Published August 14, 2026
The Conceptual Foundation
The coercive control framework traces to the scholarship of Evan Stark, a sociologist and forensic social worker. Stark, Professor Emeritus at Rutgers University, published “Coercive Control: The Entrapment of Women in Personal Life” in 2007, a work that became one basis for the offense of “coercive and controlling behaviour” in the United Kingdom. Stark argued that domestic violence is “neither primarily domestic nor necessarily violent,” but a pattern of controlling behaviors more akin to hostage-taking. Reviewers noted that the domestic violence revolution’s focus on physical violence, while effective at drawing attention and resources, had moved the field away from “women’s true experience of which bodily injury is only one piece.”
That theoretical shift, from a single-incident assault model to a pattern-of-conduct model, has since shaped legislation in multiple countries and a growing number of US states. England and Wales criminalized coercive control in 2015 under the Serious Crime Act, Scotland followed in 2019, and Ireland, Northern Ireland, New South Wales, and Queensland have also enacted criminal offenses. The US coercive control state laws that have emerged follow a different lineage, with most embedding the concept within civil and family law rather than criminal statutes.
The State-Level Landscape
Hawaii remains the only US state to have criminalized coercive control as a standalone offense. States including California, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Washington, Colorado, New Jersey, Maine, Kentucky, Louisiana, and Vermont have incorporated it into civil and family law, enabling protective orders and influencing custody decisions without making it a criminal charge. There is no federal statute defining coercive control, and state-by-state variation produces sharply different outcomes for similar fact patterns, especially when families move between states.
This coercive control family law trend takes different statutory forms. In California, Family Code section 6320 was amended in 2020 (SB 1141) to add coercive control as a basis for domestic violence restraining orders, listing isolation, deprivation of basic necessities, controlling movements or communications, and compelled debt as examples. A finding under section 6320 then triggers the Family Code section 3044 rebuttable presumption against custody. In Connecticut, Public Act 21-78 (“Jennifer’s Law”), effective 2021, expanded the definition of domestic violence in family court to include coercive control and a non-exhaustive list of behaviors including isolation, monitoring, threats against children and pets, and forced sex.
As the American Bar Association noted in December 2025, most states across the United States still have no statute regarding coercive control, leaving “a large gap in those states, rendering victims of nonphysical abuse with fewer options for protection.”
Arizona HB 2995 and Its Lineage
Against this backdrop, Arizona enacted HB 2995 with notable structural ambition. On June 22, 2026, the Governor signed HB 2995, known as the “Alec and Lydia Act.” Because the bill carries an emergency clause, it became operative immediately. It deletes nearly all of A.R.S. section 25-403.03 and replaces it with an entirely new framework for domestic violence in legal decision-making and parenting time cases.
The law is named for Alec and Lydia Mater, two Arizona children who were killed by their father while he was exercising parenting time after his divorce from their mother. During the divorce, the father had exhibited psychiatric issues including reporting suicidal thoughts.
The Arizona HB 2995 lineage draws on the pattern-based recognition of abuse that earlier state laws adopted, but the statute goes further in several procedural dimensions. The definition of domestic violence now includes fifteen enumerated categories of coercive control under new section 25-403.03(M)(1), some of which are non-criminal: isolation from friends and family, monitoring or controlling finances, harassment, and weaponized litigation, among others. Coercive control, meaning non-physical forms of psychological and emotional abuse, is for the first time in Arizona expressly included in the definition of domestic violence for family court purposes, and the use of litigation as a coercive tool is specifically named.
Several procedural features distinguish HB 2995 from earlier US coercive control state laws:
The legal standard for proving domestic violence is now established as preponderance of the evidence. Corroboration from exhibits or witness testimony of another person is not required, a change from the prior statute where those accused of domestic violence were free to argue that lack of corroboration should lead to rejection of the claim.
