The phone rings and Jan jumps from her seat. Jan knows that it is the person who has been stalking her. He showed up at Jan's work, school, and even at the mall when she went shopping with a friend. Jan is afraid because she knows if she calls the police, they will not be able to help her unless the police see him outside her house. Victims are no longer left on their own to handle stalkers. Florida and the federal government have enacted laws to protect stalking victims and to prosecute the offenders. Florida law gives a victim the right to obtain an order for protection from the stalker. The Florida stalking statutes allow stalkers to be charged with either misdemeanor or felony offenses if they violate these stalking statutes. Nevertheless, it is incumbent that state and federal laws continue to evolve as offenders begin to use additional resources, such as through the Internet, to stalk their victims. There are pretrial detention options that should be exercised by judges in stalking eases where it has been proven that the offender poses a threat of great bodily injury or death to the victim. There are also many victim support centers established to help victims understand the laws in their respective state, understand what safety precautions to take, and understand what actions to avoid. These services are available to any victim of stalking, whether a college student, a female, a male, a minor or an elderly person.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:ucf.edu/oai:stars.library.ucf.edu:honorstheses1990-2015-1458 |
| Date | 01 January 2005 |
| Creators | Lopez, Maria |
| Publisher | STARS |
| Source Sets | University of Central Florida |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Source | HIM 1990-2015 |
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