic relationship or in a romantic relationship with each other.
And some of those can be physical but a lot of those are verbal.
And,
community, is ready to take [:Jonathan Breeden: Hello, and welcome to another edition of The Best of Johnston County Podcast. I'm your host, Jonathan Breeden. And today we have a special edition episode of The Best of County Podcast that we call Ask Jonathan Breeden Anything, where I will answer questions from our social media coordinator, Raena Burch, about some type of family law.
I do not really know what the questions are very often, but I probably know the answer is having practiced family law for around 24 years here in Johnston County. Our normal episodes is where I, Jonathan Breeden, interview local community leaders business owners and interesting people in Johnston County about what they love about Johnston County.
ounty Podcast come out every [:Raena Burch: I'm ready. You ready?
Jonathan Breeden: I'm ready.
Raena Burch: All right.
Jonathan Breeden: All right.
Raena Burch: So we've got a theme today. Let's see if we can guess what it First question, what is domestic violence and what does it include?
Jonathan Breeden: Domestic violence, you know, there are technical answers to that and there are common sense answers to that. And a lot of stuff can be what is domestic violence? To me, it's any act of aggression, whether it be verbal or physical between two partners, whether they are same sex, heterosexual, whatever.
And it can also be among family members as well. And I think people sort of lose track of that, whether it's father-son, mother-child, sister-brother, sister,
sister, but it, you know, but
romantic relationship or in [:And some of those can be physical but a lot of those and, are verbal.
And I think the verbal ones can do more damage than the physical acts of aggression between people, because I think what we've seen over the years here at the Breed L*aw* office is people don't recognize that the verbal taunts, the verbal insults are actually a form of domestic violence, but they recognize if somebody actually were to hit them, hold them down, choke them, that's domestic violence. But what they don't understand is the verbal is also domestic violence, saying you're fat, or you're ugly, or unattractive, or you're stupid or
Raena Burch: using it as a means to control
Jonathan Breeden: as a means of control. And, I think a lot of people come in here and they're like, well, I'm not a victim of domestic violence because I've never been hit.
that is just awful. But you [:I don't care if it's taking your car keys to where you can't leave. I don't care if it's verbal abuse of you or physical abuse of you. All of it is domestic violence and all of it has really no place in our society. And all of which is extremely damaging to both people involved. The person, The victim of it and the perpetrator.
Raena Burch: Yeah, I mean, it could be like you said, physical, mental, emotional, financial, all sorts of.
you know,
Jonathan Breeden: Correct. You cut somebody off from the credit cards. Don't have any other bank account. They're given $50 a week to buy groceries. Yeah we've seen it all over the years and it's not good.
aces, all different types of [:It's got the same characteristics, regardless of income, regardless of race, regardless of religion, it's all the same and it usually has to do with trying to gain control over another human being to where they feel like they don't have the free choice that we're all entitled to.
Raena Burch: Yeah. Alright. Number two, how does domestic violence impact child custody?
earn that this is how things [: ming majority were witnesses [:Raena Burch: They don't that.
Jonathan Breeden: They don't know that, right? Because the people they looked up to and mimic and respected the most, that's what they did. And so that's the thing. And so when it comes to custody, if there's been domestic violence, the children are aware of it or witnessed it or whatever, the perpetrator of that domestic violence is going to be limited in their ability to be able to parent their children, because the court will believe okay, well, this relationship's over.
bility to parent their child [:They have a HALT in Johnston County. They also have a program in Harnett County, where people that have perpetrated domestic violence for both verbal and physical can go to a 26 week course that has a six month follow up where they can learn how to be better and how not to react in these situations.
