Domestic violence enhancer is a legal term used to describe behaviors intended to cause harm, injury, or distress to a former or current intimate partner. It is used to add context to a variety of criminal offenses.
Colorado and Wisconsin do not recognize domestic violence as a criminal offense in its own right. Instead it is regarded as a sentence enhancer that adds context to various other crimes as an indicator of the perpetrator’s intention to frighten, intimidate or coerce the recipient of the abuse.
“In Colorado, domestic violence is not a separate charge, but rather something that can enhance sentencing, “explains Casey Krizman, a Criminal Defense Attorney, “In other words, you are unable to be convicted of domestic violence without being convicted of some other crime.”
Acts of aggression associated with domestic violence enhancers can be psychological or physical. It can be attached to any criminal offense, including assault, harassment, stalking, theft, trespassing, crimnal mischief, disorderly conduct, and property damage. While domestic violence is not illegal in its own right in Colorado and Wisconsin, attaching a domestic violence enhancer to a crime can significantly impact the severity of the punishment.
The state of Colorado issues mandatory protection orders is all cases with domestic violence enhancers to safeguard recipients of the abuse from more criminal acts from the alleged perpetrators. Moreover, a domestic violence enhancer helps move such cases more swiftly through the legal system.
Domestic violence enhancers prevent alleged perpetrators from re-entering a shared residence with an at-risk intimate partner. Alleged perpetrators charged with crimes with domestic violence enhancers are prohibited from having contact with the minor children they share with the recipient of the abuse.
Manya Wakefield is a narcissistic abuse recovery coach, coercive trauma specialist, and the developer of the Coercive Trauma Recovery Method™ and TENEL™ (Traumatic Exposure to Narcissism in Early Life) — proprietary recovery frameworks built from seven years of direct professional work with survivors of coercive control, narcissistic abuse, and Adult Children of Narcissists. Both frameworks have been reviewed by Dr. Michael Kinsey, PhD, clinical psychologist, New School for Social Research. She is the founder of Narcissistic Abuse Rehab, a global social impact platform launched in 2019 to support survivors through evidence-based recovery frameworks. Manya is the author of Are You In An Emotionally Abusive Relationship (2019), a resource used in domestic violence recovery groups worldwide. Her original research contributions include the Global Coercive Control Legislation Index (2020) — the first systematic index of its kind on the web — and the Global Femicide Legislation Index (2026), comprehensive legal references used by advocates, legal professionals, and policymakers internationally, cited in peer-reviewed publications including the Southern Illinois University Law Journal, Palgrave Macmillan, and the University of Agder. Her expertise has been featured in Newsweek, Elle, Cosmopolitan, HuffPost, Parade, and YourTango. She hosts the Narcissistic Abuse Rehab Podcast, available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and Amazon Music. All content on this site reflects Manya's direct professional experience working with survivors of narcissistic abuse and coercive control, her published research, and her ongoing advocacy work.
