Jaymie Munoz arrived on the fifth floor of San Francisco Superior Court in tears. She was six months into a custody battle over her toddler, Julieanna, and it wasn’t going well. She needed help.

Her ex Juan Jones Jr. has a history of violence, according to court records. Munoz alleged that within their first year together, he hit her, threw her, and held a gun to her head. She said she was too shocked to call the police but took photos of the bruises. When their daughter was 2 months old, Munoz took her and left for good.

Jones had sporadic visits with Julieanna. After one visit, Munoz picked up her hysterical 10-month-old at the hospital — her shoulder had been dislocated. For Munoz, that was enough. She didn’t want Jones to have any more unsupervised visits. Shortly thereafter, Jones filed for custody.

Munoz was terrified. The paperwork, she said, “seemed like a completely different language.” Munoz typed up a short response, alleging Jones degraded her and kept unsecured guns in his home, and when Julieanna returned home from visiting him, the child smelled of marijuana. Jones denied the allegations. Still, in March 2022, a judge ordered that he be allowed daytime visits. By July, overnights were added.

After the second overnight visit, Jones refused to return Julieanna to her mother. Munoz called the police, who knocked on his door but left when he didn’t answer. When Jones returned Julieanna the next morning, the toddler was clearly in pain. This time it was a dislocated elbow. 

Munoz realized she needed more than determination to protect her daughter: She needed a lawyer. She spent $600 on two brief phone consultations with family law attorneys before realizing she couldn’t afford them. “I was crumbling,” she said. 

In criminal court, Munoz would have a prosecutor to make her case or a public defender to guard her rights, and a jury to weigh the evidence. If she were a tenant facing an abusive landlord, San Francisco would provide legal counsel to help her.

But here, in family court, she would be alone.

Survivors of domestic violence are repeatedly told to leave their abusers. But the justice system does little to help them: In San Francisco, 90% of domestic violence incidents are not resolved through criminal court. In 2024, only around 20% of domestic violence calls to 911 led to an arrest, and less than 2% resulted in a conviction.

Instead, survivors seeking protection for themselves and their children turn to family court. Of those, the vast majority cannot afford an attorney and must navigate the opaque, high-stakes legal process alone. Abusers, meanwhile, routinely use the court as a means to maintain control over their victims — dragging on hearings and forcing repeated contact. Their behavior is rarely checked by judges, who often prioritize an abuser’s parental rights over their victim’s safety.

In San Francisco, domestic violence cases last an average of two years — twice as long as the statewide average. Over the last few years, more cases are being filed, and fewer are being resolved. 

For victims, the system that’s supposed to provide safety can keep them tethered to the person they are trying to escape, with no one to advocate on their behalf.

Survivors of domestic violence are often forced to turn to family court at the most dangerous time in their relationship — when they’ve decided to leave their abuser. The stakes are high. 

“It determines the course of your life,” said Ivy Lee, a civil rights attorney and director of the Mayor’s Office for Victims’ Rights, which connects survivors with legal resources and advocates on their behalf. “Do you have your kids? Do you get enough child support? Does he get custody? Does he get to keep guns?”

In 2024, San Francisco received 1,016 requests for domestic violence restraining orders. Judges granted 295 — about 1 in 3. Nine out of 10 survivors represented themselves. In some cases, that meant being cross-examined by their abuser.

The power imbalance is stark. A 2021 national survey by the Legal Services Corporation found that 98% of domestic violence survivors needed help in a civil legal problem, but around 90% couldn’t afford counsel. In San Francisco, domestic violence survivors seeking court protection are predominantly low-income Black and Latino women.

To grant a restraining order, a survivor must prove to a judge that abuse has occurred by a preponderance of the evidence. An attorney can improve a survivor’s chances. Between 2015 and 2019, a California legal aid program provided free counsel to 287 domestic violence survivors seeking restraining orders; 49% were granted, a rate far higher than that of San Francisco.

When a domestic violence restraining order petition is filed and the couple has children, the case is treated like a standard divorce or child custody petition. While restraining orders can be in place up to five years before requiring renewal, custody proceedings can grind on until the child is 18. 

A study conducted from 2000 to 2010 in King County, Washington, found that when domestic violence survivors had legal representation, courts were 85% more likely to deny visitation to abusive parents and 77% more likely to place restrictions on visits.

The power dynamic of an abusive relationship doesn’t vanish in court. Survivors know the cost of saying no to their abuser, and the threat of violence shapes what they ask for, what they concede, and how they testify. 

