Family & Personal Safety
Leaving is often the first step. Many survivors of domestic violence face a flood of legal problems – for protection orders, divorce, debt issues, housing and more. With legal help, survivors can find safety and build a future free from abuse.
Worried about your or your children’s safety?
If you’re in danger: Call the National DV Hotline 1-800-799-7233. Computer use leaves a trail. These technology safety tips can help if you think someone is monitoring this device.
How we help
We help survivors obtain protection orders, including orders requiring abusers to surrender their firearms, and handle the divorces and parenting plans that follow so that children’s safety can be built into the court’s decisions. Because survivors typically face more than twice as many legal problems as other low-income households, we also help with housing, debt, and public benefits, giving them a real path to a safe, independent life.
60%
Survivors are 60% more likely to obtain a full protection order with an attorney
I feel so much safer thanks to NJP and the courts. I am now settled in a new city with housing assistance and great schools for my kids. I am amazed by the determination of NJP’s team and the dedication they display for each person they encounter. A better life is out there and NJP can help you achieve it.
Raheela, NJP client
Legal Aid Matters
Family law and domestic violence make up about one in five of our cases. Many survivors leave with few resources, often because the abuser controlled the money. Survivors may face an abuser who can afford a lawyer. In court and out, the trauma they face is real. An attorney levels the playing field, and gives many survivors their best hope for protection and justice.
Kalaya’s Story
A Fight for Survival
Kalaya experienced years of domestic violence before leaving her partner. “He wouldn’t let me visit the reservation or dance in powwows. He told me it was my job to cook, clean. He didn’t allow me to get a job or education,” she recalls. With NJP’s support, she successfully fought for her parental rights. She is a Native American woman and now also organizes on behalf of Murdered and Missing Indigenous women.
Case Study
Family & Personal Safety
A First for Survivors’ Housing Rights
No survivor of domestic violence should have to choose between her safety and a roof over her head. The Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) makes that promise, protecting survivors from losing their housing because of the abuse they’ve endured. But a promise is only as strong as the power to enforce it, and for years, no court had said whether survivors could sue when that promise was broken.
When one survivor finally reached NJP, she had already missed the deadline to respond to an eviction lawsuit, and the court had ordered her to leave her home. Our eviction attorney asked the court to reverse that ruling. The court didn’t budge.
But that wasn’t the end. While reviewing the case, the attorney noticed something important. Her landlord was a public housing authority, and it had wrongly cut off her housing voucher. Without the rental assistance that voucher provided, she had no way to pay her rent. In cutting off her voucher, the housing authority ignored her right to a fair process and violated VAWA.
NJP’s local office sued the housing authority for the harm it caused.
The result was the first federal court decision ruling that people can sue to enforce their rights under VAWA. For survivors across the country, that ruling means VAWA’s housing protections are more than words on paper: when they are violated, survivors can hold housing providers accountable in court. And secure housing is crucial to survivors. Without it, many may feel trapped into staying with the abuser.
For our client, the decision meant everything. She received a significant financial settlement and got her housing voucher back.
One survivor’s eviction became a turning point for survivors everywhere, because NJP attorneys looked beyond the immediate issue in front of them.
Recent News & Stories
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A 46-year-old Auburn man with a lengthy history of domestic-violence convictions is accused of fatally shooting his estranged girlfriend after she refused to reconcile with him. He had recently been released from jail after an earlier domestic-violence incident involving her.
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NJP also appeared as amicus in two important cases involving protections for victims of sexual assault. NJP Advocacy Coordinator Leslie Savina joined the Washington State Coalition Against Domestic Violence and Legal Voice as amici in a case challenging the trial court’s denial of a sexual assault protection order because the petitioner, a UW freshman who,…
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In another excellent decision NJP joined with Legal Voice as amicus in a case that challenged the trial court’s denial of a sexual assault protection order because the petitioner had failed to prove acts of the respondent which made her fearful of future contact. The Court of Appeals (Division I) reversed and remanded holding that…
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