VAWA Posts:
Drop in Family Violence Unrelated to VAWA, Govt. Report Shows
PR Newswire (USA)
January 3, 2007
https://infoweb.newsbank.com/
A recent Department of Justice report on Intimate Partner Violence shows that such crime has been falling in the United States for many years, but the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) does not appear to have contributed to the drop.
According to the DOJ report, Intimate Partner Violence in the United States, partner crime began to fall long before VAWA programs were started in 1995.
In 1976, 1,348 men were killed by their wives and girlfriends. By 1994, that number had fallen to 684. Likewise, the number of women killed by intimate partners dropped 12% over the same time period.
Even for non-fatal intimate partner victimization, the Department of Justice report shows that rates began to fall before the Violence Against Women Act was enacted. From 1993 to 2004, intimate partner abuse of women fell 61%. But abuse rates of women fell across the board: 59% when the abuse was perpetrated by a stranger, and 66% when by a friend or acquaintance.
"There's still no generally accepted consensus about why any crime in general has dropped," explains Shannan Catalano, the DoJ statistician who authored the report. Possible reasons for the decline include increased policing, neighborhood-watch programs, and an overall aging of the general population.
The Justice Department report is based on data from the National Crime Victimization Survey, which is believed to underreport partner abuse, especially victimization of men. The Department of Justice report can be seen at http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/intimate/ipv.htm.
One reason for VAWA's lack of impact, researchers say, is its limited focus. "For years, researchers have been saying that half of all domestic violence is instigated by women, but most VAWA-funded programs don't accept that," notes family violence researcher Donald Dutton, PhD, a professor at the University of British Columbia.
"Now we see the result of not providing anger management and counseling services to female batterers."
A 2005 report by the Independent Women's Forum, "Domestic Violence: An In- depth Analysis," concluded that many VAWA-funded law enforcement strategies have been found to be ineffective.
R.A.D.A.R. -- Respecting Accuracy in Domestic Abuse Reporting -- is a non- profit, non-partisan organization of men and women working to assure that the problem of domestic violence is treated in a balanced and effective manner. http://www.mediaradar.org.
WHO'S THE REAL TARGET?
PRO-GUN ACTIVISTS SAY DOMESTIC RIGHTS LAWS ARE ONE MORE WAY WOMEN ARE TAKING AWAY THEIR RIGHTS
Seattle Post-Intelligencer (WA)
January 7, 2007
https://infoweb.newsbank.com/
He was much larger than me and had a beefy football-player build and short dark hair -the bouncer type. He was going to get physical if I objected. He was ready to push as we walked quickly past the long row of tables covered with guns and ammunition, past the woman collecting money for admission. Talk to him, I said to myself. Talk to him. I kept telling him I didn't work for the newspapers as he herded me to the exit.
"No pictures," he kept repeating.
"No pictures," he insisted one last time as he opened the heavy door and gently pushed me out. Then he closed the door and left me standing outside with my camera dangling from my hand. A hand-lettered sign appeared outside the entrance: NO CAMERAS ALLOWED.
Thirty minutes earlier I had walked into the public fairgrounds to attend a local gun show in Moscow, Idaho. It was the mid-1990s, and I was taking photographs of abandoned lumber mills and deserted mines in the Pacific Northwest. I was shooting what I thought were the industrial ruins of the rural West. I had also taken pictures of men in gun stores eyeing new rifles, and men hunting during deer and elk seasons. I wanted to add pictures of men and women at gun shows. At that point, I wasn't writing about gun culture. I was only taking pictures of daily life in small, rural Western towns.
When I came back to the gun show to talk with the organizer, an unofficial compromise had been reached with the relevant public officials. I could come back the next morning with my camera and take pictures before the public was admitted, provided the exhibitors agreed.
Before I left, I asked him why they enforced rules against cameras. What was the problem? Was it a distrust of government? Did they think I worked for the ATF, the IRS or the FBI? Was it anger against gun-control groups? Did they think I worked for Sarah Brady's handgun organization, or for CeaseFire, a Seattle-based gun violence prevention group? Maybe it was about hunting and animal rights? Or worse, I could be a PETA activist?
He looked at me hard and responded with one word, "Alimony."
"What?" I asked. Had I heard right? "Alimony?"
"Yes, alimony." He explained that the men inside the gun show didn't want their pictures showing up in newspapers where their ex-wives might see them spending what was legally theirs.
Wives were threats. Girlfriends were threats. They are the new scourges of secular life, hunting down unsuspecting men to get bucks and tear out their hearts. Women who talked too much were threats. And women who held public office and wouldn't shut up were the scourge of the land. I also have picked up bumper stickers at gun shows that said: "I just got a gun for my wife. It's the best trade I ever made." Or handouts detailing the "Top 10 Reasons Handguns Are Better than Women," ending with the No. 1 reason, "You can buy a silencer for a handgun." I also had seen some pretty vicious materials on Hillary Clinton and Janet Reno. A new fear floated above some of the gun exhibits: judges, lawyers and voters were giving women too much power, and the women were using that power to take guns away from their husbands, their boyfriends and their constituents. A gun-grabber lurked in the heart of the liberated woman.
