Los Angeles Domestic Violence Restraining Order Lawyer Wins Full Dismissal After Contested DVRO Trial

The Result at a Glance

On September 28, 2026, after a fully contested evidentiary hearing at the Stanley Mosk Courthouse in downtown Los Angeles, the court denied a Domestic Violence Restraining Order (DVRO) sought against a Power Trial Lawyers client, dissolved the Temporary Restraining Order (TRO) that had been in force for more than five months, and dismissed the case outright. The petitioner walked away with nothing. Our client walked away with his name cleared, his record protected, and his rights restored.

The matter was heard in Department 723 before Commissioner Laura Cohen, sitting as Judge Pro Tem by stipulation of the parties. Attorney Matthew Barhoma, Esq., founder of Power Trial Lawyers, tried the case for the respondent. After hearing live testimony from both sides, the court found the petitioner’s claim of fear not credible, found our client credible, and characterized the underlying incident as a general altercation among a group rather than targeted conduct by our client. That finding was fatal to the petition. Under the Domestic Violence Prevention Act, a restraining order requires proof of abuse by the respondent against the petitioner; a chaotic family fight that the petitioner’s own side helped start does not qualify.

This post is written for anyone searching for a Los Angeles domestic violence restraining order lawyer, anyone who has just been served with a DVRO in Los Angeles County, and anyone trying to understand what actually happens inside a DVRO trial. It is a detailed, analytical account of how this case was won: the procedural road from ex parte TRO to trial, the weaknesses identified in the petition, the examination strategy used at hearing, and the legal standards the court applied. Names, case numbers, and identifying details have been removed to protect the privacy of everyone involved. The judicial officer is identified because the ruling is a matter of public record and because the way a particular bench officer weighs evidence is relevant to anyone facing a hearing in that department.

If you take one thing from this post, take this: a TRO is not a verdict. A domestic violence restraining order petition in California can be defeated at hearing, and it is defeated most often by respondents who retain experienced restraining order defense counsel early, prepare methodically, and force the petitioner to prove every element of the claim under oath.

Served With a Domestic Violence Restraining Order in Los Angeles: What It Actually Means

Being served with a domestic violence restraining order in Los Angeles is one of the most disorienting legal experiences a person can have, because the consequences arrive before the hearing does. In nearly every case, the papers a process server or sheriff’s deputy hands you include a Temporary Restraining Order (Judicial Council Form DV-110) that a judge signed ex parte, meaning without you present and without hearing your side. The petitioner filed a Request for Domestic Violence Restraining Order (Form DV-100) with a declaration describing alleged abuse, and the court issued the TRO based on that one-sided account, usually the same day or the next day.

From the moment of service, the TRO is fully enforceable. A violation is a crime under Penal Code section 273.6. The typical orders include:

• Personal conduct orders prohibiting contact, harassment, threats, or disturbing the peace of the protected persons
• Stay-away orders, often 100 yards, from the petitioner’s home, workplace, vehicle, and sometimes school or other locations
• Move-out orders if the parties share a residence
• Firearm prohibitions requiring you to surrender every firearm, firearm part, and round of ammunition within 24 hours and file proof with the court (Family Code sections 6389 and 6306)
• Entry of the order into CLETS, the California Law Enforcement Telecommunications System, so every officer who runs your name sees it

The notice of hearing (Form DV-109) sets a court date, typically within 21 days, though in Los Angeles County the first date is almost never the actual trial. Hearings are continued for service issues, for the respondent to retain counsel, for the petitioner to amend, for firearm compliance reviews, and for court congestion. Every continuance brings a reissued TRO (Forms DV-115 and DV-116). In the case discussed here, the TRO was reissued five separate times before trial.

Many people served with a DVRO make the same mistakes in the first 72 hours. They contact the petitioner to “talk it out,” which is a violation. They ignore the firearm surrender deadline, which creates a separate problem with the court. They assume the TRO will go away on its own if they simply show up and explain. They file a Response to Request for Domestic Violence Restraining Order (Form DV-120) that admits more than it should, or that argues the petitioner’s character instead of the legal elements. And they wait until the week before the hearing to call a lawyer.

The stakes justify taking it seriously from day one. A DVRO issued after hearing lasts up to five years and is renewable, potentially permanently. It appears in background checks run by employers, licensing boards, and landlords. It bars firearm possession for its entire duration under both state and federal law. It can affect immigration status, professional licensing, security clearances, and child custody. It can be cited in any future criminal case, civil case, or family law proceeding as a prior judicial finding of abuse. And in sibling, roommate, and extended-family cases like this one, it can permanently fracture relationships that were already under strain.

The good news is that the burden of proof is on the petitioner, not on you. The petitioner must prove, by a preponderance of the evidence, that you committed an act of abuse as defined in the Domestic Violence Prevention Act. That standard is lower than beyond a reasonable doubt, but it is still a real burden, and petitions that rest on fear without a qualifying act, on secondhand accounts, or on incidents where the petitioner’s own side was the aggressor are regularly denied when a prepared defense attorney puts them to the test.

