Vermont Harassment Laws: Stalking, Penalties, and Protective Orders

Vermont harassment laws make it a crime to direct repeated threatening or intimidating conduct at another person, with penalties that run from misdemeanor fines up to five years in prison and a $25,000 fine for aggravated stalking. Victims can also seek a protective order from the Superior Court and sue for financial damages. The same conduct can trigger criminal charges, a civil order, and a lawsuit at the same time.

What Counts as Harassment in Vermont

Under Vermont’s stalking chapter, “harassing” means actions directed at a specific person or that person’s family member that would cause a reasonable person to fear unlawful sexual conduct, unlawful restraint, bodily injury, or death. The statute lists verbal threats, written threats, telephonic and other electronically communicated threats, vandalism, and physical contact without consent.¹

Two things decide whether conduct clears the legal bar. The behavior has to be aimed at a specific person, not a general audience. And the test is objective: it must be the kind of conduct that would frighten or seriously distress a reasonable person, not just the particular victim. A single rude comment or one heated argument usually falls short. Vermont’s criminal framework targets patterns of behavior that serve no legitimate purpose and are designed to intimidate.

Stalking and Aggravated Stalking

Vermont defines stalking as a course of conduct involving following, lying in wait for, or harassing another person when that conduct serves no legitimate purpose and would cause a reasonable person to fear for their physical safety or suffer substantial emotional distress. “Following” means maintaining visual or physical proximity over time in a way that would cause a reasonable person to fear bodily injury, unlawful restraint, unlawful sexual conduct, or death. “Lying in wait” means hiding or being concealed to attack or harm someone.¹

The phrase “course of conduct” does important work. It requires at least two acts showing a continuity of purpose. A single incident, however frightening, generally does not qualify as stalking under Vermont law.

Aggravated stalking applies when the accused commits stalking and has a prior stalking or aggravated stalking conviction, among other circumstances. It carries up to five years in prison, a fine of up to $25,000, or both.²

Electronic Harassment and Cyberstalking

Vermont’s harassment definition expressly covers electronically communicated threats, so text messages, emails, social media messages, and other digital communications can support a criminal harassment or stalking charge.¹ Persistent unwanted digital contact, doxxing, and spreading false information online to harm someone can all qualify when the conduct fits the pattern requirement.

Federal law adds a second track. Under 18 U.S.C. § 2261A, cyberstalking becomes a federal crime when someone uses the internet or other electronic communication systems in interstate commerce to engage in a course of conduct intended to kill, injure, harass, or intimidate another person, and that conduct places the victim in reasonable fear of death or serious bodily injury or causes substantial emotional distress. Federal prosecutors must prove at least two acts showing a continuity of purpose. Cases that cross state lines or involve especially severe threats are sometimes charged federally rather than in Vermont courts.

Nonconsensual Pornography

Vermont makes it a crime to knowingly share a nude or sexually explicit image of an identifiable person without that person’s consent when the disclosure is intended to harm, harass, intimidate, threaten, or coerce the person depicted. Consenting to the recording of an image does not, by itself, mean the person consented to its distribution.³

A standard violation is a misdemeanor punishable by up to two years in prison, a $2,000 fine, or both. If the images are shared for financial profit, the offense becomes a felony carrying up to five years in prison, a $10,000 fine, or both.³ When the victim is a minor or the images involve sexual content directed at children, separate statutes come into play.

Penalties at a Glance

Harassment or threatening behavior: generally a misdemeanor, with potential jail time up to one year and fines. Threats involving a deadly weapon or targeting someone based on a protected characteristic can be charged more severely.
Stalking: penalties scale with the severity of the conduct and the victim’s circumstances.
Aggravated stalking: up to five years in prison and up to $25,000 in fines, or both, when the accused has a prior stalking conviction, violates a court order, or other aggravating factors apply.²
Nonconsensual pornography: up to two years and $2,000 as a misdemeanor; up to five years and $10,000 as a felony when done for profit.³

Prior convictions push sentences up. In domestic violence cases, violating a court-issued protective order is a separate criminal offense that stacks on top of the underlying harassment charges.

Protective Orders for Victims

Vermont offers two main types of protective orders, and the right one depends on the relationship between the parties.

Relief from Abuse (RFA) order: for abuse by a family or household member. Filed in the Family Division of the Superior Court.⁴
Order Against Stalking or Sexual Assault: for harassment by acquaintances, coworkers, neighbors, strangers, or anyone who is not a family or household member. Filed in the Civil Division of the Superior Court.⁴

You file a request with the appropriate division of the Superior Court describing the harassing behavior.⁵ When there is immediate danger, the court can issue a temporary order quickly to restrict contact until a full hearing. If the judge finds sufficient grounds at the hearing, a longer-term order can be issued. Violating a protective order is itself a criminal offense.

A Vermont protective order does not lose its force at the state line. Under the federal Violence Against Women Act, every jurisdiction in the United States is required to recognize and enforce a valid protection order issued in any other jurisdiction. If your harasser follows you to another state, your Vermont order remains enforceable there.