Maybe the no-camera rule was about alimony. In this latest male fantasy about the war between the sexes, I could have been hired by a female predator to shoot pictures at a gun show for a ruthless ex- or estranged wife. I was just part of a new generation of bottom feeders out to get men, one of the vast army of women intent on misandry, a new word invented to capture this hatred of men by women.
At the law seminar in Reno during the 2002 National Rifle Association annual convention, I learned about other ways women can grab guns. In the midst of these carefully paced presentations, I first heard about the legal problems gun owners confronted when faced with domestic-violence restrictions. Under the terms of certain restraining orders, ownership of guns is prohibited. Domestic violence and divorce set in motion a range of state and federal statutes and laws aimed at disarming violent or potentially violent intimate partners. The 1996 Lautenberg Amendment that followed passage of the 1994 Violence Against Women Act made it a federal crime to possess a firearm while subject to a restraining order or after a misdemeanor conviction of the crime of domestic violence.
No one at the law seminar lingered on why there was domestic violence in the United States, or how this violence affected men, women and children, or what steps could be taken to reduce or prevent such violence. For many of the lawyers present, it was strictly a legal issue about due process, federal statutes and legal precedents. What happened in the living room or bedroom, likely sites of what crime analysts called simple assault, was off the political and rhetorical radar screens. I also heard no discussion on how to protect women from men in their own homes. No, the subject was about individuals convicted of misdemeanors or slapped with restraining orders who had lost their right to own firearms. And the big issue was how to get them back. It was all about the guns.
I found out that the police were particularly vulnerable. There was mention of how the Minneapolis Police Department was practically disarmed because so many police had present or past restraining orders against them. No one talked about domestic violence, because violence in the home didn't have the emotional punch of a violent predator breaking into your home. Then the homeowner was a hero defending his property, not a villain beating up on his spouse. The vigilante gun owner could hang a sign in his window announcing "Warning, Trespassers will be shot. Survivors will be shot again." But what kind of sign could the battered wife hang up?
In 2005, Ted Nugent, in his keynote address to the NRA annual meeting in Houston, could rant about plugging all the bad guys: "I want 'em dead." But what if the cop or the soldier or the storeowner was the bad guy? Cops were a touchy subject in gun-rights circles. Some police organizations wanted exceptions made for officers under restraining orders, which would make it more difficult for them to lose their firearms. Other cops wanted "law enforcement persons" held to a "higher standard, not a different standard." In 1997, Ronald Hampton, the executive director of the National Black Police Association, testified before the House Subcommittee on Crime. He spoke against exempting police officers. According to other testimony, police and military personnel were implicated in the crime of domestic violence at higher rates than were the general population.
In 1998, the National Institute for Justice reported that each year 1.5 million women were raped or physically assaulted by intimate partners. Many of these attacks occurred in the privacy of the home. Men were more likely to be attacked by strangers. In contrast, women were seven to 14 times "more likely to report that an intimate partner beat them up, choked or tried to drown them, threatened them with a gun, or actually used a gun on them."
As a woman at gun shows, I am usually pitched specific guns to ward off the predator breaking into my house or stalking me. At a gun show in the state of Washington, I spent time talking with an arms manufacturer who specialized in variations of the AR-15, originally made by Colt. This marketing specialist at the booth told me that the AR-15 could be adapted for home defense. I could put in a short barrel, less than 16 inches long - what cops used in closed spaces to shoot the bad guys. He warned me that he couldn't put the short barrel in the gun receiver because he would be breaking the law. No barrel under 16 inches can go into the gun frame. Instead, he held it about a half-inch from the gun frame and demonstrated how it would work. It was an impressive-looking weapon. Stocky and mean, a dull black.
Only once do I remember a salesman trying to sell me a gun to shoot my husband or boyfriend if he turned abusive. His personal philosophy on life was that everyone should be armed and packing. If everyone in the world were armed, there would be no domestic violence; in fact, there would be no violence at all. The bad husbands would finally get what they deserved. And all the bad people in the world would be stopped - killed or executed on the spot. He insisted that even everyone in a bar, the traditional hot spot for assault, should be packing heat. Forget about alcohol. The gun itself would stop the violence. So what if the guy packing was drunk out of his skull? The gun had this amazing magic to prevent violence. It was a talisman of peace. I had reached the logical end of the gun-rights argument. Stop crime: Arm everyone.
Yet something was desperately wrong with this picture, even though I knew that some women, fearing for their lives every day, have decided to arm themselves against their ex-loved ones. Overall, domestic violence took the glamour out of the crime scene that pro-gun activists loved to describe. Husbands and wives shooting it out in the living room didn't have the same appeal as the brave homeowner gunning down a crazed burglar. And what about all those ad campaigns to get me to buy guns? The magazine and book tales of masked young predators generated gun sales. How do you advertise buying guns when the criminal was an ex-husband, a boyfriend, or a guy you dated a couple of weeks ago?