Case Background

This was a sibling-on-sibling domestic violence restraining order case, a category that is more common in Los Angeles County than most people realize and that presents its own distinct challenges. The petitioner and our client are brothers. Under Family Code section 6211, the Domestic Violence Prevention Act reaches not only spouses and dating partners but also any person related by blood or marriage within the second degree, which includes siblings. A brother can obtain a DVRO against a brother on the same legal standard that applies between spouses.

The petition arose out of a family gathering that turned into a physical altercation. According to the petition, our client was the aggressor: he allegedly engaged in violence at the gathering and allegedly made a threat afterward. On that basis the petitioner sought a restraining order protecting not only himself but a group of additional people who had been present at the gathering, several of whom, as the evidence would later show, were themselves participants in the fight.

Our client’s account was fundamentally different. He had been invited to the gathering by family members. The confrontation did not begin with him; it originated with others on the petitioner’s side. When it escalated, he acted to protect family members who were being attacked. The alleged threat, as it turned out, was something the petitioner never personally heard. It was relayed to him secondhand through a relative after a phone call. And separately, a child-welfare referral that had been made in connection with the same events was investigated by the Los Angeles County Department of Children and Family Services and closed as unfounded.

In late April 2026 the petitioner filed Form DV-100 with an ex parte declaration stating that no notice had been given to our client. The court issued a TRO the following day and transmitted it to the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department. The TRO included firearm relinquishment orders. Our client, who was self-represented at the time, complied: he surrendered his firearms, firearm parts, and ammunition, filed the receipts, and at a review hearing in June the court found him in compliance with Family Code section 6306.

For more than three months our client appeared in court on his own at hearing after hearing, each ending in a continuance and a reissued TRO. By early August, with the petitioner now represented by counsel and the hearing finally approaching, he retained Power Trial Lawyers. Matthew Barhoma substituted in as attorney of record, served the substitution on opposing counsel, and began building the defense that would end the case.

The anonymized facts above are the facts that mattered. Every one of them became a line of attack at trial.

The Legal Standard Under the Domestic Violence Prevention Act

Every DVRO defense in California starts with the statute, because the statute defines exactly what the petitioner must prove and therefore exactly where the petition can fail. The Domestic Violence Prevention Act (DVPA), Family Code section 6200 and following, authorizes a court to issue a restraining order if the petitioner shows, to the court’s satisfaction, reasonable proof of a past act or acts of abuse (Family Code section 6300). The standard of proof is a preponderance of the evidence, meaning the petitioner must show it is more likely than not that abuse occurred.

“Abuse” is a defined term. Under Family Code section 6203, abuse means any of the following:

1. Intentionally or recklessly causing or attempting to cause bodily injury
2. Sexual assault
3. Placing a person in reasonable apprehension of imminent serious bodily injury to that person or to another
4. Engaging in any behavior that has been or could be enjoined under Family Code section 6320, which includes molesting, attacking, striking, stalking, threatening, battering, harassing, telephoning, destroying personal property, contacting, coming within a specified distance of, or disturbing the peace of the other party

Three features of this definition decided the case discussed here.

First, the apprehension must be reasonable. A petitioner’s subjective statement that he is afraid is not enough. The court evaluates whether the facts, as proven, would place a reasonable person in apprehension of imminent serious bodily injury. Fear that is not credible, or fear grounded in an event the petitioner did not actually witness, does not satisfy section 6203.

Second, the abuse must be attributable to the respondent. The DVPA does not authorize a restraining order because a petitioner was involved in a frightening event. It authorizes an order because the respondent committed an act of abuse against the petitioner or a person the petitioner is entitled to protect. When the evidence shows a melee involving multiple participants, with injuries and aggression on both sides, the court must still find that this respondent did something to this petitioner that fits the statutory definition. A general brawl is not, by itself, abuse by any particular person.

Third, “disturbing the peace,” the broadest category under section 6320, is defined in section 6320(c) as conduct that, based on the totality of the circumstances, destroys the mental or emotional calm of the other party. The leading case, In re Marriage of Nadkarni (2009) 173 Cal.App.4th 1483, confirmed the breadth of this provision, but courts since then have consistently required a factual showing that the respondent’s conduct was directed at the petitioner. A threat the petitioner did not hear, relayed by a third party, is doubly removed from the statute: it is hearsay as to its content and it did not, by definition, disturb the petitioner’s peace at the time it was allegedly made.

Two other provisions shaped the strategy. Family Code section 6305 governs mutual restraining orders and requires detailed findings that both parties acted as primary aggressors and neither acted primarily in self-defense; a court that finds the respondent acted in defense of others cannot issue an order against him under section 6305 without those findings. And Family Code section 6344(b), as amended, allows a prevailing respondent to recover attorney’s fees and costs upon a showing by a preponderance of the evidence that the petition was frivolous or filed solely to abuse, intimidate, or delay. The possibility of a fee award changes the calculus for petitioners who file weak or retaliatory petitions, and it rewards respondents who litigate carefully and build a clear record.