“There’s an inherent imbalance if you have a domestic violence survivor and a batterer in front of a judge,” said Emberly Cross, coordinating attorney for the Cooperative Restraining Order Clinic. “The batterer has an advantage.”

CROC is one of a handful of providers in San Francisco that exclusively represent domestic violence survivors. Its team of five attorneys helps around 700 people each year — discussing legal options, preparing documents, and offering support during hearings. CROC files requests for restraining orders on behalf of about 160 people each year. 

Cross, who has represented survivors for 29 years, sets expectations for clients about how difficult, long, and dangerous the process can be. “To get a restraining order, survivors have to tell complete strangers the most difficult, embarrassing parts of their lives, again and again,” she said. “In some cases, survivors decide staying is the safest option.”

The legal system isn’t designed to be understood by the layperson. The courthouse has a help center on the fifth floor — a small window at the end of a crowded hallway, open three days a week. It’s first come, first served. Spots can fill up an hour after the courthouse opens.

“Just being in the building with all the documents and the paperwork is already so intimidating,” said Munoz. “If you write something incorrectly on a filing, it can set back that court hearing.”

When Munoz came to the courthouse in July 2022, a woman in the hallway overheard her conversation. She told Munoz to call CROC.

Before CROC decides to take a case, staffers perform a “dominant aggressor analysis” to determine whether they’re dealing with a likely victim. Munoz passed the test, and CROC took her case for free.

Munoz’s new attorney suggested she file for a domestic violence restraining order — something Munoz never knew was an option.

CROC drafted sworn declarations, assembled exhibits — police reports, screenshots, photos of bruises — and made sure everything was filed and served correctly. Jones denied the abuse in his response, but the court found Munoz’s allegations credible.

In September 2022, Judge Maria Evangelista granted a two-year domestic violence restraining order. The court found that Jones perpetuated domestic violence — that he assaulted Munoz and that his daughter was injured twice in his care. “I thought, OK, boom, we’re done,” Munoz said. “I can focus on healing and taking care of my child.”

Instead, she’s been back to court roughly every six to eight weeks for nearly three years. Each trip means another declaration and another stack of proof: missed visits, order violations, late-night messages, public insults, calls to police. And of course, more facetime with Jones. For Munoz, it feels like a cruel cycle: Jones violates an order, Munoz tells the judge, Jones gets another chance. 

“Any tool that is created to assist a survivor can and will be used by a batterer," Cross said. 

Abusive partners commonly weaponize family court as a means to maintain control over their victims, a tactic known as “litigation abuse.” Judges have the ability to limit this behavior but often let it continue.

It’s especially common in San Francisco. On average, two-thirds of the city’s domestic violence restraining order cases continue to involve hearings even after the orders are granted. 

Statewide, the 2024 clearance rate for domestic violence cases was 82%. In San Francisco, it was 50%.

“The language of the restraining order basically says this person cannot be around me or harm me in any way,” Munoz said. “But I’m having to co-parent with this person and having to continuously go to court with this person. It doesn’t make sense.”

On a Friday morning in July, the hallway outside the family courtrooms was full. Dozens of people, mostly women, clutched petitions, handwritten declarations, police reports, and screenshots of threats. There were only one or two lawyers to be found.

“It’s like the DMV for people who have been abused and mishandled,” said one woman who last year was granted a two-year domestic violence restraining order against the father of her child. “It almost seems befuddling on purpose.”

Domestic violence restraining order cases are heard twice a week. On this day, Superior Court Judge Carolyn Gold began by calling the calendar. Of the day’s 24 cases, eight were dismissed at the start because neither party showed up. Others were delayed due to missing documents, confusion, or parties not filing papers in time.

The lack of counsel became clear immediately. One petitioner, a woman seeking a restraining order, told the judge, “I’m going to have to ask for a contingency.” 

“You mean ‘a continuance,’” Gold said. 

Another hearing stalled when the respondent didn’t understand the judge. 

“You’ll need to lodge it in the court,” Gold told him.

“Your honor,” he said, “what does it mean to ‘lodge it in’?”

Gold explained that it means bringing the paperwork to court.

The following week, in a courtroom down the hall, Judge Anne Costin granted a continuance to a father who said a pending criminal case made it risky to testify — he didn’t want to incriminate himself. Neither party had an attorney. 

The mother, who sat quietly for most of the hearing, spoke up in tears. 

“So, this will just continue on and on?” she asked the judge. “I am tired of coming to court. I am traumatized.”

