We Provide Direct Services to Survivors
StatuteFINDER is a direct service provider of legal-information support for domestic violence survivors. We help survivors directly by identifying potentially relevant laws, explaining legal rights and options in plain language, preparing them for orders of protection, police reports, and court, and helping them take informed, concrete next steps toward safety and justice. To date, we have directly served 7,500 users. StatuteFINDER is free, anonymous, available 24/7, and accessible without sign-in.
We do more than refer survivors somewhere else. Survivors come to StatuteFINDER and receive individualized, immediate legal-information support they can use right away. We help them describe what happened, identify potentially relevant statutes, understand what legal protections may apply, and prepare to communicate more clearly with judges, police, advocates, and attorneys. A referral may sometimes be one next step, but it is not the service itself. The service is the direct legal-information support we provide to the survivor in that moment.
What makes this a direct service
How survivors receive direct help from StatuteFINDER
Step 1: The survivor tells us what happened.
They can describe the abuse in their own words, privately and at any hour.
Step 2: StatuteFINDER provides direct legal-information support.
We identify potentially relevant laws, explain possible legal issues in plain language, and help the survivor better understand rights, protections, and next steps.
Step 3: The survivor uses that information to take action.
That can include preparing for an order of protection, a police report, court, custody proceedings, immigration-related questions, or other abuse-related legal matters.
1) Orders of Protection
We help survivors take concrete steps toward an order of protection by identifying potentially relevant statutes, helping them describe the abuse in legally relevant terms, showing them where the correct courthouse is located or which website to use to file, pulling up the appropriate forms and hyperlinks, and helping them prepare before they submit.
Direct services we provide
Tanya Foster shares how survivors have used StatuteFINDER to act on urgent protective-order matters, file before deadlines expired, and pursue relief that protected their safety and housing.
2) Criminal Law
We help survivors identify which criminal laws may have been violated, match their experiences to potentially relevant statutes, and organize the facts in a way that can be used for police reports, prosecutor conversations, or court preparation.
Sonia Owchariw explains how StatuteFINDER helped her identify the statute of limitations, confirm she could still file charges, and walk into court prepared with the relevant statute codes.
After spending countless hours trying to decipher legal codes on her own, Tanja Davis says StatuteFINDER gave her the clarity and confidence she needed to face the judge and district attorney.
3) Civil vs. Criminal Pathways
We help survivors figure out whether the issues they are facing may fall into a criminal matter, a civil matter, or both, so they can decide what process to pursue next and what kind of filing, agency, or court action may be involved. This helps survivors avoid losing time and gives them a clearer path forward.
4) Police Reports and Evidence Preparation
We help survivors identify the statutes tied to what happened so they can better organize screenshots, messages, photos, timelines, and other evidence before speaking with police, an advocate, or an attorney. This turns scattered evidence into something more usable and actionable.
5) Court Preparation
We help survivors prepare for court by giving them the legal language, statute codes, and issue-specific information they may need to speak more clearly and confidently before a judge, magistrate, prosecutor, or court staff.
Chuck shares how StatuteFINDER helped him organize traumatic experiences into a clear, professional narrative and gave him information he felt confident using when facing his abuser in court.
6) Family Law
We help survivors navigate abuse-related family-law issues by identifying legal issues tied to divorce, custody, parenting time, child support, and division of assets, while also helping them locate the relevant forms, statutes, and issue-specific resources that may apply to their case.
Justine Manzano explains how StatuteFINDER helps survivors identify the statutes affecting their relationships and use that information in court and family-court proceedings.
7) Divorce Support
We help survivors move through divorce-related abuse issues by identifying relevant laws, clarifying possible legal issues, and helping them prepare information that may strengthen divorce filings or related court proceedings.
8) Child Custody Cases
We help survivors identify legal issues affecting custody, parenting-time interference, denial of records, calculation of child support, and related family-court concerns. We also help them prepare for the next steps by surfacing the statutes and information that may matter most.
Mikayla shares how StatuteFINDER helped her build confidence, identify the laws being broken, and strengthen her case during a high-stakes custody battle. She ultimately ended up winning sole custody of her child by self-representing with StatuteFINDER.
9) Child Abuse Issues
We help survivors identify when abuse involving a child may raise urgent legal concerns, what statutes may be implicated, and what information may be important to document before taking the next step with court, law enforcement, or a child-serving agency.
10) Child Protective Services (CPS) Issues
We help survivors navigate CPS-related situations by identifying legal issues, clarifying rights and concerns, and helping them prepare to respond when they believe a case is not being handled fairly or lawfully.
11) Parental Alienation and Custody Interference Issues
We help survivors identify legal issues related to denied parenting time, manipulation, interference, withheld records, and family-court enforcement problems.
Alan Donovan explains how StatuteFINDER helps parents dealing with parental alienation and custody-order violations identify the statutes that match their case.
12) Immigration Law
We help immigrant survivors identify abuse-related legal issues, including statutes and rights that may relate to immigration relief, visa eligibility, or petition rights. We also help make that information easier to access, including in Spanish.
Jessica shares how StatuteFINDER directly helps Hispanic immigrant survivors understand abuse-related immigration protections and move forward with greater clarity and confidence.
13) Cyberstalking and Digital Abuse
We help survivors identify legal issues related to stalking, harassment, threats, digital monitoring, and other forms of technology-facilitated abuse, then use those results to support next steps with police, court, or safety planning.
14) Housing and Eviction Issues
We help survivors identify legal issues tied to housing instability, exclusive use of property, eviction threats, how to end a lease due to domestic violence, and access to a home after abuse. In urgent situations, this can be the difference between remaining unsafe and taking action to protect housing.
15) Disability and ADA-Related Rights
We help disabled survivors identify ADA protections, accommodations, and access rights that may apply to courtrooms, law enforcement interactions, and related systems.
Rose explains how StatuteFINDER helped her identify ADA protections, request courtroom accommodations, and move forward with a protective-order filing.
16) Shelter and Immediate Safety Navigation
When a survivor is in danger, we help them locate nearby shelters, identify urgent protective-order information, and build a more realistic escape plan while also giving them abuse-specific legal information they can use immediately.
Ashley shares how StatuteFINDER helped her find temporary protective-order information, locate nearby shelters, and build an escape plan to get herself and her children to safety.
17) Statute of Limitations and Filing Urgency
We help survivors identify when a legal deadline may be approaching, including situations where immediate filing matters.
18) Legal Forms, Hyperlinks, and Filing Navigation
We help survivors move from confusion to action by surfacing the relevant statutes, directing them to the correct hyperlinks, showing them forms and filing pages, and guiding them toward the next concrete step in the process. That is part of what makes StatuteFINDER a direct provider of legal-information support rather than a referral-only resource.
19) And more
Whenever abuse creates a legal problem, StatuteFINDER helps survivors do more than learn abstract information. We help them identify laws, locate forms, prepare filings, organize evidence, get ready for court, and move toward safety and justice with concrete next steps they can use right away. As of April 8, 2026, we have served 7,500 survivors for free across all 50 states.