Stay Away or Refrain From Order of Protection in NY?

A New York order of protection goes one of two ways. A refrain from order of protection leaves the respondent in the home but bars abuse, threats, and harassment. A full stay away order bars all contact and presence. Family Court Act § 842 sets out both, plus ten more conditions a court can impose.

Most people arrive at a family offense hearing knowing they want protection and having no idea what protection actually looks like on paper. The answer matters, because the terms written into that order govern where the respondent can live, whether the children are seen at all, who keeps the phone plan, and what happens to any firearms in the house.

Cedeño Law Group, PLLC appears in family offense proceedings in the Family Courts of Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, the Bronx, and Staten Island, for petitioners seeking protection and for respondents facing an order. Founding partner Peter L. Cedeño has practiced New York matrimonial and family law since 1994. This page belongs to our guide to New York family and divorce laws, and it walks through every condition FCA § 842 authorizes, how long an order runs, and what a violation costs.

What Is the Difference Between a Stay Away and a Refrain From Order of Protection in NY?

Contact. A refrain from order of protection lets the respondent remain in the home and continue normal contact, but forbids family offenses, threats, and harassment. A full stay away order under FCA § 842(a) bars the respondent from the home, school, business, and place of employment entirely.

The practical gap between the two is enormous. A refrain from order is the lighter form, often issued where the parties still share a residence and the court sees no need to displace anyone. The respondent keeps a key, keeps sleeping there, and simply has a court order telling them not to commit the conduct alleged. Violating it still carries the full consequences described below.

A full stay away order removes the respondent from the household. In New York City, where a second apartment is rarely a realistic overnight solution, a stay away order can mean a respondent leaves with a bag the same afternoon. That is precisely why the choice between the two is contested at the hearing rather than assumed, and why our NYC order of protection attorneys treat the form of the order as a separate question from whether an order issues at all.

What Can a New York Order of Protection Order Under FCA § 842?

Twelve categories of conditions. FCA § 842 lists lettered paragraphs (a) through (l), running from stay away directives and refrain from directives through visitation, counsel fees, pet protection, identification documents, and smart home devices, closing with a catch-all for any other condition necessary to protect the parties.

The statute authorizes a court to direct the respondent to:

• Stay away (§ 842(a)): from the home, school, business, place of employment, and any other location the court designates, and to stay away from the protected persons themselves.
• Permit visitation (§ 842(b)): with a child at stated periods, which is how an order can carve out parenting time even while barring other contact.
• Refrain from conduct (§ 842(c)): family offenses, criminal offenses, and acts of harassment or intimidation against the protected parties.
• Permit removal of belongings (§ 842(d)): allowing a party to retrieve personal property during a specified window.
• Refrain from risk to a child (§ 842(e)): any act that creates an unreasonable risk to a child’s health, safety, or welfare.
• Pay counsel fees (§ 842(f)): reasonable fees and disbursements incurred in obtaining or enforcing the order.
• Attend an education program (§ 842(g)): participate in a batterer’s education program and pay the cost where able to do so.
• Provide medical care (§ 842(h)): pay medical expenses either directly or through medical and health insurance.
• Protect companion animals (§ 842(i)): refrain from intentionally injuring or killing a pet owned by the protected party or a child.
• Return identification documents (§ 842(j)): promptly return a passport, license, or similar document to the protected party.
• Stop remote device control (§ 842(k)): refrain from remotely controlling connected devices affecting the home, vehicle, or other property.
• Observe other conditions (§ 842(l)): any further condition necessary to further the protective purpose of the order.

Paragraphs (i) through (k) are the newer additions, and they answer the ways control actually gets exercised now. A respondent who keeps the smart lock app, the thermostat, and the doorbell camera can make a home unlivable without ever setting foot in it, and § 842(k) exists to shut that down.

How Long Does an Order of Protection Last in NY?

Up to two years in the ordinary case. FCA § 842 allows a period not in excess of two years, extended to a period not in excess of five years on a finding of aggravating circumstances on the record, or a finding that the conduct alleged violated a valid existing order of protection.