Workplace Harassment

Vermont’s Fair Employment Practices Act prohibits employers, employment agencies, and labor organizations from discriminating against individuals based on characteristics including race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, age, and disability.⁶ Harassment that creates a hostile work environment based on any of these characteristics violates the Act.

Vermont has a separate sexual harassment statute that makes employers responsible for maintaining a workplace free of sexual harassment and requires them to adopt clear policies. Meeting the notice requirements does not shield an employer from liability for sexual harassment of employees or applicants.⁷

Enforcement can come through the Vermont Attorney General, a state’s attorney, or a private lawsuit. Remedies include back pay, reinstatement, compensatory damages, and civil penalties. Employees should document incidents and report through the employer’s internal process first, then file with the Vermont Human Rights Commission or the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission if the employer fails to act.

Harassment in Schools

Harassment, hazing, and bullying are prohibited in Vermont schools, and state policy requires all educational institutions to provide safe, orderly, and positive learning environments.⁸ Schools and districts must adopt policies against those behaviors and address complaints through established procedures.⁹ Schools that fail to intervene can face accountability for negligence, particularly when the harassment targets a student based on race, gender identity, disability, or another protected characteristic.

Civil Lawsuits for Damages

Beyond criminal charges and protective orders, victims can sue for financial compensation. Two claims come up most often.

Intentional Infliction of Emotional Distress

The plaintiff must show the defendant’s behavior was extreme and outrageous, that the defendant intended to cause severe emotional suffering or acted with reckless disregard for that outcome, and that the plaintiff actually suffered serious emotional harm as a result. Courts look at how often the harassment happened, how severe each incident was, and how the pattern affected the victim’s mental health. Isolated rude behavior rarely meets the “extreme and outrageous” standard.

Defamation

When harassment includes spreading false statements that damage the victim’s reputation, a defamation claim may fit. Vermont distinguishes libel (written falsehoods) from slander (spoken falsehoods). The plaintiff must prove the harasser communicated false information to others and that the falsehoods caused tangible harm such as job loss or damaged relationships. Public figures face a higher bar, including proof that the defendant knew the statements were false or acted with reckless disregard for the truth.

How to Report Harassment

Immediate danger or criminal conduct: call 911 or file a report with your local law enforcement agency. Officers will document the complaint and may open a criminal investigation.
Workplace harassment: report internally first. If that fails or the employer is the problem, file with the Vermont Human Rights Commission or the EEOC.
School harassment: report to the school’s designated contact or Title IX coordinator for sex-based misconduct. Vermont schools must have procedures for these complaints.
Protective orders: file with the Vermont Superior Court. RFA orders go to the Family Division; stalking and sexual assault orders go to the Civil Division.⁴

Whatever path you take, save the evidence. Keep text messages, emails, voicemails, social media posts, and photographs. Write down dates, times, locations, and the names of any witnesses as soon as you can after each incident. The same documentation supports a criminal complaint, a protective order petition, and a civil suit.

Defenses to Harassment Charges

People accused of harassment in Vermont have several possible defenses, and which ones work depends entirely on the facts.

Lack of intent is the most common. Vermont’s harassment and stalking statutes require intentional conduct that is part of a pattern. If the accused can show the behavior was a misunderstanding, a single isolated incident, or genuinely served a legitimate purpose, it may not meet the statutory threshold. Weak cases often fall apart here.

Sufficiency of evidence is another line of attack. The course-of-conduct requirement means prosecutors need at least two acts showing a continuity of purpose.¹ In electronic cases, forensic evidence such as IP addresses, message timestamps, and account ownership records can be used to dispute whether the accused actually sent the communications.

First Amendment protections sometimes apply when the alleged harassment involves speech. Vermont criminalizes threatening communications, but courts have to balance those statutes against free speech rights. Speech that does not constitute a “true threat” or targeted harassment aimed at a specific person may be constitutionally protected. Political criticism, heated but non-threatening arguments, and offensive general commentary typically fall outside what harassment statutes reach.

In workplace cases, the defense may argue the conduct did not create a hostile environment as defined under the Fair Employment Practices Act, or that the employer’s investigation was flawed. In school cases, the defense often turns on whether the behavior actually met the statute or was ordinary peer conflict mischaracterized by the institution.

1
Vermont General Assembly. Vermont Code Title 13 Chapter 19 Section 1061 – Definitions
2
Vermont General Assembly. Vermont Code Title 13 Chapter 19 Section 1063 – Aggravated Stalking
3
Vermont Judiciary. Vermont Supreme Court Opinion 2018 VT 95 – State of Vermont v. Superior Court, Bennington Unit
4
Vermont Judiciary. Protective Orders
5
Vermont Judiciary. Relief From Abuse
6
Justia. Vermont Code Title 21 Section 495 – Unlawful Employment Practice
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Vermont General Assembly. Vermont Code Title 21 Section 495h – Sexual Harassment
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Vermont General Assembly. Vermont Code Title 16 Section 570 – Harassment, Hazing, and Bullying Prevention Policies
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Vermont Agency of Education. Harassment, Hazing and Bullying Prevention and Response