Is a restraining order ever enough?

My best friend who lives in Oakland, CA called me over the weekend because her neighbor was violently murdered by an ex and stalker whom she had a restraining order against. Everyone knew he was crazy, she had kicked him to the curb, she had done everything within her legal right to stop him from coming near her.

Elnora Caldwell was always clear about what she wanted. And after a turbulent marriage, she wanted nothing to do with Robert Woods. The 46-year-old Oakland woman, a Nordstrom employee in downtown San Francisco known for her impeccable appearance, served Woods with divorce papers several weeks ago, relatives said, and filed for a restraining order. She told her landlord, “I kicked him to the curb.”
But police said Woods, a burly weight lifter who once worked for the city of Oakland, did not leave his estranged wife alone.
Woods fatally stabbed her Saturday evening in his black pickup and pushed her out on a road just off Highway 24 near the Orinda side of the Caldecott Tunnel in front of stunned motorists, authorities said.

But see the problem is a restraining order doesn’t restrain someone who is psychotic, obsessed or just hates women which is usually at the root of most violence against women. Perhaps if the abusive person is a rational human being, than maybe it would work, but how many abusive people that are capable of taking someone’s life are rational?
A quarter of women experience domestic violence and the murder of women via intimate partner violence and homicide is the fourth leading cause of death for women of childbearing age and 1/3 of women murdered are by intimate partners. Yet all of the resources that are available to us do not effectively solve the problem, nor do they save lives. Where were the cops? Why was he not being patrolled or why was he not forced to relocate? Or why was he not put in rehabilitative services, counseling, anything? What does it take to take that kind of action? He has to kill her first?
Sorry to sound so frustrated, but when I had to leave my apt for a stalking incident I too was told that the only recourse I had for a man that lived under me and could get to my front door at any time of day or night, was to file a restraining order. I don’t think a piece of paper will actually stop a mentally ill person that hates women from doing what he is planning on doing. That is not how it works.
It is stories like this where theory meets action and I feel so at a loss for how to move forward or what words of solace to even offer. I don’t support the heavy policing of communities of color, I don’t support increased rates of incarceration and I support rehabilitation for all kinds of offenders, however, given the current conditions of the prison industrial complex, it is difficult to see any of that theory in action. Without policy based support for alternatives to rehabilitation for people committing domestic partner violence, what hope do we have?
My condolences to the family of Elnora Caldwell and the community surrounding her. Our thoughts are with you.
Update: They are considering the death penalty for the murderer.