You asked about the number of people incarcerated for violating protective or restraining orders.

Connecticut courts can issue a variety of different orders to protect victims of family violence who fear for their safety from threatened or further harm. These orders may, among other things, prohibit criminal defendants or respondents from restraining, threatening, harassing, assaulting, molesting, sexually assaulting, or attacking the victim, or entering the victim's home.

Restraining orders are issued in civil proceedings whether or not the offender is arrested. Protective orders are criminal and are issued after the accused has been arrested for committing a family violence crime. However, courts may issue standing criminal restraining orders when they believe the history and character of the offender and circumstances warrant it.

The Department of Correction counts each inmate once under his or her most serious offense. Thus, all inmates incarcerated for violating one of these orders do not appear in the count (e.g. someone convicted of murder and violating a protective order is counted as a murder). On January 1, 2010, 357 people were incarcerated for criminal violations of protective, standing criminal restraining, and restraining orders as their most serious offense. This is 2% of the total prison population of 18,052 on that date. Table 1 shows the penalties for violating each type of order and the number of sentenced and unsentenced inmates incarcerated for violating each type of order as their most serious offense.

Table 1: People Incarcerated for Violating Protective, Standing Criminal Restraining, and Restraining Orders on January 1, 2010

OLR Report 2009-R-0367 provides more details on these three types of orders and statistics from the Judicial Branch on the number of orders issued and prosecutions for violating them.

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