But the same thing, when you talk to. and it's often, and domestic violence goes both ways. And we've seen a lot of men that are victims of domestic violence from verbal abuse for women, not as much physical abuse on men from women. We've seen that some but we've seen a lot of men who've been verbally abused by women.
he time, it's a man verbally [:But we're like, look at these texts you sent. These texts are horrible. Like They're horrible. They're not good. They're not positive. You know, And I'm asking, like, you know, and the thing you have to ask yourself is, what I'm saying to my spouse, or the mother of my children or to a family member about is it in the best interest of the child that I say this?
dge and it's not going to go [:But now the other thing is, we just talked about, the judges are also aware that if you're a victim of domestic violence, the overwhelming odds are you're going to be a victim again. And while you may not be with this particular spouse or boyfriend that you have a child with, if you as a victim of domestic violence, don't go get help. Then the odds are the next relationship we're going to be in is going to be with somebody who's the same, who is also a batter, who's also verbally abusive.
So if you're a victim of that, you need to go get your own help, whether it's through Interact in Wake County, whether it's through Safe House in Harnett and Lee Counties, whether it's through Harbor House in Johnson County, all of these places have free 24 hour shelters. They have the free 24 hour hotlines that you can call.
eing in these situations and [:We don't have time to get into that today but it does affect, it affects child custody. And here's the thing, I have been in DSS Court where children have been placed in foster care. I don't know how many times because of just domestic violence to where the parents cannot stop the message.
They,
Even if they break up, the mom gets in another relationship with a person and there's domestic violence and the court needs to take the children out of the home. Or the dad or the mom stay together and the domestic violence continues. And the court has to come in and department services and remove the children out of the home so that they're not witnessing this anymore.
Tons [:So I think, if you're in that situation now, there's tons of resources to get out, interact, harbor, safe house. There's all those things. If you find that you cannot control your emotions and you can't hold your tongue, and you could not send that text, you know, there's tons of help out there for you through the DOSE program, the HALT program, all these programs around the state they're either low cost or free. And you need to do it because you need to be better, you need to be better for your kids and be better for everybody else in your life
Raena Burch: and your next partner.
Jonathan Breeden: Correct. And your next partner. Correct.
ple don't realize, you don't [:It could just be you witnessing it.
Jonathan Breeden: Correct.
Raena Burch: Repeated, like, that also makes you a victim of domestic violence, because you, especially as kids, when they feel like they can't do anything and they feel helpless. So I'm with you on all of that for sure. All right, next one. Three, what protections are available for victims of domestic violence?
Jonathan Breeden: The most common protection for the victim of domestic violence is to go get what is called a 50B North Carolina Domestic Violence Protective Order. And they're called 50Bs because they're under North Carolina General Statute 50B. And that is the most common, the easiest to obtain, and the most immediate protection that a victim of domestic violence can get.
with the programs that we've [:They actually have court advocates who help you fill out the paperwork and help you get in front of the judge and explain to your situation. And the court can give you, a judge can give you an immediate restraining order. If it happens to be over on a weekend or overnight or on a holiday when the courts are closed, you can go to your local magistrate, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year. The magistrates never close and they can give you a 50B restraining order as well. So there's no reason that you cannot go get one at any point that you need one. And it'll be immediate. It's ex parte based on what you say. The other side is not giving any notice of that.
e other side will be served. [:And there will be a trial in front of a judge where you will present your case as to why you believe that you qualify for a domestic violence protective order. There has to be a familiar relationship or a sexual relationship between you and the person who's perpetrating it that is either current or in the past.
And you also have to have some active domestic violence, which does not have to be physical. It can be verbal. And the verbal attacks have to rise to the level of substantial emotional distress, which basically causes you to be physically ill, which we see all the time from stomach aches to camp, to throwing up panic attacks, can't sleep, OCD tendencies.
All of that are outward signs of verbal abuse that can lead to being able to get a domestic violence protective order. And then of course the physical acts as well. But there's also the verbal abuse that if the other side commits to fights to commit suicide, that is a very common thing.
If you leave me, I [:And so at some point, if you
are, after you get the restraining order or whatever, you're going to need to go to regular custody, court and need to go to regular alimony court, and you'll need to go to regular property distribution court under the regular domestic courts to deal with these things on a more permanent basis.
ou get into those. They also [:You could then qualify for food stamps and Medicaid for your children. And all of those things can be made available to you. And these work groups can help you get those and help you navigate those. And you can of course, call an attorney, like the attorneys here at the Breeden Law Office.
