Butterworths Family Law Journal 3(6) June 2000 : 139-145

This article presents the findings from a study of 208 applications for protection orders made to the Christchurch Family Court in the 9-month period from 1 January 1997 to 30 September 1997. This study was completed for the author's LLM dissertation, from which this article has been written. The research had two main objectives. The first was to examine how domestic violence impacted on the applicants and their children, including violence witnessed by children. It also considered the severity of the abuse that was happening prior to the application being lodged. The second objective was to look specifically at why some applicants later requested to withdraw their application for a protection order, and to examine the Court's decisions in these cases. The author makes comparisons between applicants who withdrew their applications and those that didn't, looking at variables, such as the type of relationship, the nature and severity of the violence, whether children or pregnancy was involved, and history of withdrawing applications for a protection order. The research findings show that in the majority of cases the applicants for protection orders: were women; had been in a defacto relationship and the relationship had lasted for more than one year; had separated from their partner before applying for a protection order, but had been victims of domestic violence again after the separation; had children under the age of 17 years still living at home; and had suffered from a variety of forms of abuse. In the majority of cases, applications for protection orders were granted. Just under one-third of applicants applied to withdraw their protection orders. This was more likely to happen if an applicant's partner gave notice that they were going to defend the application. A high majority of these applications were discharged by the Court.