Defending a non-molestation order — from service to final hearing
A non-molestation order under s.42 FLA 1996 can be made without you being told (a "without notice" order) when the applicant says notice would risk safety or flap. You are served, often with police present. The order lists prohibited acts and carries a return hearing date. There is no fee to apply — one reason applications are frequent and sometimes tactical.
The first 48 hours
- Comply absolutely Not "mostly". No replies, no messages via relatives, no "accidental" meetings. Breach is arrestable where a power of arrest is attached. If you live together or need to collect belongings, do it only as the order allows.
- Screenshot and preserve Export every relevant thread with dates while your access is intact. Do not delete anything — deletion at disclosure stage reads as concealment.
- Build your chronology A one-page dated table of your relationship to each allegation. Method.
- Draft the undertaking vs contest analysis Scott Schedule responses ready before the return hearing; know which path you prefer and why — what contest actually involves.
- Check the parallel children case If C100 proceedings exist or are threatened, the injunction strategy must fit inside that strategy — allegations answered inconsistently in two cases is how respondents lose both.
At the return hearing
- The applicant must usually attend and can be cross-examined on the evidence (through the court's s.31R QLR mechanism where both sides lack representation — how that works).
- Outcome range: order discharged · order continued (fixed term) · order varied (narrower prohibited acts) · undertaking offered in place of an order (no findings, no admission — but binding on you).
- Come with a proposal: the narrowest undertakings you can live with, or your denial plus the exhibit list. Proposals frame outcomes.
Strategic truth: the undertaking resolves the injunction but not the allegations. If the same allegations anchor a contact battle, you will answer them under the C100 — prepare once, consistently, with the Scott Schedule method.
The five self-inflicted wounds
- Contact "just to explain" — converts a weak application into a strong one.
- Long emotional texts — they become her exhibits, quoted verbatim.
- Social media commentary — courts read it, and it reads as menace.
- Missing the return hearing — the order continues by default.
- Ignoring the children dimension — injunction and contact are one strategic problem, not two.
Before your hearing
Turning scattered messages, notes and dates into evidence takes structure. apply this guide to your own documents — EvidenceCanvas is a guided toolkit that helps you draft a child-focused witness statement, answer a Scott Schedule point by point, and assemble a paginated court bundle. It is not a law firm and does not give legal advice.