Finally, the Evidence Code applies in full at a DVRO hearing. Hearsay (Evidence Code section 1200) is excluded unless an exception applies. Photographs and video must be authenticated (Evidence Code sections 1400 and 1401) by a witness with personal knowledge of what they depict and when they were taken. Text messages must be tied to a sender. These rules are frequently ignored in self-represented DVRO hearings, where courts are lenient with pro per litigants. They are not ignored when a trial lawyer insists on them.

Five Months Under a TRO: The Procedural Road to Trial

The single most misunderstood aspect of a Los Angeles DVRO case is how long the temporary order can remain in effect before anyone decides anything. In this case our client lived under a TRO, with his firearms surrendered and his name in CLETS, for 157 days. Nine court dates were held in Department 723 before the petition was finally decided. The table below shows the sequence.

Several procedural points from this timeline are worth understanding if you are facing a DVRO hearing in Los Angeles County.

Reissuance is automatic in practice. Under Family Code section 245 and Judicial Council Forms DV-115 and DV-116, a TRO is reissued whenever the hearing is continued, regardless of which side requested the continuance. The court does not re-evaluate the merits at each reissuance. The practical effect is that a respondent who cannot get to trial quickly lives under the order indefinitely, which is one reason early retention of counsel matters: an attorney can push for a firm trial date and resist open-ended continuances.

The firearm compliance track runs in parallel. Los Angeles courts set separate review hearings to confirm the respondent has surrendered all firearms and filed Form DV-800 receipts. Non-compliance is treated seriously and can result in independent sanctions. Our client’s full compliance while self-represented, confirmed on the record on June 24, meant that by the time the merits were tried there was no collateral compliance issue for the petitioner to exploit and no reason for the court to view him as anything other than a respondent who follows orders.

Stipulation to a commissioner is a real decision. Department 723 is presided over by a commissioner, not a judge. Under article VI, section 21 of the California Constitution and California Rules of Court, rule 2.816, a commissioner may hear a contested matter and issue a binding order only if the parties stipulate to the commissioner sitting as a temporary judge. A party who does not stipulate is entitled to have the matter heard by a judge, which in practice means transfer and delay. The oral stipulation entered in this case was renewed when Power Trial Lawyers substituted in, after an evaluation of whether the assigned bench officer was the right forum for a credibility-driven defense. The decision to proceed before Commissioner Cohen as Judge Pro Tem was deliberate.

Substitution of counsel near a hearing date requires a plan. When Power Trial Lawyers was retained in early August, the next hearing was days away and the petitioner was already represented. The firm filed Form MC-050, served it on opposing counsel, and appeared on August 12 to request a continuance for preparation. The court granted it. That continuance, and the one that followed, were used to complete the evidentiary work described in the next sections, not simply to delay. The case went to trial on the first date on which the defense was fully ready, with a stipulated continuance from September 14 to September 28 resolving a calendar conflict without prejudice to either side.

Taking Over Mid-Case: Substitution and Rapid Preparation

Matthew Barhoma inherited this case with a hearing less than a week away, a client who had been self-represented for three and a half months, an opposing counsel already in place, and a file that consisted of the petitioner’s DV-100, the TRO paperwork, scattered text message screenshots, photographs of uncertain origin, and a DCFS closure letter. The first task was not to argue. It was to know the case better than the petitioner did.

The preparation followed a sequence that Power Trial Lawyers applies to every restraining order defense:

1. Full document review. Every page of the petition and its attachments was read against the statutory elements. Each allegation was mapped to the subdivision of Family Code section 6203 it would have to satisfy, and each was tagged with the evidence the petitioner would need to prove it and the evidence the defense had to rebut it.
2. Structured client interview. Rather than an open-ended conversation, the client was given a written questionnaire of roughly 60 questions built from the file: who invited him, who arrived when, who was present, who struck whom, where each photograph was taken and by whom, what was said on each phone call and who was on the line, what the DCFS investigator asked and concluded. Written answers create a record, surface inconsistencies before opposing counsel finds them, and force the client to commit to a timeline.
3. Evidence triage. Each photograph and screenshot was assessed for admissibility. Who took it? When? Does the client have personal knowledge of what it shows? Can the person in the frame be identified? Photographs the client could not authenticate were set aside; photographs he could were organized by time and location so that a foundation could be laid in under a minute per exhibit at hearing.
4. Outstanding evidence demands. Doorbell camera footage, law enforcement incident reports, 911 audio, and urgent care records bearing on who was injured and how were identified as material and pursued through demands and subpoenas where time allowed.
5. Responsive pleading. A Form DV-120 Response was prepared that denied the allegations with specificity, asserted defense of others, and put the petitioner on notice of the evidentiary problems in the petition without previewing cross-examination.
6. Hearing architecture. A cross-examination outline for the petitioner, a direct examination outline for the client, an opening statement, and a closing argument were drafted in advance, each organized around the record points that needed to exist by the end of the hearing for the court to deny the petition.

Two aspects of this preparation deserve emphasis because they are where most DVRO defenses fail.