At the law seminar, I sat thinking about how much the right to own a gun owed to the typical crime-scene scenario. Those millions of hours that Americans spend watching cop shows and vigilante heroes have helped pump up the psychic investment in guns. Still, I was having a hard time understanding how teams of lawyers for the National Rifle Association and other gun groups were ready to defend men under restraining orders. Maybe I just wasn't listening right.
At one point a question came up about Attorney General John Ashcroft and his push in the Department of Justice to accept the Second Amendment as an individual right to own guns. We were told that the Emerson case would determine whether Ashcroft's position would hold. Over the next couple of years, everywhere I turned in the gun-rights world the Emerson case was heralded as a great Second Amendment victory. Second Amendment activists would hand me copies of the complete legal ruling in paperback form. It was the greatest news to hit the gun lobby in years.
It came down to this: In 1998, the wife of Timothy Joe Emerson filed for divorce and applied for a restraining order against her husband. At a hearing, Sacha Emerson alleged that her husband made a threat over the telephone. He threatened to kill her "friend." The restraining order was granted. Later, her husband was indicted for "possession of a firearm while being under a restraining order." But, in a Texas federal district court, this indictment was dismissed by Judge Sam Cummings. In a memorandum brimming with colonial history, the Second Amendment reared its righteous head. Cummings argued that the federal actions to protect women against intimate partner violence didn't hold up against the struggles of our revolutionary fathers to found a nation with arms.
The government appealed to the 5th U.S. Court of Appeals, which upheld the indictment against the husband. Emerson's attorneys argued there were insufficient judicial findings that he was a "credible threat"; the 5th Circuit Court disagreed. Two of the three judges accepted the argument that while the Second Amendment gave an individual a right to own a gun, it did not give an individual under a restraining order the right to own a gun. This was especially true, the court found, since upon purchasing a Beretta semiautomatic pistol, the husband had signed a BATF Form 4473, stating that "so long as he was under a court order such as that of Sept. 14, 1998, federal law prohibited his continued possession of that weapon." The third judge on the court "chose not to join" in the lengthy individual rights argument because they were "dicta" and "at best an advisory treatise on this long-running debate" and really had nothing to do with the decision made by the court. He went on to say that if the Second Amendment was interpreted as an individual and not a collective right, in a way, who cares? There would still be legal grounds for "reasonable restriction" on gun ownership.
Was Sacha Emerson just another gun-grabbing wife? In reading the opinion of the 5th Circuit Court, I wondered, because most of the opinion was not about the restraining order at all. That question was settled in a concise statement by the judges. Supported by amicus curiae submitted by the NRA, the Second Amendment Foundation, the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, and the Texas State Rifle Association, two of the three federal judges had used the opinion to expound for more than 50 pages about how the Second Amendment protected individual rights.
At meetings of the NRA, including their law seminar, I repeatedly heard these legal opinions, especially arguments focused on what our founding fathers said or didn't say about the right to bear arms. I guess the two federal judges were hoping that the Supreme Court would jump on their position and finally give the gun-rights activists what they had been claiming in their brand of conservative politics for 30 years. The final, sweet vindication by the highest court in the land seemed within reach. The prize was finally in sight. Who cared if some frightened wife in Texas was worried enough to get a restraining order? She was probably overreacting. She didn't need protection; his gun did.
In the end the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear any further appeals. Gun rights activists would have to wait. I wonder how Sacha Emerson reacted to this court drama.
DNA SAMPLING
EXPANSION COULD ENSNARE THE INNOCENT
Watertown Daily Times (NY)
January 23, 2007
https://infoweb.newsbank.com/
The Justice Department is developing a program that will vastly expand the collection of DNA samples for criminal databases to include the accused as well as convicted criminals.
The plan goes beyond what most states practice by limiting DNA sampling to convicted persons, in some cases only felons and in other states much broader requirements to take samples in misdemeanor convictions as well.
The federal government will join seven states requiring DNA of anyone accused, even if not convicted of a crime. The program was approved in last year's reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act. As approved, DNA samples would be taken from "any person arrested under federal authority and from a non-U.S. person who is detained." The latter would apply to illegal immigrants held before being sent back home. Had it been in effect, more than 400,000 illegal immigrants taken into custody between October 2003 and June 2006 would have had to supply a DNA sample.
Federal officials say it would help identify and link detainees in the war on terrorism to terrorist activities and track illegal immigrants who repeatedly return to the United States and who commit crimes after being released. The unique genetic information would be entered into a national system that now holds DNA information collected by the states and federal government on 3.9 million criminals. The FBI system has helped solve more than 41,000 criminal investigations since 1990, but the scope of the federal plan troubles civil liberties and privacy advocates.
