Welcome to Ward Adams Bryan-Lamb
When you need legal services you want efficient, practical and knowledgeable advice. The team at Ward Adams Bryan-Lamb is here to listen and give you the right advice for your situation. We pride ourselves in helping people achieve all of their personal business and legal solutions.
We are proud of our Southern roots and with offices in Invercargill and Riverton, Southland, New Zealand. Our lawyers capably assist clients locally, throughout Otago, Central Otago and the rest of New Zealand as well as internationally to achieve the best possible outcomes. Whether you require assistance with issues relating to your family, house, business, farm, trust, civil or employment disputes, succession planning, retirement, estate planning, immigration
or any other legal matter, we are here to help.
At Ward Adams Bryan-Lamb we understand that what you are experiencing may be challenging. Our firm was established over 100 years ago and we continue to offer an experienced team who take pride in handling all legal matters in a confident, professional and caring manner, with utmost respect and integrity. We ensure that you are kept informed about the process every step of the way while delivering up-to-date and effective solutions.
Our expertise covers all areas of legal practice. We represent a wide variety of clients including individuals, families, large and small businesses, retailers, the rural sector trade and professional organisations, as well as community groups.
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With the use of social media and online platforms becoming more and more prevalent in our daily lives, it is also becoming easier for people to use these platforms as a way to inflict psychological and verbal abuse or harm on other people. Individuals are now able to use online platforms to create fake profiles, post, threaten, and stalk people as a form of psychological harm. It is even becoming increasingly common for people to send messages by entering text into the reference box in a bank transfer. Individuals are becoming more creative, so it is important that we are aware of the risks of harm, and take the necessary steps to avoid such behaviour from continuing. Under the Family Violence Act 2018, such online behaviour may constitute “family violence” and an application to the Family Court for a Protection Order may be necessary. In order to make an application under this Act, you and the person exerting this harmful behaviour (the Respondent) must have been in a “family relationship”. The Respondent may be a current or previous spouse or partner, or a family member. You may wish to seek special conditions to be included in the Protection Order should the Court grant one. This may include that the Respondent must take all reasonable steps to remove harmful material about you from social media. If you are not in a “family relationship”, an application can be made in the District Court under the Harmful Digital Communications Act 2015. In contrast to an application under the Family Violence Act 2018, for an order to be granted under this Act, it must be satisfied that the other party had intention to cause you harm, and such communication would cause harm to a reasonable person and did cause you harm. If successful, the Court may make orders against the other party including taking down or disabling the material, ceasing or refraining from the conduct concerned, or publishing an apology. This Act is narrow and more targeted, and is not likely to result in quick or efficient redress compared to the Family Violence Act 2018. In any event, it is important that you put necessary measures in place to stop this behaviour from continuing including not sharing your passwords, disabling GPS tracking on online platforms, blocking others on social media, and making a complaint to the relevant agencies.