Monday, August 20, 2018

Stalking Laws And Its Challenges

The term stalking is commonly used to refer to the act of establishing repeated unwanted unhealthy contact with someone to the level of making them feel potentially threatened. The Stalking Statutes of Oregon allows a person facing the issue to file a case with the civil court and also makes the act of stalking a serious crime.

One can face stalking from a complete stranger but generally, it is the outcome of some bitter past relationship. However, it is tough to generalize the reason behind stalking, as they are very unpredictable. Any kind of stalking should be addressed and dealt with in the budding stage. Stalking behaviors are broadly related to harassment and intimidation that can be further categorized as:

  • Repeated attempts to establish any kind of forced contacts with petitioner
  • The regular following of petitioner’s actions and deeds
  • Following or physically being present within the petitioner’s vicinity 
  • Damaging a petitioner’s property
  • Threatening harm to the concerned person or anyone from the immediate family
  • Accessing public social profile of the concerned person 

However, it has been seen in many cases that there are certain challenges associated with stalking laws in general. Similarly, Oregon stalking laws are no exception and face the same challenges. There remains an ambiguity regarding the legitimacy of a stalking case registered against an individual. 

Some Of The Challenges Are:-

As has been identified by Oregon attorneys while dealing with stalking orders that the laws have been highly manipulated for personal grievance and advantages.

It has been seen that the reason behind a false stalking order can vary from the desperate need to gain child custody to simple neighbor disputes or relationship breakups.

Stalking order, if not genuine, can cause grave damage to the overall image and goodwill of the person against whom the order is filed.

Separation from children, loss of face in public, rendering one jobless, putting a black mark on character, limiting freedom of movement, loss of important human rights, and cancellation of licenses are some of the damages caused due to unrightfully registered stalking orders.
 
Oregon attorneys dealing in stalking orders have seen real examples of clients’ being harmed due to frivolous stalking order petitioned against them leading to extreme situations until the cases have been solved by them.
    
Now the question is how to deal with such state of affairs. Once any Eugene criminal defense attorney gets involved in such cases, most of the frivolous orders are simply dismissed through both parties mutually agreeing on not to contact each other in future.

The stalking laws have been sadly used in many incidents as a tool to take out personal grievances. The investigation has shown that there have been both ways of communication in many cases and the petitioner has just casually filed the petition without having proper knowledge of the consequences.

Stalking Laws are definitely a powerful mechanism to curb unnecessary harassment and stalking and crimes related to it. But they should be used more judiciously and in genuine cases. This will avoid its misuse and will lead to better and proper implementation of a restraining order in Oregon.

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