We represent people in domestic violence situations every day, and we can help you guide you through this process as well and represent you in court.
ompassionate team at Breeden [:Raena Burch: All right. Number four, what are the potential legal consequences for domestic violence charges?
Jonathan Breeden: It depends, right? Because when you say legal consequences, you've got a very broad scope there.
So domestic violence can be criminal and it can be civil. So these restraining orders we're talking about are civil. Nobody's going to jail because somebody gets a restraining order. But if you violate a restraining order, that's one misdemeanor in North Carolina, punishable by five months in prison.
ted touching, if I swing and [:Jonathan Breeden: All of these are crimes. Okay. If I threatened to kill you, that's a crime of communicating a threat. If you have a reasonable belief that I'm going to carry that out. If I call you a hundred times in three hours, that is a crime. for the purposes of harassing you, that's a crime of harassing phone calls.
If I keep coming around where you are and calling and texting, I can be stalking. Stalking is a crime. So there are a lot of crimes that are domestic violence and they have the most severe penalties of any misdemeanors there are. And some of these are felonies, including any kind of assault by strangulation, if you put your hands around your neck, if there are any marks on your neck or whatever, that's a felony.
[:Similarly you can lose your, the ability to go to your home, you can lose your ability. And of course, if you can be committed of a crime, and it's got domestic violence, you want to have a weapon, these restraining orders can also civilly keep you from being able to own a gun, possess a gun. And a lot of people like to hunt, won't be able to do that anymore.
It will keep you from being able to go to your home. It can divest you of a car that maybe you paid for because the court gave the car to the other side because they needed a vehicle. You can lose pretty much everything. You can have be ordered to pay large sums of money and child support, alimony and post separate support.
ife a lot. And it's going to [:You know, These are training orders can say where you can and can't go. And that's not good. you know, Including your children's school, including your children's ballgames, you know, the things you start to take credit for as a parent, all of a sudden you can't do because you can't be around the other parent because it's not safe.
Raena Burch: Yeah.
Jonathan Breeden: So there are a lot of consequences. Financially, possibly your freedoms, freedom of movement by going to prison, freedom of movement on places you can go, your ability to defend yourself because you won't be able to out on a weapon, or possess a weapon. I mean, The consequences are substantial.
Raena Burch: Yeah.
Jonathan Breeden: And they can be substantial on a first offense as well. It's not one of these three strikes, you're out kind of things.
Raena Burch: No.
Jonathan Breeden: It can be substantial on the first offense. And oftentimes, it takes they say, on average of six acts of domestic violence before a victim actually does anything.
y comes in and they're like, [:you know, you're the Saying something like probably first time it happened.
Correct. It's not going to be the first time it happened. They're going to know that. And they're going to act accordingly in deciding what are the grant, these restraining orders or not.
Now, there are a lot of people that go and get it restraining orders, unfortunately, where it's not quite enough or they're using it for leverage in at a custody matching as well. And so that's where that 10 day hearing is so important because I can go in there and say whatever I want about you, Raena.
And as long as I'm swearing that it's true and it may not be true, they're going to give me that 10 day order. The good thing is it's only 10 days and you're going to be able to come back in there, and bring an attorney with you, and bring the evidence, and be able to have a trial, and defend yourself against what could be false allegations.
ake false claims of domestic [:I'm not saying that we see that every day. But we do see that more frequently than we would like because these domestic violence check to orders are needed. I'm glad we have them. They're some of the most difficult things we have to do, whether we're representing the perpetrator or representing the victim of domestic violence or the accused.
They may not even have done it. You know what I mean? Because we don't want this, particularly if they didn't do it. We don't want it following them. We don't want it on the record. We don't want their civil rights and their civil liberties to be taken away from them base false allegations. So we work really hard to try to defend people that have been falsely accused of domestic violence.
at maybe they will be better [:So it's not the end of the world either way. If you're a victim or if you may have done something that you regret, but you do need to get help. You do need to seek the resources that are in the community. You do need to talk to attorneys, family law attorneys, like the attorneys here at the Breed Law Office to find out what your rights are, to find out what the resources in the community are.
