Melissa Cohen: New Jersey's Coercive Control Law, Explained

New Jersey's family courts have always been able to weigh a person's full history when deciding a restraining order, whether or not anything was ever reported before. Attorney Melissa Cohen says that's been an advantage over states where a single incident has to fit neatly into one legal box. The state's new coercive control law builds on that foundation.

Melissa Cohen is a family law attorney at Seiden Freed in Cranford, New Jersey, where she handles the full range of family law matters alongside a significant number of domestic violence cases, work she says she finds especially meaningful. She's been a guest on the show before, and this conversation picks up a debate that started at a lunch-and-learn Melissa and Lisa did together, over whether coercive control legislation helps or complicates cases for the people it's meant to protect.

Melissa lays out what New Jersey's law formally recognizes now: financial control, isolation, digital and cyber stalking, legal abuse through repeated false reports, revenge porn, and other patterns that never left a mark but were always abuse. She and Lisa talk through how a case actually gets built: keeping a dated journal instead of relying on memory, using a parenting app that can't be edited after the fact, and staying calm in the courtroom because a judge is watching both parties' behavior, not only the evidence. They also cover the parenting-time gap that follows a temporary restraining order, sometimes weeks or months before a hearing, and what that delay does to a falsely accused parent's relationship with their kids.

Lisa shares a piece of her own story: getting her son a non-custodial-parent waiver for college financial aid after his father refused to submit his financial information, and the years it then took to enforce the resulting court order. She talks about why she now pushes so hard for orders that spell out real deadlines and real consequences instead of language a difficult ex can simply wait out.

As always, this is strategic education, not legal or mental-health advice for your specific situation.

🎓 What you'll learn

• Why a final restraining order in New Jersey never expires, and what that means for how judges weigh the evidence
• What New Jersey's coercive control law formally recognizes: financial control, isolation, digital stalking, legal abuse, and revenge porn
• Why courtroom demeanor can matter almost as much as your documentation
• Where men's worry about coercive control laws comes from, and why the law isn't about physical strength
• Why a temporary restraining order can suspend parenting time for weeks or months before a hearing
• How to keep a dated journal and use a tamper-resistant parenting app to build credibility
• Why court orders need real deadlines and real consequences, not language an ex can simply wait out

⏱️ Chapters
0:00 Intro
1:00 Catching up, and the debate behind Jennifer's Law
5:00 What coercive control actually adds: financial, digital, and legal abuse
9:00 Why a New Jersey restraining order is permanent, and the one case that got one vacated
13:00 Proving a pattern: harassment as the catch-all, and "show, don't tell"
17:00 Custody exchanges, intimidation, and safer handoff logistics
21:00 The totality of the circumstances, and why prior history counts even unreported
27:00 Self-representation, and an experimental "informal trial" from another state
31:00 Men, coercive control, and the misconceptions around it
35:00 The parenting-time gap after a restraining order, and what's still being proposed in New Jersey
45:00 Lisa's own fight: financial abuse through college costs, and building enforceable orders
53:00 Building your case: journaling, tamper-proof apps, and courtroom credibility

Keep going 💜
Book a free 30-minute discovery call and we'll help you map your next steps: https://beentheregotout.com/call
📘 Been There Got Out: Toxic Relationships, High-Conflict Divorce, and How to Stay Sane Under Insane Circumstances — https://www.amazon.com/dp/194627495X
📘 Been There Got Out: When Your Ex Turns the Kids Against You (our parental-alienation book) — https://www.amazon.com/dp/1967674183
🔗 Melissa E. Cohen, Esq. at Seiden Freed: https://www.seidenfreed.com/melissa-e-cohen-esq/

🎧 More with Melissa Cohen on this podcast
Ep 48: Virtual Court and Smarter Documentation

About Been There Got Out
Chris Barry and Lisa Johnson are high-conflict divorce, custody, and co-parenting strategists, and the founders of Been There Got Out. They know these cases from the inside: both have successfully represented themselves in family court. Few attorneys have a playbook for a case like this — Chris and Lisa write yours with you, so you and your kids can get through it as unscathed as possible.