The first is the questionnaire. Self-represented respondents, and too many lawyers, prepare for a restraining order hearing by rehearsing the client’s story. The problem is that the client’s story is the one piece of evidence the petitioner’s lawyer is guaranteed to attack. A written, detailed, fact-locked account produced weeks before the hearing lets counsel find the soft spots first. In this case the questionnaire surfaced a records discrepancy concerning the firearm surrender that needed to be reconciled with the client before he took the stand. It was reconciled. Had it surfaced for the first time on cross-examination, it would have handed the petitioner a credibility argument on the one subject, firearms, on which courts are least forgiving.

The second is photo authentication. Restraining order petitions in Los Angeles routinely include photographs with no indication of who took them, when, or what they depict. Courts hearing self-represented matters often admit them without objection. A trial lawyer does not. In this case the defense identified, before the hearing, which people appeared in each set of photographs, which photographs the petitioner could personally authenticate and which he could not, and which photographs actually helped the defense by showing the petitioner’s side as participants rather than victims. That work converted the petitioner’s own exhibits into cross-examination material.

Building the Defense: The Four Weaknesses in the Petition

Power Trial Lawyers does not defend restraining order cases with generic denials. The strategy in every case is to identify the specific points at which the petition fails the statute and then build the entire hearing around proving those failures on the record. The full file review in this case produced four.

Weakness one: the client was invited. The petition framed our client’s presence at the gathering as an intrusion, the implicit premise being that a person who shows up uninvited and starts a fight is the aggressor. The evidence showed the opposite. Family members had invited him. He arrived as a guest. This mattered for two reasons. It undercut the narrative of aggression at its root, and it meant the petitioner’s own witnesses, if called, would have to either confirm the invitation or contradict their relatives under oath.

Weakness two: the altercation originated with others. The petition described our client as the person who initiated violence. The timeline, reconstructed from the client’s questionnaire, the photographs, and the sequence of injuries, showed that the confrontation began between other people on the petitioner’s side and family members our client was there to see. He became involved when it escalated and relatives were being attacked. Under the DVPA, a respondent who intervenes to protect a third party from an ongoing assault has not committed abuse against the person he intervened against, let alone against a petitioner who was one of several participants. The defense-of-others framing was not a mitigating argument; it was a complete answer to the element of abuse.

Weakness three: the alleged threat was never heard by the petitioner. The petition’s second theory, independent of the physical altercation, was that our client made a threat afterward. On close reading of the declaration, the petitioner did not claim to have heard the threat himself. It was allegedly made during a phone call with a relative and relayed to the petitioner afterward. That is hearsay within hearsay as to the content of the statement, and more fundamentally it cannot support a finding of reasonable apprehension under Family Code section 6203(a)(3) or disturbance of the peace under section 6320, because a person cannot be placed in apprehension by words he did not hear and cannot have his peace disturbed by a statement he learned of only later and secondhand. The threat theory was dead on the face of the petition once the court focused on who actually heard what.

Weakness four: the DCFS referral was closed as unfounded. A child-welfare referral arising from the same events had been investigated by the Department of Children and Family Services and closed with an “unfounded” determination, the agency’s finding that the allegation was false, inherently improbable, or lacked any credible evidence. The defense did not treat this as the centerpiece of the case, because a DCFS finding is not binding on a family court and the petition itself did not involve a minor. But it was powerful corroboration: a neutral government agency with investigative resources had looked at the same incident and found nothing. It also raised a question about timing and motive that framed the petition as a retaliatory filing rather than a response to genuine fear.

A fifth structural problem reinforced all four: the petition sought protection for a group of additional persons who were themselves participants in the altercation. Naming the people who were throwing punches as “protected persons” invited the court to ask whether the petition was about protecting anyone or about obtaining a judicial label for a family dispute. It also meant that every protected person the petitioner identified was a witness the defense could cross-examine about their own conduct.

The hearing plan assigned each weakness to a phase of the trial. Weaknesses one and two would be established through the petitioner’s own admissions on cross-examination and the client’s direct testimony. Weakness three would be established through cross-examination alone, because the petitioner’s own account made the point. Weakness four would be introduced through documentary evidence and the client’s testimony about the investigation. Closing argument would tie each weakness to the statutory element it defeated.

Trial Procedure: How a Contested DVRO Hearing Works in Los Angeles

A contested domestic violence restraining order hearing in Los Angeles Superior Court is a bench trial. There is no jury. The judicial officer hears the evidence, applies the DVPA, and rules, usually from the bench the same day. Most DVRO hearings in Los Angeles County are resolved in under an hour because one side is unrepresented or because the parties reach a stipulation. A fully contested hearing with counsel on both sides, live testimony, exhibits, objections, and argument is a different event, and it is the event a respondent should be preparing for from the day of service.

The September 28 hearing in Department 723 proceeded in the following sequence.

Stipulation and preliminary matters. The parties confirmed on the record their stipulation that Commissioner Cohen would hear the matter as Judge Pro Tem. The court confirmed the TRO remained in effect, confirmed firearm compliance, and addressed scheduling. Counsel identified the witnesses each side intended to call and the exhibits each side intended to offer. Objections to exhibits lacking foundation were noted for ruling when offered.