HB 2995 allows consideration of other acts of domestic violence against any person that tend to prove coercive control, even if those acts have been previously litigated, predate the last decree, or could have been litigated at another time or place.
The court must consider the severity and frequency of domestic violence, whether the parent denied, deflected, or minimized domestic violence during treatment or courtroom proceedings, whether the violence was severe or frequent enough that passage of time is not a mitigating factor, and whether the child has imitated any aspect of the parent’s domestic violence behaviors. A certificate of completion of a treatment program alone is no longer proof of rehabilitation.
Why the Underlying Research Matters
The legislative movement toward recognizing coercive control in family courts addresses harms that research has documented extensively. According to CDC data, the lifetime economic cost of intimate partner violence (including medical care, lost productivity, and criminal justice costs) is approximately $3.6 trillion, with per-victim lifetime costs of $103,767 for women and $23,414 for men. CDC’s National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey indicates that about 41 percent of women and 26 percent of men experienced contact sexual violence, physical violence, or stalking by an intimate partner during their lifetime and reported a related impact. Over 61 million women and 53 million men have experienced psychological aggression by an intimate partner in their lifetime.
Research published in BMC Public Health (2022) described economic abuse as “a unique form of intimate partner violence” that “includes behaviors that control a survivor’s ability to acquire, use, and maintain resources,” tactics that “can result in someone becoming economically dependent on their partner and may limit their ability to leave the relationship.” These are precisely the conduct categories that statutes like HB 2995 now instruct family courts to weigh.
Enduring Questions in the Coercive Control Family Law Trend
The expansion of coercive control into family law raises questions that no single statute resolves. Evidentiary standards remain unsettled across jurisdictions: California applies a rebuttable presumption against custody once coercive control is found; Arizona, as of its 2026 enactment, requires the court to weigh enumerated factors but structures the inquiry differently. In California, the extent to which the post-2020 statutory language actually helps survivors is still being determined; several survivors who sought restraining orders under the law were denied relief.
Gaps in current US law likely to shape future developments include the absence of a federal statute defining coercive control and the state-by-state variation that produces sharply different outcomes for similar fact patterns. Judicial training is another persistent concern: legislatures across the United States are passing laws that include explicit references to coercive control, and these laws are designed to address damage inflicted apart from physical violence, but the implementation of such provisions depends on whether family court judges, evaluators, and guardians ad litem receive adequate training in pattern-based abuse analysis.
Analysis of the enacted statute, the fifteen enumerated categories of coercive control, and the preponderance standard continues on the Carlton Research hub page for Arizona’s coercive control law (HB 2995).
Further Reading
This article is educational content and does not constitute legal advice. Individuals facing issues related to domestic violence or coercive control may consult the National Domestic Violence Hotline (1-800-799-7233), review the CDC’s intimate partner violence prevention resources, or seek guidance from a licensed attorney in the relevant jurisdiction.
Sources
- Arizona HB 2995, Fifty-seventh Legislature 2nd Regular Session (signed June 22, 2026), via LegiScan
- Annette Burns, “Legislative Changes to Arizona Domestic Violence Laws 2026 (Part 1),” HeyAnnette.com (June 2026)
- American Bar Association, “Redefining Domestic Abuse: Coercive Control,” Family Law Quarterly (December 2025)
- CDC, “About Intimate Partner Violence,” Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (updated 2026)
- Peterson et al., “Lifetime Economic Burden of Intimate Partner Violence Among U.S. Adults,” American Journal of Preventive Medicine (2018)
- California SB 1141, Domestic Violence: Coercive Control, via California Legislature
- Johnson et al., “Examining the Impact of Economic Abuse on Survivors of Intimate Partner Violence: A Scoping Review,” BMC Public Health (2022)
Disclaimer
Coercive control law moves fast. Jurisdictions are actively criminalizing it, amending definitions, and changing the scope of litigation. This article is current as of its date of publication and may not reflect subsequent changes. It is provided for general educational purposes and is not legal advice.