Domestic violence cases in Queens follow their own track from the moment an officer walks through the door. Where there is reasonable cause to believe a felony was committed against a member of the same family or household, or that a duly served order of protection was violated in the ways the statute specifies, CPL 140.10(4) says the officer shall arrest and shall not attempt to reconcile or mediate. From there the DA's Domestic Violence Bureau, based at the Queens Family Justice Center, takes over the file. Spodek Law Group P.C. owes loyalty to only you, and an attorney answers 212 300 5196 at any hour.
Mandatory arrest under CPL 140.10(4) and what follows.
Because the arrest is mandatory in these situations, the officer's decision says very little about the strength of the case, and it also takes the usual appearance-ticket route off the table. CPL 150.20(1)(a) generally calls for an appearance ticket for offenses below a class D felony, but a mandatory arrest under 140.10(4) is carved out of that rule, so you should expect to see a judge at Queens Criminal Court, where arraignments run from 9:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m. every day. The order of protection question can come up at that very first appearance, and we arrive ready to address its terms before it is signed.
Orders of protection and criminal contempt charges.
An order of protection is a court order, and an alleged violation is prosecuted as its own crime regardless of how the underlying case turns out. Criminal contempt in the second degree under Penal Law 215.50 is a class A misdemeanor, criminal contempt in the first degree under 215.51 is a class E felony, and aggravated criminal contempt under 215.52 is a class D felony, which means a phone call, a text or a visit can add a charge heavier than the one you were first arrested on. We explain the exact terms of your order in plain language, and when a violation is alleged we look closely at service, notice and what the contact actually was.
The QIDV part in the Kew Gardens Annex.
Queens Supreme Court, Criminal Term runs the Queens Integrated Domestic Violence part, which appears on the court's own parts list as QIDV/K-16 and sits in the Annex Building, Courtroom E-123. It follows a one family, one judge model, in which a single judge hears a family's related criminal, family and matrimonial cases where the underlying issue is domestic violence, and it also operates as a compliance part with intensive judicial monitoring. For you, that means the judge deciding your criminal case may also be following a custody or divorce matter, and what happens in one proceeding can shape the other, so we coordinate the defense with every related case in view.