Petitioner’s case. Because the petitioner bears the burden of proof, the petitioner’s side goes first. The petitioner testified on direct examination by his counsel, walking through the allegations in the DV-100. The petitioner’s declaration is not itself evidence at a contested hearing unless the parties stipulate; the petitioner must testify live and is subject to cross-examination. Matthew Barhoma cross-examined the petitioner at length, as described in the next section. Exhibits offered through the petitioner were subject to authentication objections, and photographs the petitioner could not personally authenticate were addressed on that basis.

Respondent’s case. Our client testified on direct examination, giving his account of the invitation, the origin of the altercation, his intervention, the phone call, and the DCFS investigation. He was then cross-examined by petitioner’s counsel. Defense exhibits were offered through him with proper foundation.

Argument. Both sides argued. Petitioner’s counsel argued that the altercation and the alleged threat established abuse. Matthew Barhoma argued, element by element, that the petitioner had failed to carry his burden on any theory.

Ruling. The court ruled from the bench, making express credibility findings before stating its conclusion.

Several procedural tools used at this hearing are worth explaining for anyone preparing for their own.

The decision to try the case before the assigned commissioner rather than demand a judge was made after evaluating how Department 723 handles credibility disputes. The defense’s theory depended entirely on the court being willing to disbelieve a petitioner’s testimony of fear, something many bench officers are reluctant to do in the domestic violence context. The assessment was that this bench officer would decide the case on the evidence. That assessment proved correct.

Live testimony was required rather than submission on declarations. In many Los Angeles DVRO hearings the court invites the parties to “submit on the papers” or to supplement declarations with brief testimony. The defense declined. A petition built on a secondhand threat and a misattributed altercation cannot survive cross-examination, but it can survive a declaration that is never tested. Insisting on a full evidentiary hearing was the single most important procedural choice in the case.

Foundation objections were made and pressed. Photographs of injuries are among the most emotionally powerful exhibits in a DVRO hearing. They are also among the easiest to exclude or neutralize when the witness offering them cannot say who took them, when, or whose injuries they depict. The defense’s pre-hearing work on photo identification meant that each objection was specific and each ruling was informed.

The record was built with the appeal and the fee motion in mind. Every cross-examination sequence was designed to produce a clean admission that could be cited later. A DVRO denial is not appealable by the petitioner as a matter of right in the same way an issued order is appealable by the respondent, but a respondent who prevails may seek fees under Family Code section 6344(b), and that motion depends on what the record shows about the petition’s merit. Trying the case as if the record would be read again later is how a trial lawyer protects the win.

Cross-Examination of the Petitioner

Cross-examination is where a domestic violence restraining order case is won or lost, and it is the skill that separates a restraining order defense lawyer from a lawyer who occasionally handles restraining orders. Matthew Barhoma’s cross-examination of the petitioner was structured not to argue with him but to have him establish, in his own words, each fact the defense needed. The outline was organized by record point rather than by topic: each sequence of questions had a single admission as its goal, and once the admission was on the record the sequence ended.

Record point one: the invitation. The petitioner was walked through who organized the gathering, who was invited, and how our client came to be there. By the end of the sequence the petitioner had acknowledged that family members had invited our client and that he arrived as a guest. The “intruder” premise of the petition was gone before the altercation was even discussed.

Record point two: who started it. The petitioner was taken through the sequence of events leading to the physical confrontation, one step at a time, with questions that asked only where each person was and what each person did. The petitioner’s own chronology placed the first physical contact between individuals on his side and family members our client was there to see. Pressed on what our client was doing at that moment, the petitioner could not place him as the initiator. The petition’s central factual claim, that our client began the violence, did not survive the petitioner’s own account of it.

Record point three: the group. The petitioner identified, one by one, the additional persons he had asked the court to protect, and was asked what each of them was doing during the altercation. The answers established that several of the people the petitioner wanted protected had themselves been physically involved. This sequence did double duty: it supported the characterization of the event as a general brawl, and it undermined the sincerity of the request for protection.

Record point four: the threat. This was the shortest and most decisive sequence. The petitioner was asked whether he was on the phone call during which the threat was allegedly made. He was not. He was asked whether he heard our client say the words attributed to him. He had not. He was asked how he learned of the alleged threat. A relative told him afterward. The entire threat theory of the petition collapsed into an admission that the petitioner was relying on what someone else said someone else said. The defense did not need to prove the threat was never made. It needed only to establish that the petitioner could not, and that even if it had been made, it had not been made to him.

Record point five: fear. The petitioner was asked about his conduct after the incident, his contact with family members, and the timing of the petition relative to the DCFS referral. The purpose was to give the court a factual basis to evaluate whether the claimed fear was reasonable and genuine, rather than asking the petitioner directly whether he was afraid, a question that would have produced a predictable and unhelpful answer. The court ultimately found the petitioner’s fear testimony not credible; this sequence is where that finding was built.

Record point six: the photographs. For each photograph the petitioner had offered, he was asked who took it, when, and whom it depicted. Where he could not answer, the exhibit was addressed on foundation grounds. Where he could, the answers were used to confirm that the injuries shown were consistent with a multi-party fight rather than a one-sided attack.