Caroline Fredrickson, director of the American Civil Liberties Union's Washington office, told USA Today that the federal law could be used to collect DNA from people charged by park rangers or even airline passengers stopped for screening.
The sampling of accused but not convicted persons could lead to arrests on minor charges to obtain DNA samples for use in other investigations. If a person is acquitted, the DNA information is supposed to be removed from the database.The Justice Department plan has to protect innocent people from misuse of the system and ensure protection of basic civil liberties.
Some facts on domestic violence
MetroWest Daily News, The (Framingham, MA)
January 28, 2007
https://infoweb.newsbank.com/
According to Mr. Rizoli's article, domestic violence is the latest ''scam'' being employed by immigrants. Mr. Rizoli's letter to the editor is disappointing, fraught with misinformation and misleading statements and endangers the safety and wellbeing of our community. The real scam is Mr. Rizoli's grinding a personal axe at the expense of victims in our community who are struggling every day just to stay safe and alive. Just once it would be refreshing if Mr. Rizoli would get his facts straight.
Fact: All victims of domestic violence and sexual assault face a complex array of medical, legal and other trauma-related issues, but immigrant, refugee and other non-English speaking victims experience unique forms of abuse as well as unique barriers to seeking services. This puts them at much higher risk of significant physical injury and death than their nonimmigrant counterparts. Anything that creates additional barriers to seeking services gets people hurt and I would hope that we would all agree that it is just and right to keep every member of our community safe from harm.
Fact: Victims without documented legal immigration status are not eligible for most government benefits, keeping them financially dependent on the abuser, isolated and at risk. They cannot receive transitional assistance (welfare) or Mass Health benefits. They do not qualify for public housing (there is no such thing as ''free housing'') or Social Security benefits. Children born in the United States may be eligible for food stamps, but their undocumented parents are not.
Fact: Some individuals legally enter the country because their documented spouse or fiancee sponsors them. If the relationship turns violent, the victim is faced with a dangerous decision - stay and put your life at risk, or leave and face the withdrawal of the sponsorship and possible deportation. In such cases, organizations such as Catholic Charities will provide free legal assistance to those who want to apply to the INS on their own for citizenship without depending on the status of the batterer, commonly known as a VAWA (Violence Against Women Act) exemption. If they qualify, the lengthy process can take 2 years.
I am confident that we can find room in our community to have respectful discourse about things over which we disagree, but there is no room in this or any other community to step away from our fundamental humanity. This vitriol needs to stop.
MARY GIANAKIS, Director, Voices Against Violence
One Million False Allegations of Domestic Violence Each Year, Report Finds
PR Newswire (USA)
January 29, 2007
https://infoweb.newsbank.com/
Over one million false allegations of domestic violence are filed each year. These allegations often result in family break-up and the removal of children from their parents, according to a report released today.
"A Culture of False Allegations: How VAWA Harms Families and Children" documents how the Violence Against Women Act defines "domestic violence" in broad terms. That has given rise to one million claims of domestic "violence" each year in which physical violence is not even alleged.
Elaine Epstein, former president of the Massachusetts Bar Association, is on the record as saying, "Everyone knows that restraining orders and orders to vacate are granted to virtually all who apply ... In many cases, allegations of abuse are now used for tactical advantage."
An example of the problem is Dan Iagatta of Foxboro, Mass. A quadriplegic dad who is confined to a wheelchair, he was accused of domestic abuse by his wife and recently ordered to vacate his home: http://www.mediaradar.org/Iagatta.php.
"False allegations of domestic violence have become so widespread that lawyers now call them a legal 'slam-dunk,'" notes RADAR spokesman Ron Grignol. "Some are saying we should pass a David Letterman Protection Act to curb the problem."
TV talk-show host Letterman was formally charged with domestic violence after a New Mexico woman accused him of harassing her with mental telepathic messages.
Restraining orders are now seen as part of the "gamesmanship of divorce," according to a 2005 article in the Illinois Bar Journal. The RADAR report documents how these false allegations violate civil rights and harm families. As a result, children often lose daily contact with one of their parents.
The report was issued by RADAR (Respecting Accuracy in Domestic Abuse Reporting), a research and education organization. The report can be viewed at http://www.mediaradar.org/docs/VAWA-A-Culture-of-False-Allegations.pdf.
The document reveals that children who grow up in a single-parent home are greater risk of child abuse, academic failure, and a broad range of social pathologies. The report concludes that VAWA needs to be reformed to become family-friendly.
Domestic Violence Programs Lack Effectiveness and May Harm Women, Report Concludes
PR Newswire (USA)
February 5, 2007
https://infoweb.newsbank.com/
Domestic violence laws such as the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) are not reducing abuse rates and may be placing women at greater risk of violence, according to a report released today.
"Has VAWA Delivered on its Promises to Women?" reveals that partner homicides had already dropped 29% by 1994, the year that VAWA was enacted into law. After 2000, declines began to bottom out, according to Department of Justice statistics.