And that kind of stuff so that you can be better, so you can get back to being the hero of your life story, which is what we're trying to help everybody do that comes in to meet with us here at the Breen Law Office.
Yeah.
Raena Burch: And
Jonathan Breeden: I mean,
Raena Burch: any system out there, no matter what system it is, you're always going to have those few people that try to abuse the system.
But for the most part, I think it, it helps more than it hurts.
Jonathan Breeden: Correct. Correct.
s, when you hear about these [:the majority of the time, the murders and the real serious assaults take place after the victim has left the relationship. And the other side, it feels like they're losing control and they're not going to get them back. And then they sort of overreact and they can't imagine living without them. And then they kill them.
And then they often will kill themselves as a result, because now they killed them. They can't live without them. They can't bring it back. They don't want to go to prison for the rest of their life. And then they will kill themselves. And so it is oftentimes that the domestic violence victims are in the most danger in the first 30 days after they've actually separated, then when they are actually still in the home. And so that is unfortunate, but that is what we've seen.
Raena Burch: That's why
Jonathan Breeden: this,
Raena Burch: this
Jonathan Breeden: you know,
ere you are. They can't find [:Jonathan Breeden: Correct. And that's true. And it can be hard. It's hard to break out of these relationships. And one thing I would say is that if you are a victim of domestic violence, you should go and try to get whether these counseling sessions with these groups Harbor Interact Safe House, or even individual counseling yourself to work on gaining more self confidence.
ften pretty good people that [:And it's just not necessary but that's the way they see it.
Raena Burch: Instead of building themselves up, they try to bring the other person down.
Jonathan Breeden: Correct, Correct. And that's just really unfortunate situation. Um, But a part of all of the victims of domestic violence that at some level in their subconscious, believe what they're being told.
the perpetrator telling you [:And that's really the most important part.
Raena Burch: Counseling can absolutely help you break that.
Jonathan Breeden: Correct.
Raena Burch: That thought pattern and that behavior pattern.
Jonathan Breeden: Correct.
Raena Burch: Alright, last question. How can a family law attorney help in cases of domestic violence?
Jonathan Breeden: The family attorney can do a lot of things in the help of domestic violence.
They can represent you in a 50B hearing, whether you are the person seeking a 50B or you are the person that the 50B is against. So either in prosecuting the restraining order or defending the restraining order, they can help you get to some of these community resources. We work with all of these community resources every week.
We have personal contacts there. Friends at all of these places we can get you into those resources as well. We can also help represent you in regular domestic court in custody, child support, property distribution, so that you can get separated from this perpetrator, and have your financially be able to live your new life on your own.
And we can also [:Raena Burch: That's still the contributing member society, contribute to your family.
Correct.
Jonathan Breeden: Correct. And again, also in some situations, defend you in criminal court as well to try to make sure that you, keep your freedom.
So all of these things are important. So family law attorneys can help all people that are involved in this be better. And that's what we're all trying to do. Every single one of us is trying to help our clients be better people so that they can be the hero of their life story.
Raena Burch: Yeah. All right. I think that's it.
Jonathan Breeden: All right.
Raena Burch: Well,
bscribing, or following this [:The Best of Johnson County Podcast comes out every Monday and has a lot of interesting guests from the Johnson County community, from community leaders, to community volunteers, to elected officials, to people with the Johnson County schools, be free to listen to all of those, whether it be Scott Riley, the Cleveland High School football coach, Brian Jones, the 3PLE S band director, Adrian O'Neill, the county parks and rec director.
We've had a lot of great guests over the first episodes of The Best of Johnson County Podcast. I guarantee you that you will learn something about your county and that you will learn to love Johnson County even more than you already do. And as much as I do by listening to this podcast, that's what we're trying to do. Till next time.
I'm your host, Jonathan Breeden.
of Best of Johnston County, [:If the legal aspects highlighted raised some questions, help is just around the corner at www. breedenfirm. com.