Three principles governed the cross-examination and apply to every DVRO defense:

• Ask only questions whose answers are already known. Every question in the outline was tied to a document, a prior statement, or a fact the petitioner could not plausibly deny.
• Never argue with the witness. The petitioner was allowed to be sympathetic; the facts did the work.
• Stop when the record point is made. A cross-examiner who keeps going after obtaining the admission gives the witness the chance to explain it away. Each sequence ended on the admission.

By the close of cross-examination the petitioner had, in his own testimony, conceded the invitation, failed to place our client as the initiator, identified his own protected persons as participants, and admitted he never heard the alleged threat. The petition’s two theories of abuse, the physical altercation and the threat, had each been undermined by the only witness who could support them.

Direct Examination of the Respondent and the Defense-of-Others Narrative

The respondent’s testimony in a DVRO hearing serves a different purpose than the petitioner’s cross-examination. Cross-examination dismantles the petition. Direct examination gives the court an alternative account it can adopt in its findings. A court that disbelieves the petitioner still needs something to believe instead, and the respondent’s direct is where that account is supplied.

Our client’s direct examination was built around a defense-of-others narrative and organized chronologically so that the court could follow it without effort.

The invitation and arrival. He testified to who invited him, when, and why he attended. This corroborated the petitioner’s own admission on cross and established that he had every right to be where he was.

The origin of the confrontation. He described what he saw when the altercation began: who confronted whom, what was said, and where he was standing. The account was specific as to position and sequence, consistent with the photographs, and consistent with the petitioner’s chronology on the points where the petitioner had been candid.

The intervention. He testified that he became physically involved only when relatives were being attacked and that his actions were directed at stopping that attack. This is the heart of a defense-of-others theory. Under California law a person may use reasonable force to defend another from imminent harm, and conduct that is justified as defense of others is not “abuse” within the meaning of Family Code section 6203. The testimony was framed in terms of what he saw, what he feared would happen to the people being attacked, and what he did in response, not in terms of legal conclusions.

The phone call. He testified about the call during which the threat was allegedly made: who was on it, what was discussed, and what he said. The point was not to deny every word but to give the court the context the petitioner could not supply, because the petitioner had not been there.

The DCFS investigation. He testified that a child-welfare referral had been made in connection with the same events, that he had cooperated with the investigator, and that the referral was closed as unfounded. The closure letter was introduced. This gave the court independent corroboration that a neutral agency had examined the incident and found no basis for action.

Firearm compliance. He testified briefly to surrendering his firearms, firearm parts, and ammunition under the TRO and to the court’s prior compliance finding. The records discrepancy identified in preparation had been resolved, and the testimony was clean. The purpose was to foreclose any suggestion that he had been anything other than fully compliant with the court’s orders while the TRO was in effect.

The direct examination was also designed to preempt cross-examination. Every point on which petitioner’s counsel could be expected to attack, the fact that he had been physically involved, the fact that injuries resulted, the existence of the phone call, was raised on direct and explained before the other side could frame it. A respondent who acknowledges the difficult facts on direct and explains them is far more credible than one who is confronted with them on cross for the first time.

On cross-examination by petitioner’s counsel, our client held to his account. He did not overstate, did not argue, and did not volunteer. Where he had been physically involved, he said so. Where he had acted to protect others, he said so. The consistency between his questionnaire answers, his DV-120 response, his direct testimony, and his cross-examination answers was the product of the preparation described above, and it was the foundation for the court’s finding that he was credible.

The contrast the court was left with was stark. On one side, a petitioner who had conceded the invitation, could not identify our client as the initiator, had asked the court to protect people who were themselves fighting, and had never heard the threat he was complaining about. On the other, a respondent who gave a specific, consistent, corroborated account of being invited, witnessing an attack on family members, intervening to stop it, cooperating with a government investigation that cleared him, and complying with every court order while the case was pending.

Closing Argument and the Court’s Credibility Findings

Closing argument in a DVRO hearing is short, and it should be. The court has just heard the evidence. What it needs from counsel is a map from the evidence to the statute: which element the petitioner had to prove, what the petitioner’s own witness said about it, and why that is insufficient as a matter of law. Matthew Barhoma’s closing followed that structure, taking each theory of abuse in the petition and matching it to the record that had been built.

On the physical altercation theory, the argument was that Family Code section 6203 requires an act of abuse by the respondent, that the petitioner’s own testimony established a multi-party confrontation that began with others, that the petitioner could not identify our client as the initiator, and that the only evidence of our client’s conduct was his credible, corroborated testimony that he intervened to protect family members. Conduct in defense of others is not abuse. A petitioner who was one participant in a general fight has not proven that this respondent abused him.

On the threat theory, the argument was simpler still. Reasonable apprehension under section 6203(a)(3) requires that the petitioner apprehend something. Disturbing the peace under section 6320 requires that the respondent’s conduct disturb the petitioner’s peace. The petitioner admitted he was not on the call, did not hear the words, and learned of them secondhand. There was no admissible evidence of the threat’s content, and even taking the petitioner’s account at face value, a statement he did not hear could not have placed him in apprehension or disturbed his calm when made. The threat theory failed on the petitioner’s own testimony.