The report can be viewed at: www.mediaradar.org/docs/VAWA-Has-It- Delivered-on-Its-Promises-to-Women.pdf .
Some VAWA-driven policies, such as mandatory arrest for restraining order violations, are seen as placing certain groups of women at greater risk of subsequent violence.
"Get-tough domestic violence laws aren't working the way persons had hoped," notes RADAR spokesperson Lisa Scott. "In some areas, arrests of females have skyrocketed and 15% of restraining orders are taken out against women."
The report highlights the case of Kimberly Piscopo of New Jersey, who was barred from the marital home on the grounds that she was spitting and using foul language.
Women who do not cooperate with prosecutors may be charged with contempt. In one California case, the county prosecutor put a woman in jail for 8 days after she refused to testify. She later won a $125,000 settlement for false imprisonment.
The report reveals that many VAWA-funded programs do not offer services for abusive women, sometimes with tragic consequences.
Arguing that VAWA-funded programs are overly-intrusive, a 2003 report from the Ms. Foundation for Women notes, "Unfortunately, when state power has been invited into, or forced into, the lives of individuals, it often takes over."
That intrusion escalates partner conflict and reconciliation becomes almost impossible. The result is what has been called "state-imposed de facto divorce."
A growing number of women's groups are critical of heavy-handed VAWA programs that often ignore civil liberties and don't curb abuse.
U.S. women doing fine without international act
Intelligencer, The (Doylestown, PA)
February 28, 2007
https://infoweb.newsbank.com/
Feminists have cooked up a new plan to raid the U.S. Treasury for more feminist pork. They want Congress to pass the International Violence Against Women Act.
They are using a report issued in October by former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan called "In-Depth Study on All Forms of Violence Against Women." The report is said to be based on interviews with 24,000 women conducted by the World Health Organization.
Who better to introduce the act than Sen. Joe Biden, D-Del., the leading advocate of ratification of the United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women? Biden never saw a U.N. treaty or a radical feminist spending bill that he didn't like.
The WHO report asserts that one in three of the world's women, in some countries as many as 70 percent, experience violence in their lifetime, usually from their own partner, which is the rationale for calling it domestic violence. I'm surprised feminists don't claim 100 percent, because "violence" is broadly defined to include nonphysical "psychological and economic" actions.
Biden says the "statistics are appalling." Indeed they are. But it doesn't follow that the solution is the U.N. "In-Depth" report's demand for "consultation with women's groups" with "adequate funding streams" to develop "international standards" for all nations.
A new feminist front group called the Women's Edge Coalition is partnering with Amnesty International U.S. to lobby for congressional passage of International Violence Against Women Act, which would create millions of dollars of feminist pork. The act's stated mission is to carry out a campaign of policy advocacy and education, consulting with dozens of U.S organizations, grass-roots organizing and working with strategic media partners (i.e., getting the media to do their propagandizing).
You can bet that a primary purpose of International Violence Against Women Act money will be to lobby the U.S. Senate for ratification of the U.N. Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women so that its U.N. monitoring committee can force U.S. compliance with feminist goals. That agenda includes everything from requiring unlimited abortion rights to rewriting schoolbooks to eliminating so-called "stereotypes" and gender-specific references.
Our senators are taunted with the assertion that the United States should be embarrassed because 185 countries have ratified the U.N. Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women, while the United States has not. I'm glad the Senate so far has had the good sense to reject a treaty that fraudulently makes naive people believe it will improve the lot of U.S. women.
Pakistan has ratified the U.N. Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women. That's the country where a tribal council ordered a young woman gang-raped to avenge her brother's crime of being seen with an unchaperoned woman from another tribe. Gang rape is common in Pakistan.
Nigeria has ratified the convention. That's a country where women are stoned to death for the crime of adultery. Islamic law, called shariah, calls for death to women who commit adultery, but a lesser punishment for adulterous men.
Saudi Arabia has ratified the convention. That's the country where 14 girls died inside a Mecca school that went up in flames. Religious police kept rescuers from entering the building because some of the girls were not wearing their head coverings.
Colombia has ratified the convention. That's a country where thousands of women a year are sold into sex slavery. Similar outrages take place in India, Nepal and Thailand, which have also ratified the convention.
All these countries are eligible to sit on the convention's monitoring committee of 23 "experts" who monitor "progress" and order compliance. All U.N. projects to improve the lot of women follow the feminist model: Break up the family, force women into the work force and send kids to day care.
The International Violence Against Women Act is based on the lie that violence against women is the same problem in all countries. Many non-Western countries have social norms that justify abuse (such as genital mutilation, forced marriage and polygamy), and "international standards" would vastly diminish the rights and benefits U.S. women now enjoy.
U.S. women are the most privileged class of people on the face of the Earth. That's because we are the beneficiaries of the Judeo-Christian civilization.
Mark Steyn presents a good idea in his new book called "America Alone: The End of the World as We Know It" (Regnery, $28). Because the majority of women in European battered women's shelters are Muslim, he suggests that a serious push for women's rights in the Islamic world could destabilize Islamic regimes such as Iran.