CROC has an unusual arrangement with the court: One of its lawyers is always present in the domestic violence courtroom to sit by the clerk and type restraining orders as they are issued aloud. Once an order is printed, the attorney steps into the hallway to explain it to both parties individually. It’s not just a formality. 

“If the abuser doesn’t feel heard,” said Cross, “the person they’ll take it out on is the survivor.”

Power dynamics only multiply when the abuser has counsel. When San Francisco Sheriff's Deputy Jonathan Espiritu was arrested on felony domestic violence charges in April 2024, he retained a high-profile private attorney for his criminal case. 

Days before he was arrested, his alleged victim filed in family court for a domestic violence restraining order. She wrote that Espiritu strangled her, stalked her, pointed his duty gun at her, and threatened to kill himself if she told anyone.

He retained counsel. She, like most survivors, is representing herself. At Espiritu’s request, the case has been continued at least seven times since 2024.

“I feel harassed and abused by his multiple requests to delay my very simple request for protection,” she wrote to the court. The next hearing is set for January — nearly two years after she first asked for protection.

The hallway outside Courtroom 403 hummed with low, nervous chatter. It was just before 9 a.m. on a Tuesday in early August. Munoz took a seat at the end of a wooden bench. Dressed in gray slacks and a black blouse, her straight hair neatly combed, she did her best to show no emotion. But her eyes darted around the hall, to and from the elevator. Then she saw Jones.

“He’s here,” Munoz whispered to her CROC attorney, Carly Tomaine.

Jones strolled past them along the marble courthouse floor. He was dressed casually: jeans, tennis shoes, and a hoodie. Tomaine shifted her body diagonally in an attempt to block Munoz from his line of sight.

They waited until he disappeared behind the courtroom door. Munoz took a deep breath, and she and Tomaine slipped in after him.

Last fall, Judge Russell Roeca approved a five-year extension of Munoz’s original restraining order. Yet Munoz has been ordered back to the courtroom to face Jones more than 20 times in the past three years, often at Jones’ request.

“I think maybe it’s his way of saying, ‘Oh, I can get you down here if I want to,’” Munoz said.

In a recent declaration, Munoz’s exhaustion was clear. “Going to court does not get easier each time; it gets harder each time,” she wrote. “The more Mr. Jones screams at the judge, the more visitation time he gets. I see why a lot of people in my situation just give up and stop seeking help.”

Inside the dimly lit courtroom, Roeca called the case and swore them in. Jones had requested the hearing — he wanted overnight visits with Julieanna, who is now 4.

Munoz wanted to retain the schedule of visits two days a week.

Roeca questioned Jones about a sworn statement Munoz and her attorney filed about Julieanna returning from his care in fear, and social media posts that seemed to threaten Munoz.

Jones huffed. “Twitter is a place of freedom of speech,” he told the judge.

Roeca asked Jones if he was in therapy.

“Therapy? I don’t need therapy,” Jones scoffed, agitated. Roeca suggested he try it. Jones began to yell. Over the 30-minute hearing, Jones interrupted Roeca at least 17 times, despite pleas from the judge and shouts from the clerk.

At one heated moment, a sheriff’s deputy moved to stand next to Jones to keep him in check.

Throughout it all, Munoz sat quietly, staring straight ahead, letting her lawyer speak on her behalf. 

Tomaine had one final request on behalf of her client: that Jones not be allowed to ask for another hearing until there’s been a substantial change in his circumstances, like losing a job or moving. It is not an uncommon request. Judges have a variety of tools to restrict litigation abuse, including ordering payment of the survivor’s attorneys fees and prohibiting excessive hearings.

But Roeca denied the request. “I understand the angst that Ms. Munoz faces here,” he said, but added that he’d consider allowing overnight visits with Julieanna if Jones’ behavior were to improve by the next hearing.

“I’m patient,” the judge added.

Tomaine asked to come back in six months. Jones wanted three. The judge decided on four.

When the hearing was over, Jones stormed out of the courtroom, the door slamming behind him. Munoz rose from her seat and made her way to the hallway slowly, to avoid meeting him at the elevators.

“We’ve been in court for so many years, and even after all the times that my child has been physically harmed, there’s still no end to it,” Munoz said. “Where do we draw the line here? When is enough enough? Does it have to come to someone getting so hurt that we can’t come back from that?”

She sank down on the nearest bench and exhaled, crying softly.

“Having an attorney is the only reason that I’ve been able to get through this,” she said.

The alternative, she believed, was unthinkable.