On the request for protection of additional persons, the argument was that the petitioner had identified participants in the altercation as the people he wanted protected, that none of them had testified, and that the request reflected the character of the petition as a whole: an attempt to obtain a judicial finding against one family member arising from a dispute in which many were involved.

On credibility, the argument did not ask the court to find the petitioner a liar. It asked the court to compare the two accounts against the documents, the photographs, the DCFS closure, and the petitioner’s own admissions, and to find that the respondent’s account was the one the evidence supported.

The court ruled from the bench. Commissioner Cohen, sitting as Judge Pro Tem, made express findings:

• The petitioner’s testimony regarding his fear was not credible.
• The respondent’s testimony was credible.
• The incident was a general altercation among a group, not targeted conduct by the respondent toward the petitioner.
• The petitioner had not met his burden of proving abuse within the meaning of the Domestic Violence Prevention Act by a preponderance of the evidence.

The request for a Domestic Violence Restraining Order was denied. The Temporary Restraining Order was dissolved. The case was dismissed.

These findings deserve a moment of analysis because they are unusual and because they show what a prepared defense can achieve. Family courts in Los Angeles are, appropriately, cautious about denying protection to a person who testifies to fear. A finding that fear testimony is “not credible” is a finding the court does not make lightly, and it does not make it on the strength of a respondent’s denial. It makes it when the petitioner’s own account, tested on cross-examination, does not support the fear claimed, and when the respondent offers a specific, consistent, corroborated alternative. The “general brawl, not targeted conduct” characterization is likewise a finding that goes to the core of the DVPA: the statute protects people from abuse by a particular person, not from family conflict in general.

The result was not a technical dismissal, a settlement, or a petition withdrawn before hearing. It was a merits ruling after a contested evidentiary hearing, with express credibility findings in the respondent’s favor, from the bench officer who presides over one of the busiest restraining order departments in the state.

The Aftermath: Dissolved TRO, Firearms, CLETS, and Attorney’s Fees

Winning a DVRO hearing is the end of the petition but not the end of the work. Several things happen, or should happen, after a denial, and a respondent who does not understand them can find that the practical consequences of a TRO outlast the order itself.

The TRO is dissolved and removed from CLETS. When a DVRO is denied, the temporary order terminates and the clerk transmits the termination to law enforcement for removal from the California Law Enforcement Telecommunications System. In Los Angeles County this transmission is generally prompt, but it is not instantaneous, and it is worth confirming. A respondent stopped by police in the days after a denial can otherwise find an officer looking at a database entry that no longer reflects reality. Power Trial Lawyers confirms the minute order reflects the dissolution and that the termination has been transmitted.

Firearms may be returned. Firearms surrendered under a TRO are held by law enforcement or a licensed dealer. Once the order is dissolved, the respondent is eligible to retrieve them, but retrieval is not automatic. It requires a background check, often a Law Enforcement Gun Release application through the California Department of Justice, and coordination with the agency or dealer holding the property. A respondent with any other disqualifying factor will not pass the check regardless of the DVRO outcome. This is a separate process, and the firm advises clients on it after the case concludes.

The denial is a judicial finding. A denial after a contested hearing, with credibility findings in the respondent’s favor, is a result that can be cited. If the petitioner files again on the same facts, the prior denial is directly relevant. If the same events surface in a custody proceeding, a criminal investigation, or an employment matter, the respondent has a court ruling, not merely his own account, that the allegations were not proven. This is one of the reasons a contested hearing is preferable to a withdrawal or an informal resolution: a withdrawn petition proves nothing, while a denied one does.

Attorney’s fees are available to a prevailing respondent. Family Code section 6344(b) provides that a court may award attorney’s fees and costs to a respondent who prevails on a DVRO petition if the respondent shows, by a preponderance of the evidence, that the petition was frivolous or filed solely to abuse, intimidate, or delay, and the court finds the petitioner has the ability to pay. The showing requires evidence, not merely a denial. A record that includes the petitioner’s admissions that he never heard the alleged threat, that his own protected persons were participants, and that he filed shortly after an unfounded child-welfare referral is the kind of record that supports such a motion. Whether to pursue fees is a decision made with the client after the hearing, weighing cost, likelihood of recovery, and the value of closure.

No order means no restrictions. Perhaps the most important post-hearing point is the simplest. Once the DVRO is denied and the TRO dissolved, there are no personal conduct orders, no stay-away orders, and no contact restrictions. The respondent is restored to the position he was in before the petition was filed. Whether and how to interact with the petitioner and other family members going forward is a personal decision, not a legal one, though prudence often counsels distance for a period of time regardless of the outcome.

For our client, the practical result was that five months of restrictions, a surrendered firearm collection, repeated court appearances, and a public accusation ended with a court finding that he was the credible party and that no abuse had been proven. That is what a successful domestic violence restraining order defense in Los Angeles looks like.

What to Do If You Are Served With a DVRO in Los Angeles

The case above was won because of decisions made in the first days after Power Trial Lawyers was retained, and it could have been won sooner had those decisions been made in the first days after service. If you have been served with a domestic violence restraining order in Los Angeles County, the following steps apply whether the petitioner is a spouse, a partner, a sibling, a parent, or a roommate.