Phyllis Schlafly is a columnist for Copley News Service.
U.S. domestic violence is now at record low
Fort Worth Star-Telegram (TX)
March 8, 2007
https://infoweb.newsbank.com/
WASHINGTON — Criminal violence against intimate partners fell by nearly two-thirds in recent years and has reached a record low, according to preliminary government figures.
The declines were greatest for nonfatal attacks, which fell by about 65 percent from 1993 to 2005, according to the federal Bureau of Justice Statistics. Homicides among intimate partners dropped by roughly a third.
The figures are based on the annual National Crime Victimization Survey, which counts criminal abuse against spouses, girlfriends, boyfriends and former spouses, whether it's been reported to police or not. The information, collected in thousands of confidential interviews, is the most widely used instrument for charting U.S. crime trends.
Because nonfatal attacks are hundreds of times more common than fatal ones, the overall drop in U.S. criminal abuse of intimate partners approaches two-thirds.
That's the lowest abuse rate since the crime survey began in 1973.
"It's very good news," said Frank Zimring, a criminologist at Boalt Hall, the law school of the University of California-Berkeley.
"There's no way to apportion the credit precisely," Zimring added, but the decline began in 1994 as states and the federal government launched major efforts against intimate abuse.
According to the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, legislatures have passed at least 660 measures aimed at curbing domestic violence since then.
In 1994, the federal Violence Against Women Act authorized massive new aid from Washington for shelters, treatment, police initiatives and research.
To date, the aid has totaled $5.6 billion.
The effectiveness of the effort shows most clearly, analysts said, in a seemingly perverse trend: a sharp drop in the number and proportion of men killed by female partners.
Thirty years ago, women and men were killed by intimates in nearly equal numbers. By 2004, however, 1,159 women were killed by intimates but only 385 men were. The imbalance persists in 2005 figures, due out next month, according to statistician Marianne Zawitz of the Bureau of Justice Statistics.
The disproportion in fatalities, while seemingly adverse to women, reflects a major gain, said Richard Gelles, the dean of the University of Pennsylvania's School of Social Policy and Practice: Abusive men are killed less often now because women can get free of them more easily.
"We've eliminated a good deal of defensive homicide by giving women easier access to shelters and ERs and by measures such as mandatory arrest laws" that restrain or punish abusive spouses, Gelles said.
Easier escape from abusive partners also helps explain the drop in nonlethal violence, analysts said. It's a category that includes rape and robbery but consists mainly of aggravated and simple assault.
According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, the 1993 rate was 5.8 per 1,000 people age 12 and older. Preliminary figures for 2005 put the rate at 2.0.
SPOUSAL ABUSE
Pennsylvania State University sociologists asked 2,000 married people in 2000 the same two questions about spousal abuse that they'd asked a comparable sample in 1980.
Question 1: Has there ever been a time in your marriage when one of you, during an argument, pushed, shoved, slapped or hit your spouse?
Husbands in 1980: 22 percent said "yes."
Husbands in 2000: 11 percent said "yes."
Wives in 1980: 20 percent said "yes."
Wives in 2000: 13 percent said "yes."
Question 2: Has this happened during the last three years?
Husbands in 1980: 13 percent said "yes."
Husbands in 2000: 5 percent said "yes."
Wives in 1980: 11 percent said "yes."
Wives in 2000: 7 percent said "yes."
The two groups were representative of the U.S. population in terms of age, gender, race, ethnicity, education, household size and region of the country.
SOURCE: Alone Together: How Marriage in America Is Changing, By Paul R. Amato, Alan Booth, David R. Johnson and Stacy J. Rogers
Justice Department: Indian women raped at rate 2.5 times higher than U.S. average
Rapid City Journal, The (SD)
March 9, 2007
https://infoweb.newsbank.com/
Norma Rendon has seen too many women blame themselves for being raped. But women need to learn to report the crime to police, she said, and understand that rape is not their fault.
"Too often, they are not being reported," said Rendon, a women's advocate at Cangleska, a shelter on Pine Ridge Indian Reservation. "There is so much shame that comes with being a victim."
Only one in five adult women report being raped to the police.
Although more than 17 million women have been raped in their life, according to a U.S. Department of Justice report for 2006, American Indian women reported the highest number of rapes of any racial or ethnic group in the United States -- a rate 2.5 times higher than the national average.
The FBI reports that women in Alaska, New Mexico, South Dakota, Washington, Minnesota and Colorado are among the most-raped in the country. Each state has a significant population of Native women.
Amnesty International, a worldwide human-rights organization, has spent two years researching sexual assaults in urban and reservation areas. Amnesty officials have scheduled an April 24 news conference at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. The next day, organization leaders will release a report titled, "USA: Maze of Injustice -- The Failure to Protect Indigenous Women from Sexual Violence."
