“I am involved with a woman who’s husband has been neglecting for several years. Recently, he became violent and assaulted his wife and I. He is currently on bail with a no contact order, and his actions have been increasingly erratic, especially toward her (bad enough that one occasion the police voluntarily escorted her home). He has made allusions that his behavior is due to jealous rage because I am involved with his wife, though his violent tendencies began to surface before I came on the scene. The wife has no intention to stop seeing me. We are in Pennsylvania. Is it possible, or likely, that the judge will order us to stay apart to remove the fuel from the fire?”

It’s unlikely, but it doesn’t mean that it’s not advisable. It depends on how serious you are about this woman – are you willing to risk your life for her? Her life?

Unfortunately, the reality is that there is only so much that the law can do before the commission of even a probable act of domestic violence, and so once has to rely on one’s own common sense, and not the law. If you can’t trust him to honor the no contact order, and if you believe that either your girlfriend (who is still his wife – why hasn’t she divorced him?) or you are in jeopardy, then you should consider all of your alternatives, and make a decision based on both the best information you have, and what common sense dictates. That may be moving away together, that may be not seeing her, or it may be some other arrangement. Only you can make that determination.