English
EspañolStep 2: A judge will review your petition and may issue an ex parte order.
The court clerk will give your petition to a judge. The judge may want to ask you questions as s/he looks over your petition. The judge will then decide whether to give you an ex parte 20-day order for immediate protection. To get this order, the judge must believe (from reading your petition) that a crime involving domestic violence has occurred and that an immediate protective order is necessary to protect you from domestic violence.1 All of this will happen while the abuser is not present.
Whether or not you get an ex parte 20-day order, the judge will give you a date for a full court hearing, which will probably take place within 10-20 days. The judge or court clerk will give you a notice with the date and time of the hearing written on it.
Note: Even though the petition asks you about what efforts you made (if any) to notify the abuser that you were filing the petition, you do not have to notify the abuser in advance – and you should not do so if it would put you in any danger.
1 Alaska Statute § 18.66.110(a)