A reprieve from the violence seems distant. The 2005 Violence Against Women Act authorized Congress to spend $50 million annually on sexual assault services, which have never been funded.
Meanwhile, women's advocates agree assault rates continue to climb. Already, one in three Native women will be raped in their lifetime, according to a 1999 report from the Bureau of Justice.
Tess Curley on Montana's Flathead Reservation is especially concerned at rising numbers of sexual assaults and at the age of victims. Thirty-three percent of women are raped between the ages of 12 and 17.
"It's increasing more, especially on our reservation," said Curley, who works for the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes' crime victim advocate program. "And they are beginning to target our youth. The positive thing is they (girls) are coming in and reporting this more and saying, 'This happened to me.' "
Sexual assault penalties vary state to state. In Montana, a woman who has been raped has 10 years to report it. If a girl or teenager is raped, she has 10 years starting from her 18th birthday.
The Cangleska shelter hired its first, full-time worker in February to work specifically with sexual assault victims on Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, where women have had to drive 120 miles for aid in Rapid City, now ranked fourth in the nation for rapes per capita.
The shelter has since acquired rape kits to collect samples from victims and to fill out reports.
"In many of the cases, they were raped in our border towns," said Rendon, referring to cities near the reservation. The U.S. Justice Bureau reports that the majority of violent crimes against Indian women are committed by white men.
Not only is it important to report sexual assaults, women should seek a support group, Rendon said. Mothers are also encouraged to consider how physical and sexual assaults against them affects their children.
A National Institute of Justice report shows 64 percent of children had witnessed abuse against their mothers by age 3. Youths ages 12-18 of sexually abused mothers showed more depression and had more behavioral problems than children of mothers who had not been sexually assaulted.
Rebecca St. George, a women's advocate with Mending the Sacred Hoop in Duluth, Minn., is working with local police on documenting sexual assaults. Although she reaches out to assist women, she also counts herself among the victims.
"I was raped a couple of times," St. George said. "The first time, I was at a party. I had never had sex before. I went with a guy to his car to get some beer. It was cold in northern Minnesota. He invited me to the front seat of his car and he raped me. I was shocked and confused and didn't even identify it as rape until three years later."
The Ojibwe woman said she was raped a second time after drinking too much alcohol and passing out. Rape occurs when sexual intercourse occurs without consent. "It never occurred to me to report any of those to anyone."
St. George didn't go to the police, but she said simply reporting it can be therapeutic. "For some women, it's incredibly healing just to get the guy charged, whether there's a prosecution or not," she said. "It's powerful to make a public statement that, 'What he did to me is wrong.'"
"By my silence, I certainly allowed them to continue," she said. "It's not a guilt thing, but it's true. I didn't do anything to stop them from raping the next person."
House CJS Appropriations Subcommittee Passes $61.4 Million in Increases to Fund Desperately Needed Services for Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault Victims
PR Newswire (USA)
June 15, 2007
https://infoweb.newsbank.com/
Domestic violence advocates across the country are praising the Commerce, Justice, Science and Related Agencies (CJS) Subcommittee of the U.S. House Appropriations Committee for approving Monday a $61.4 million increase in funding for Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) programs administered by the Department of Justice. The increased funding for VAWA programs will help police, courts, rape crisis centers, battered women's shelters, and other victim services providers meet the multifaceted and increased needs of victims of domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault and stalking.
"The Appropriations Committee has heard the cries of victims of domestic and sexual violence who need protection and services for themselves and their children. We thank Chairman Alan Mollohan (D-WV), Ranking Member Rodney Frelinghuysen (R-NJ) and the members of the Appropriations Committee for making VAWA funding a priority," said Sue Else, President of the National Network to End Domestic Violence (NNEDV). "Increased funding will help communities better respond to the growing demand for services and implement much needed strategies to prevent the violence."
NNEDV also recognizes Representatives Lois Capps (D-CA) and Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-WA), Co-Chairs of the Congressional Caucus for Women's Issues, and Representatives Jim Costa (D-CA) and Ted Poe (R-TX), Co-Chairs of the Victims' Rights Caucus, for their leadership mobilizing these caucuses and other Members of Congress to advocate for increased VAWA funding.
"We know that many Members of Congress worked with the CJS Subcommittee to help secure this increase," said Else. "Their leadership will make a difference in the lives of individual victims as well as help prevent future violence."
Thanks to an increase in funding and the removal of unrelated programs and earmarks, the bill includes $27.3 million more for STOP formula grants, which are distributed to all states for police, prosecution, courts, and victim services. Transitional housing, a desperately needed service to help victims move from emergency shelter to permanent housing, received a $5.2 million increase.
"Thanks to STOP grants, police are arresting abusers, courts are holding them accountable, and service providers are helping survivors rebuild their lives," Else said. "Increased funding for the Transitional Housing grant program will help break the cycle of violence by enabling victims and their children to move to safe, stable housing."
