Domestic-Violence Prosecutions
No-contact orders still count under VAWA, First Circuit says
The panel said a later objection by the protected person does not undo federal coverage. That keeps interstate domestic-violence prosecutions on the same track when a defendant crosses state lines to violate the order.
The First Circuit kept VAWA’s interstate protection-order hook in place. A later change of heart by the protected person did not erase coverage for a no-contact order that began as a request for protection.
- A later objection did not erase federal protection.
- The First Circuit relied on the victim’s first complaint.
- The ruling keeps VAWA’s interstate hook intact.
- Defendants cannot rely only on a later change of heart.
- A victim’s later change of heart does not necessarily knock a stay-away order out of federal protection
A victim’s later change of heart does not necessarily knock a stay-away order out of federal protection. In the First Circuit, that means someone who crosses state lines to violate the order can still face a charge under the Violence Against Women Act, or VAWA, even if the protected person later objects to how the case is handled.
The court’s ruling matters because it keeps the focus on how the protection effort began, not on whether the person later wanted the case to go a different way.
The first complaint still carries weight
Section 2262(a)(1) of VAWA makes it a federal crime to travel in interstate or foreign commerce with intent to violate a protection order and then go on to violate it. The First Circuit treated the order here as a state-issued domestic violence stay-away or no-contact order, which fits that language.
The panel said it was following its earlier approach in Dion, which focused on the victim’s initial complaint to police. On that view, the important fact is that the person was still “a person seeking protection” when Massachusetts initiated the complaint against Pilson.
What this means in cases like Pilson’s
Pilson’s appeal involved convictions for kidnapping his then-girlfriend and for an interstate violation of a protective order. The ruling leaves federal prosecutors with a broader tool when a defendant tries to argue that the order no longer counted because the protected person later objected.
For defense lawyers, that closes off one familiar argument. A later change of mind by the protected person does not necessarily take the order outside VAWA’s reach, and that could matter in future interstate domestic-violence prosecutions.