1. Read every page. The packet includes the DV-100 petition and the petitioner’s declaration, the DV-110 temporary order, the DV-109 notice of hearing, and often a DV-120 blank response form and DV-800 firearm proof form. The declaration tells you exactly what you are accused of. The DV-110 tells you exactly what you may not do.
2. Comply with the TRO completely. Do not contact the petitioner or any protected person for any reason, through any channel, including through third parties and social media. Stay away from every listed location. If a move-out order is included, arrange a civil standby through the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department or LAPD to retrieve belongings. A single violation is a misdemeanor under Penal Code section 273.6 and will be used against you at the hearing.
3. Surrender firearms within 24 hours. Turn in every firearm, firearm part, and round of ammunition to law enforcement or a licensed dealer, obtain a receipt, and file Form DV-800 with the court. Los Angeles courts hold separate compliance review hearings and treat non-compliance as a serious independent problem.
4. Preserve everything. Save text messages, call logs, photographs, videos, doorbell footage, social media posts, and the names and contact information of everyone who witnessed the events. Write down your own account of what happened while it is fresh, in detail, with times. Do not post about the case.
5. Do not file a DV-120 response on your own without understanding the elements. The response is a sworn statement. Anything you admit will be used. Anything you deny inaccurately will be used. A response that argues the petitioner’s character rather than the statutory elements of abuse wastes the court’s attention. A response prepared with counsel denies what should be denied, asserts the defenses that apply, and preserves what should be saved for cross-examination.
6. Retain a restraining order defense lawyer before the first hearing. The first hearing date on the DV-109 is usually not the trial, but it is the date at which the court sets the schedule, addresses reissuance, and forms its first impression. A lawyer who appears at the first hearing can request a continuance for preparation, address firearm compliance, and begin shaping the procedural path. A respondent who appears alone is at the mercy of whatever the petitioner’s side proposes.
7. Demand a contested evidentiary hearing. You have the right to cross-examine the petitioner and present evidence. Do not submit on declarations, do not agree to a stipulated order “without findings” unless counsel has evaluated the collateral consequences, and do not accept a continuance that extends the TRO indefinitely without a trial date.
8. Prepare as if the hearing is a trial. Because it is. Authenticate your exhibits. Identify your witnesses. Know the petitioner’s story better than the petitioner does. Reconcile every discrepancy in your own account before you take the stand.

The common thread is that a DVRO is a civil case with a trial at the end of it, and it is defended the way trials are defended: with preparation, with the rules of evidence, and with cross-examination. Respondents who treat the hearing as a conversation with a judge lose cases they should have won. Respondents who treat it as the trial it is give themselves the chance to end the matter with a ruling in their favor.

Frequently Asked Questions About Domestic Violence Restraining Orders in Los Angeles

Why Power Trial Lawyers for Restraining Order Defense in Los Angeles

Power Trial Lawyers, the trial practice of Barhoma Law, P.C., defends and prosecutes restraining order cases throughout Los Angeles County and Southern California, including domestic violence restraining orders (DVRO), civil harassment restraining orders (CHRO), elder abuse restraining orders (EARO), and workplace violence restraining orders (WVRO). The firm appears regularly in the restraining order departments at the Stanley Mosk Courthouse, Van Nuys, Pasadena, Long Beach, Pomona, Inglewood, Whittier, and Chatsworth, as well as in Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino, and Kern Counties.

Matthew Barhoma, Esq., the firm’s founder, is a trial lawyer. His practice spans restraining order litigation and criminal defense, and he approaches a restraining order hearing the way he approaches any trial: with a theory of the case built on the statute, a cross-examination designed to produce a record, and a direct examination designed to give the court an account it can adopt. The case described in this post was prepared and tried on that model, and the result, a contested denial with express credibility findings for the respondent, is the product of that preparation.

The firm’s restraining order defense work is organized around a few commitments:

• Every petition is read against the elements of Family Code section 6203 before any strategy is set.
• Every client completes a structured written questionnaire so that the defense knows the facts, and the weak points, before the other side does.
• Every exhibit is authenticated or set aside before the hearing.
• Every hearing is prepared as a trial, with a cross-examination outline, a direct examination outline, and a closing argument drafted in advance.
• Every ruling is pursued with the record, the collateral consequences, and the possibility of a fee motion in mind.

If you have been served with a domestic violence restraining order in Los Angeles and are looking to retain an attorney to defend it, Power Trial Lawyers can be reached at (888) 808-2179. The firm’s office is located at 835 Wilshire Boulevard, Floor 5, Los Angeles, California 90017. Consultations are for prospective clients seeking representation; the firm does not provide free legal advice.

This post describes a specific case and its outcome. Every restraining order case turns on its own facts, and no result in one matter guarantees or predicts the outcome of another. Nothing in this post is legal advice, and reading it does not create an attorney-client relationship. The judicial officer is identified because the ruling is a matter of public record; all parties, witnesses, and identifying details have been anonymized.