If one member of this board were to get a a restraining order against another member of this board, how might it be handled?
Mega unlikely…
I am a volunteer coordinator for a local science fiction convention, and we’ve wondered about that. What if one convention attendee has an r.o. against another? As far as we’re concerned, they are both entitled to attend the same panels and workshops, and if one of them tries to tell the other, “You can’t come into this room,” we are not going to be best pleased. But what are our legal obligations?
In any case…aren’t we all anonymous here? How would you even find another member’s “true name” to get a court order?
Anyway, I’ll bet a pickle the administrators here would not be willing to play along AT ALL. Kick 'em both out, likely as not. (Which might be the answer to the convention problem, too.)
Two people in a real-world relationship might end up in a situation in which one (or both!) obtained a restraining order against the other coming into the vicinity of the other or contacting the other by any means. It’s the second part that might put the board in an awkward position - is replying to a post “contacting”? IANAL, but possibly. No idea what the board would do, but in the past (if I recall correctly) the board has banned people for suggesting that that board might become part of a lawsuit.
Presumably, anyone who has a restraining order against someone else would put that person on their Ignore list. You don’t even need a court order to do that.
Good point. Does an ignore list affect PMs?
Yes, it does. If someone is on your ignore list, you won’t see their PMs.
Problem solved…
Unless you have an RO against a Moderator.
I’m not sure how you would get a restraining order against someone else here, unless you happened to have some connection with them in real life.
In any event, for anything involving potential legal issues, our orders at the moderation level are to immediately forward everything upstairs. We moderators are not lawyers. We are given no legal training, and we are not permitted to represent the SDMB in any way shape or form with respect to legal issues.
Anyone involving or attempting to involve the SDMB in any sort of legal action will likely find themselves banned or suspended until we get approval from the legal folks to lift the ban/suspension.
Never mind.
At some point in this thread, I hope the other party makes a dramatic post introducing their side of the matter.
You and I have never met in real life yet. 
As E_C_G states above we are not lawyers and certainly not the lawyers who the Straight Dope would go for advice. In my strictly unofficial capacity as a poster who has dealt with lots of restraining orders the medium used by a defendant to contact a plaintiff has nothing to do with it. Would you ask Google, Verizon, or the U.S. Postal Service the same question? The providers for whatever method of communication are not served with a court order to stop the communication only the defendant is. The defendant is ordered not to communicate not a company.
But I could also guess that any lawyer contacted would say to err on the side of caution and recommend suspension or banning.
Taking any outside restraining orders out of the equation, we would take any accusations of harassment from one poster to another very seriously.
In my state a restraining order is only given in cases of domestic violence so it couldn’t happen unless there was some real life connection. I can’t answer for the other 49 states.
How do restraining orders work in real life when the person with the order voluntarily goes to a place which the person with the order against them habituates (like, say, a place where that person does regular volunteer work)? Surely, no matter how creepy your ex is, you can’t force them out of their job or pre-existing hobbies by forcing the boundary of the RO against them.
In the same vein, people who have been entangled (and are therefore maybe more likely to have a restraining order between them) are more likely to share hobbies and community services, etc.
This goes back to the convention thing mentioned up-thread.
I’m not a moderator here, have been a moderator elsewhere, am a lawyer, don’t represent this board, not giving legal advice, etc.
That said, if it was up to me, which it isn’t, I’d ban both sides and be done with it.
Hypothetical: Mr Smith and Miss Jones have a relationship. One of them is a Doper, and introduces the other.
Domestic violence occurs, and the relationship breaks up. Jones gets a restraining order against Smith. He is not allowed to meet, contact or correspond with her.
So, Jones continues to post on the Dope. Smith sometimes replies directly to her posts. His replies are polite and non-jerkish, even informative and interesting in their own way and don’t break board rules.
So Jones complains to the board authorities that Smith is breaking the terms of the order. What would the SDMB authorities do about it?
Why should they do anything? It’s not their responsibility to enforce court orders. As long as Smith obeys board rules, the board should not get involved in their troubles. Jones should take her complaint to the court. The court may have something to say on the subject and might take action against Smith for breaking the order, but that has nothing to do with the Dope.
As has been said, legal issues are above our pay grade as moderators. As far as that goes, we would kick it upstairs.
This said, we do not allow personal real-word disputes between individuals to be brought to the board. In the distant past, I recall a case where a couple brought their disputes onto the board. They were instructed to desist. I would guess that if a conflict persisted despite instructions one or both would end up banned.
Each state might be a little different so take that into consideration.
With an initial temporary restraining most likely you are out of luck. No contact means no contact. In a final hearing if there is a situation where both have to be at the same place arrangements are often made. Also ROs are one way. If the plaintiff contacts the defendant it’s not a violation. If he replies it is.
I don’t see why that would be your problem any more than an ex-husband walking into a bar where his ex-wife is and her expecting the owner to kick him out. It’s my understanding that if he doesn’t leave, she can call the police. Wouldn’t it be the same for you? It’s certainly not your problem, they’ll sort it out. The person with the RO can call the police if the other doesn’t leave. You would really only need to (or choose to) intervene if something happened. ie they were yelling at each other and disrupting other guests.
Yes and no. Many of us may be anonymous but I know a lot of you know each other IRL, so there’s that. A lot of people pop up on facebook. If nothing else, a lot of us have been around here for a long time and if someone really wanted to comb through another’s posts, they could probably dig up enough info to figure out who they are.
In any case, when I read the OP I wasn’t thinking that the two members knew each other only from here. I was thinking more along the lines of, say, exes and after splitting up one of them stalked/harassed the other one on here.
My WAG, the powers that be would ban the defendant if they couldn’t restrain themselves from posting or, should it matter, posting in a way that violated the RO.