Shitty New Bills Would Make Domestic Abuse More Difficult to Prosecute:
Today in terrible ideas: a new pair of bills proposed by New Hampshire Republicans would seek to put fresh red tape between police and their ability to arrest domestic abusers in the state. There’s no way this could possibly go wrong!
New Hampshire currently has some of the most liberal anti-domestic violence laws in the US, but the proposed legislation would undo many of the protections the law currently offers to victims of domestic violence.
House Bill 1608 would require the state to ease up on enforcing restraining orders issued against domestic abusers, requiring an abuser to violate the restraining order against him or her three times before he or she could be arrested again. The bill would remove a judge’s discretionary power in ordering the arrest of a perpetrator before three restraining order violations. According to law enforcement, this bill would also remove a judge’s ability to bar a domestic abuser from purchasing a gun, or to require the abuser to relinquish weapons. Awesome!
[Via: Think Progress/jezebel.com/Erin Gloria Ryan/26 Jan 2012]
