A Few Notes on Battering

1
A Few Notes on Battering Stalking

• Defining terms
• Battery
• Woman battering versus Domestic violence.
• 95 male perpetrated
• Stalking
• Persistent pursuit of someone that instills fear
  in the target

2
Nature Extent of Battering Stalking

• 4 types of battering
• Physical
• Sexual
• Psychological
• Destruction of property
• Commonalities
• harm to the victim
• results from domination control
• occur in a context of intimacy

3
Nature Extent of Battering Stalking

• Estimates of the extent of Battery Stalking are
  even more difficult to come by than data on rape
  sexual assault.
• Largely due to the same factors
• Limited validity of official data (police
  reports, court records, etc.)
• Data quality is a function of
• Sample characteristics
• Questions employed
• Limiting problems associated with surveys

4
Nature Extent of Battering Stalking

• A flavor of the data
• 85 of intimate partner violence involves women
  as victims (1998 NCVS)
• 25-50 of all women will be victims of domestic
  battery at some point in their lives (from
  various sources)
• Domestic violence is gendered
• Women are much more likely to be victims
• Womens likelihood of victimization increases as
  violence increases
• Women vs Men
• Meaning or motive of DV
• ? retaliation ? control
• Responses to DV
• ? fear hurt ? humor anger
• Stalking is gendered
• Much less common than battery (less than 10 of
  pop)
• ? roughly 3-4 times as likely to experience
  stalking victimization
• ? much more likely to be perpetrators of stalking
  (87 overall, 60 even for ? victims)

5
The Process of Battering Stalking

• Walkers Cycle of Violence
• An explanation of Escalation
• 3 Stages
• Tension-building
• Acute battering incident
• Making Up (kindness, contrition, loving behaviors)

6
Building a multi-causal understanding

• Structural Supports Institutional Arrangements
• Economy
• Government the Law
• Both encourage dependency of women on men
• Lack of national and sufficient child care,
  welfare policy
• Cultural Supports
• The Role of Male Entitlement
• Violence as a means of control
• The ability of men to get away with violence
• Womens increased responsibility for successful
  relationships
• Cultural scripts
• Interpersonal Characteristics
• Control Jealousy by Batterers
• Assault as a tool to control
• Psychological Trauma dependency by victims
• Various theories attempt to explain why people
  accommodate (rather than resist) a
  dangerous/exploitive environment (prisoners of
  war)

7
Response Domestic Disputes

• Police response
• Historically, has been an area of tremendous
  discretion.
• Options
• Arrest not so common
• Mediation
• Separation (physical) police power is limited
• Referral police power is limited
• No action
• Factors influencing decision to arrest in
  domestic calls?
• Severity of crime
• Victims preference
• Relationship
• Suspect demeanor (hostility)

8
Response Domestic Disputes

• Factors influencing decision NOT to arrest?
• Belief it is a private dispute
• Officer judgment victim will not follow through
• Legacy of past dept. perspective to avoid arrest
• Arrest is work for officers
• Presents risks of injury
• Creates higher visibility of officer actions

9
Response Feminism impacts culture

• 1970s Revolution in DV cases Mandatory Arrest
• 1st attempts to control officer discretion
  through policy
• Resulted from efforts to limit police discretion
  in the courts on the grounds that ? were not
  receiving equal protection of the law (14th
  Amendment)
• Police response should be guided by citizen
  behavior, not by the relationship of the parties
  involved
• Mandatory arrest policies based upon premise that
  arrest provides specific deterrence
  (criminalization of woman battering)

10
Discretion Domestic Disputes

• Does mandatory arrest deter future DV
• Minneapolis DV Experiment (Sherman and Berk 1982)
• Examined deterrent effect of alternative actions
  on Domestic Violence
• Arrest, mediation, separation
• Cases randomly assigned to each treatment
• Findings Arrests produced lower rates of repeat
  violence (in 6 mos.)
• Resulted in widespread changes in policy toward
  mandatory arrest for dom. Violence
• Closer inspection revealed a number of flaws with
  the execution of the experiment
• Results have not been replicable in other cities
• In some cases arrest seems to have an escalation
  effect (fighting fire w/gas)
• Why? Sample of recidivists
• Abuse is normative in relationship Arrest is
  ineffective as a deterrent disconnect between
  arrest and criminal sanctions interaction effect
  with social capital (most effective on 1st timers
  and middle class)
• Preferred (pro) arrest has been adopted by most
  departments
• Other provisions have been developed training in
  handling domestic situations

11
CJS Response

• CJS is composed of 3 parts Cops, Courts
  Corrections
• Which is most important to addressing domestic
  battery?
• What role do police play in the process of
  abusive domestic relationships?
• Historically? Non-intervention (private dispute)
• Contemporary? Debatable
• 3 Options 1.Non-intervention, 2.Mediation,
  3.Arrest
• Minneapolis DV experiment Resulted in mandatory
  or pro-arrest policies in DV cases
  (Controversial)
• Temporary Restraining Orders
• Police more likely to be batterers than
  population
• evidence that up to 90 of domestic homicides
  are in HHs that police have already responded to
  a call for service.

12
Ch 21 Fear the Perception of
Alternatives-Browne

• If asking the question why battered women dont
  leave is the wrong question to ask, what is/are
  the right question(s)?
• What is the relationship between the seriousness
  of battering events and the decision to leave an
  abusive relationship?
• How does familiarity between domestic combatants
  constrain womens options?
• How has the law/CJS impacted battering
  situations? Is it a resource for batterer
  victims or batterers?
• What can we learn about the nature of lethal
  assaults by women from comparing the homicide and
  control groups?
• What is the process by which women turned from
  victim to offender?