Breaching your Apprehended Violence Order

You will breach an AVO if you knowingly do something that the AVO says you are not allowed to do.

If you breach an AVO by disobeying the orders, the police can arrest and charge you with:

• the criminal offence of contravening the AVO (breaching the AVO), and
• other criminal offences, for example, assault or malicious damage. 

You can't be convicted of breaching an AVO if:

• you were not been served with the Provisional, Interim or Final AVO, and you were not in court when the order was made
• you went to mediation referred by the Court
• you were following a Property Recovery Order. 

If you breach a DVO, NSW Police will check that:

• there is a nationally recognised DVO
• the DVO is current
• the conditions that relate to the reported breach
• either one or both parties was in NSW at the time of the alleged breach.

If you were not in NSW when the order was breached, NSW Police may refer the incident to the jurisdiction where you were located at the time of the breach for further investigation.

If you breach an AVO you may be arrested and charged with breaching the AVO. The police may give you a Court Attendance Notice and you will have to go to court.

If the Court convicts you of breaching the AVO, you can be fined $5,500 and/or imprisoned for up to two years.

If you breach an AVO by committing a crime, you can receive a separate sentence (punishment) for:

• breaching the AVO, and
• any crime(s) you are convicted of. 

If the breach involves violence, it is considered a serious offence and there is a strong chance you will be sent to prison if you are convicted.

Any conviction will appear on your criminal record and in a Working With Children Check.

For more information about criminal charges, see A criminal charge.

In certain circumstances you may find that you have accidentally breached your AVO, for example, if you enter a building without knowing the protected person is inside.

If you accidentally breach your AVO, the police may decide to charge you with the offence of contravening (breaching) an AVO. However, you can't be found guilty of contravening an AVO unless you knowingly do something that an AVO says you are not allowed to do.

Sometimes the protected person may call you or ask you to meet somewhere. If the AVO states that you are not to contact the protected person, you can still be charged with breaching the AVO even though the protected person starts the contact.

If the protected person wants you to do something that the AVO restricts you from doing, you should get legal advice.