Those two triggers matter. A five-year order is not available simply because the conduct was serious in the petitioner’s view. The court must make the aggravating circumstances finding on the record, or find that the respondent was already under a valid order when the alleged conduct happened. Both are evidentiary questions, and both are argued.

A temporary order of protection issued at the outset of the case runs on a different clock. It lasts until the next court date and gets extended appearance by appearance while the petition is pending, which our page on getting an order of protection in New York Family Court covers in detail.

Can an Order of Protection Be Extended in New York?

Yes, on motion. FCA § 842 permits the court to extend an order for a reasonable period on a showing of good cause or the consent of the parties, and it states expressly that the absence of abuse during the order does not by itself justify refusing to extend it.

That last sentence is one of the most useful in the statute and the most frequently missed. A respondent who argues that nothing happened for two years is describing an order that worked, not an order that was unnecessary. New York courts are told in the text of the statute not to treat quiet compliance as a reason to let the protection lapse.

Good cause is still a real burden on the party seeking the extension. Continuing fear, continued proximity, unresolved custody litigation, and the respondent’s conduct during the term of the order all feed the analysis, and the record built during the first order becomes the evidence for the second.

Can a New York Order of Protection Change Custody or Visitation?

It can shape parenting time, not decide custody. FCA § 842(b) allows the court to permit visitation with a child at stated periods, so a stay away order can still carve out supervised or scheduled parenting time rather than cutting a parent off entirely.

An order of protection is not a custody determination and does not substitute for one. The custody case runs on the best interests standard covered on our New York child custody law page, and the two proceedings often move in parallel in the same courthouse before the same judge.

They do influence each other. Findings made in a family offense proceeding follow a parent into the custody case, and a stay away order that excludes a parent from a child’s school for two years shapes the parenting arrangement whether or not anyone calls it custody. Our New York family offense attorneys handle both tracks together for that reason, because winning one while ignoring the other rarely produces a workable result.

Does a New York Order of Protection Take Away Firearms?

Sometimes it must. FCA § 842-a requires the court to suspend or revoke a firearms license and order surrender in defined situations, including where the conduct involved physical injury, use or threatened use of a deadly weapon or dangerous instrument, or behavior constituting a violent felony.

The mandatory triggers also reach a respondent with a prior violent felony conviction, a prior stalking conviction, or a previous willful violation of a protective order involving physical injury or a weapon. Where a mandatory trigger is present at the temporary order stage, the surrender happens before any final finding is made.

Beyond the mandatory categories, the court has discretion to suspend a license and order surrender whenever it finds a substantial risk that the respondent may use or threaten to use a firearm unlawfully against a protected person. A respondent who refuses to surrender can face immediate seizure. For anyone whose employment depends on a carry license, this is frequently the single highest-stakes term in the order, and it deserves preparation rather than improvisation at the hearing.

Who Pays Counsel Fees and Can the Court Order a Program?

The respondent can be ordered to pay both. FCA § 842(f) authorizes payment of reasonable counsel fees and disbursements incurred in obtaining or enforcing the order, and § 842(g) allows the court to direct participation in a batterer’s education program with the respondent paying the cost where able.

Medical costs sit alongside these. Under § 842(h), a court may direct the respondent to provide for medical care expenses arising from the offense, either by direct payment or through medical and health insurance, which is how insurance coverage a respondent controls can be kept in place rather than cancelled.

These financial terms are asked for far less often than they are available. A petitioner who came into court on a family offense petition and paid a retainer to get there frequently has a legitimate § 842(f) application, and our New York protective order attorneys raise it rather than leaving it on the table.

Can the Protected Person Violate Their Own Order of Protection in New York?

No. FCA § 842 states plainly that the protected party in whose favor the order was issued may not be held to violate an order issued in his or her favor, and may not be arrested for violating that order.

