After She Leaves: Legal bullying
The content in this post is adapated from our recently updated After She Leaves Resource Manual. Click here to learn more about the manual.
What is legal bullying?
When an abuser uses the family law and court processes as a strategy to try to maintain power and control over their ex-partner, it is called legal bullying. The abuser uses the family court process itself as a means to intimidate, harass and induce fear in their ex-partner.
This strategy can take many forms. The abuser may:
- Bring repeated motions on issues that have already been decided or have no merit.
- Fail to produce documents or information required in the court proceeding.
- Seek repeated delays for no real reason.
- Repeatedly change lawyers.
- Represent himself even when he has no financial need to do so.
- Make complaints about those involved in the process (lawyers, mediators, assessors, judges, etc.) to professional regulatory bodies to delay or discredit these individuals.
- Make malicious and unfounded allegations or reports to the court and other officials about the woman.
- Appeal decisions even when there is no likelihood of success.
- Fail to obey court orders.
The abuser’s overarching goal, of course, is to maintain their control over their ex-partner, intimidate her, prevent her from moving on with her life and/or wear her down to the point that she agrees to return to him or accept the outcome they want.
What harm can legal bullying cause?
The impacts of legal bullying on the woman may be varied:
- If it follows years of psychological abuse and control, she may be very vulnerable to his new strategy.
- She may have fears for her physical safety or that of her children.
- If she has a lawyer, she may incur legal costs she cannot afford.
- If she is unrepresented, she may have to take time away from work for additional court appearances, which could jeopardize her employment.
- If she is unrepresented, she may have to deal with the abuser directly, which can be both emotionally and physically unsafe.
- She may concede on issues simply to end the contact with the abuser.
- She may have to undergo repeated investigations by anyone to whom the abuser has made malicious reports.
- If she has children, she will have to deal with the impact—direct or indirect—that the bullying has on them.
The very nature of family law makes it difficult to deal with legal bullying. There are many legitimate reasons to return to court over time to deal with changes in the circumstances of the family that could mean a variation to parenting arrangements or support is in order. Because family law is so open-ended, it is easy for an abuser to attempt to find ways to manipulate the system and the process.
Dealing with legal bullying
There are some legal strategies for dealing with legal bullies. For example:
- Judges can make orders, with consequences for non-compliance, to require timely disclosure of information needed to allow a case to proceed.
- The Courts of Justice Act, section 140, allows a judge to make an order prohibiting a party from bringing further court proceedings without specific permission from the court if they have been identified as a “vexatious litigant.”
- The Family Law Rules also offer some consequences for vexatious litigants. Rule 24 allows a judge to order costs, Rule 31 deals with contempt issues, and other rules address consequences when a party fails to file documents or is not prepared for conferences.
- Perhaps most importantly, if the judge is concerned about abuse, they can require a self-represented party to use a lawyer for the cross-examination of their ex-partner.