Violence Against Women
Victories
- Successfully advocating for Washington law that requires time off from work for victims of violence who need to go to court or take other steps to get safe—the strongest such law in the country
Learn more about the law.
Read the bill. - Winning a ruling by the Washington Supreme Court that employees who are terminated for taking time off work to protect themselves from violence may sue for wrongful discharge in violation of public policy.
Danny v. Laidlaw - Drafting and helping pass groundbreaking legislation requiring hospital emergency rooms to provide emergency birth control to sexual assault survivors.
- Protecting battered immigrant women and gaining federal judicial recognition of the realities of domestic violence.
Hernandez v. Ashcroft - Keeping Washington's protection order process accessible for victims of domestic violence by defeating a challenge to the law's constitutionality.
Gourley v. Gourley - Successfully urging the Montana Supreme Court, in the first case of its kind in the nation, to recognize that when a battered woman and her children have fled to another state, a court must consider domestic violence as a reason to let the court of the other state determine child custody issues.
Stoneman v. Drollinger - Ensuring that battered women do not lose marital property as punishment for seeking restraining orders against their husbands.
Gilbert v. Muhammad - Extending statutes of limitations in Montana and Washington so adult survivors of childhood sexual abuse can sue their abusers.
- Convincing the Alaska Supreme Court that post-traumatic stress disorder caused by domestic violence is a medical condition protected by the federal Family and Medical Leave Act.
Gregg v. Anchorage - Changing Washington law to allow victims of violence who need to quit their jobs because of violence to receive unemployment compensation.
Read the bill. - Writing and helping to pass a law that protects victims of domestic violence, sexual assault, and stalking from housing discrimination and allows them to terminate their leases early without penalty.
For information on your legal rights, see Landlord/Tenant Issues For Survivors of Domestic Violence, Sexual Assault, and/or Stalking. - Writing and helping to pass a law that provides greater protections for tenants who are victims of sexual assault, unlawful harassment, or stalking by their landlords or their landlords’ employees.
Read the bill. - Successfully urging courts to recognize Battered Women's Syndrome as a defense to crimes against batterers.
State v. Allery
State v. Ciskie - Changing Washington law to create a protection order process that allows a victim of domestic violence to get a protection order requiring the abuser to stay away from her and her children.
For information on your legal rights, see Domestic Violence: How the Legal System Can Help Protect You. - Successfully advocating for a law creating a new protection order specifically for victims of sexual assault.
For information on your legal rights, see Sexual Assault Protection Orders.
Women's rights. Nothing less.
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