This provision resolves a fear that keeps petitioners from calling the police. A petitioner who answers a call, agrees to meet, or lets the respondent into the apartment has not committed an offense and cannot be arrested for it. The order binds the respondent alone.

What contact does affect is the evidence. A respondent facing a violation petition will point to invited contact, and a court weighing whether to extend an order will notice a pattern of resumed contact. The conduct is not a crime for the petitioner, but it is not consequence-free in the litigation either, and petitioners deserve that explained honestly rather than reassured away.

What Happens If Someone Violates an Order of Protection in New York?

Willful violation carries jail. Under FCA § 846-a, where the court is satisfied by competent proof that a respondent willfully failed to obey an order of protection, it may commit the respondent to jail for a term not to exceed six months, in addition to other remedies.

The Family Court’s remedies on a violation include:

• Commitment to jail: up to six months, which the court may structure as intermittent service or later suspend or revoke.
• Modification of the order: adding conditions of behavior or issuing a new order of protection with stronger terms.
• Counsel fees: payment of the petitioner’s attorney fees where the violation was willful.
• Firearm revocation and surrender: where the willful violation involved physical injury, a deadly weapon, or violent felony conduct.
• Forfeiture of bail: consistent with the criminal procedure law.

Willfulness is the contested element in nearly every violation proceeding. Contact that was invited, a term the respondent misread, and an order served defectively all go to whether the failure was willful, and a violation petition is defended on those facts rather than on the underlying family offense.

How Do Our New York Order of Protection Attorneys Handle These Cases?

By litigating the terms, not just the outcome. Our New York order of protection attorneys treat each condition in FCA § 842 as its own contested item, because a petitioner who wins an order without the right conditions in it, and a respondent who accepts terms nobody negotiated, both leave court worse off than they needed to.

The work starts before the first appearance. The relationship and the alleged acts are checked against the qualifying grounds on our New York family offense law page, because an order cannot issue at all unless the petition fits FCA § 812. Evidence is preserved immediately: messages, call logs, photographs, medical records, and device access histories that establish or refute the alleged conduct.

From there the case is prepared for the specific relief in dispute. For a petitioner, that means building the record for a stay away rather than a refrain from order where the facts warrant it, for a five-year term where aggravating circumstances exist, and for the financial and firearm terms that go unrequested in most petitions. For a respondent, it means testing the proof, seeking the narrower form of order, and protecting employment, housing, and parenting time from terms that go further than the evidence supports. Our New York City family offense attorneys prepare every one of these files as if the judge will decide the terms after reading the whole record.

Why Choose Peter L. Cedeño for a New York Order of Protection Case?

Experience on both sides of the family offense docket. Peter L. Cedeño has practiced New York matrimonial and family law since his admission in 1994 and has centered his private practice on these matters for more than 25 years.

Mr. Cedeño is a graduate of Pace University School of Law and is admitted in New York and in the United States District Courts for the Southern and Eastern Districts of New York. He serves on the Executive Committee of the Family Law Section of the New York State Bar Association, is an alumnus of the New York City Bar Matrimonial Law Committee, participates in the Matrimonial Forensic Inter-Disciplinary Forum, and lectures on divorce and family law issues for the New York State Bar Association. He began his career as an Assistant District Attorney in the Kings County District Attorney’s Office, experience that carries directly into family offense practice.

Contact a New York Order of Protection Attorney

The terms written into an order of protection govern the next two to five years of where a person lives, what contact they have with their children, and whether they keep a firearms license. Those terms are far easier to shape at the hearing than to undo afterward.

Cedeño Law Group, PLLC is located at 111 Broadway, Suite 811, New York, NY 10006, and appears in family offense proceedings throughout New York City and the surrounding counties. Contact our New York order of protection attorneys to talk through what the order in your case should say, or what the order against you should not.

Attorney Advertising. Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome. Updated 2026. This page reflects Family Court Act § 842, § 842-a, and § 846-a as in effect in 2026. It is general information, not legal advice for any individual case or situation.