The CJS bill also provides funding for two new programs created in VAWA 2005. Ten million dollars will go to create the first dedicated federal funding for rape crisis centers and other direct services for adult and child victims of sexual assault. An additional $10 million will fund the Engaging Men and Youth in Prevention Program.
The full House Appropriations Committee is scheduled to vote on the CJS appropriations bill on June 18. The Senate is expected to set their recommendations for VAWA funding later this summer.
The National Network to End Domestic Violence (NNEDV) is a membership and advocacy organization representing the 53 state and U.S. territory domestic violence coalitions. NNEDV is the voice of these coalitions, their more than 2,000 local domestic violence member programs, and the millions of domestic violence survivors who turn to them for services. In 2000 and 2005, NNEDV members across the country played a crucial role in the reauthorization of VAWA. Through its extensive state and grassroots network, NNEDV continues to mobilize a powerful constituency to make their voices heard by policymakers. For more information, please visit http://www.nnedv.org.
National Network to End Domestic Violence
BIDEN, BOXER, WASSERMAN SCHULTZ Introduce New Legislation to Combat Child Exploitation
Government Press Releases (USA)
June 29, 2007
https://infoweb.newsbank.com/
Senators Biden, Boxer and Rep. Wasserman Schultz Introduce New Legislation to Combat Child Exploitation
Biden, Boxer and Wasserman Schultz were joined at a Press Conference by the Surviving Parents Coalition, an organization founded by eleven families who have endured the abduction and sexual assault of their children who have joined together to call for leadership and a strong national effort to combat child exploitation
Washington, DC- Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime and Drugs and author of the landmark Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act, Joseph R. Biden, Jr. (D-DE), Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA) and Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL20) were joined at a press conference today by the Surviving Parents Coalition to highlight new legislation to combat child exploitation. The legislation, called the Combating Child Exploitation Act of 2007, will help provide the federal leadership and resources to establish a national network of highly trained federal, state and local investigators to focus exclusively on child exploitation.
"At the same time when the Internet has given children access to the world - it has also given the world access to our kids. This horrific and growing problem needs to be stopped," said Sen. Joe Biden. "We need to give law enforcement the funds and the tools to pull the plug on Internet predators."
Sen. Boxer said, "I will work side by side with Senator Biden on this important legislation, just as I worked with him on the Violence Against Women Act. Our children are our future and we must protect them. It's our job."
"We need to think of this as a war," said Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (FL-20). "A war we must wage against sex predators, a war for our children. This legislation would train federal, state and local police forces to lift the digital fingerprints left by child sex predators so they can be put behind bars."
"This is landmark human rights legislation. This bill will do more to prevent the sexual assault of children than any other single act within Congress' reach. Thousands of children will be rescued," said Grier Weeks, Executive Director of the National Association to Protect Children.
The Combating Child Exploitation Act of 2007 takes a bold step forward in addressing the growing problem of child exploitation. The Department of Justice and the FBI have testified before Congress that child exploitation is growing rapidly. New investigative techniques have allowed law enforcement to identify nearly 500,000 individuals trafficking child pornography over the Internet. Due to the lack of resources at the Federal, state and local level, we are investigating only 2% of the known offenders. Research shows that if we were to investigate these cases we could rescue a victim of child exploitation thirty percent of the time.
The legislation will help create a strong nationwide network of highly trained law enforcement experts to track down these offenders and put them away. To coordinate these efforts, the bill will create an Office of Child Exploitation Prevention and Interdiction at the Department of Justice. Modeled after the highly successful Office of Violence Against Women, which has helped reduce domestic violence by 50% and rape by 60%, this office will develop and oversee a coordinated national strategy to address this problem. The bill also builds upon the Internet Crimes Against Children (ICAC) Task Force Program to ensure that we have at least one cyber unit in each state dedicated to these cases.
Specifically, the legislation will authorize $1.05 billion over the next eight years for:
*ICAC Grant Program - The Attorney General will be required to establish a formula grant program for the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force Program, funded at $60 million for FY 2008, increasing to $100 million in FY 2015. This will ensure that local agencies have the additional resources necessary to create robust cyber units with highly trained investigators.
*Increased Federal Agents - The bill will authorize over $40 million per year over the next eight years for 250 new federal agents at the FBI, the Immigrations and Custom Enforcement Agency, and the U.S. Postal Service. These new agents will be dedicated to child exploitation cases.
*Increased Forensic Capacity - $7 million per year to establish increased forensic capacity for child exploitation cases at the Regional Computer Forensic Labs (RCFL).
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Elizabeth Alexander - Press Secretary for U.S. Senator Joe Biden
House Stands Strong for Domestic Violence Victims
Near landslide Votes on Key Amendments Fund Critical New Services for Victims and their Children
PR Newswire (USA)
July 27, 2007
https://infoweb.newsbank.com/
WASHINGTON -- Continuing to stand by their commitment to domestic violence victims, the U.S. House of Representatives stayed late into the evening Wednesday to pass critical amendments to the Commerce, Justice and Science spending bill, increasing much needed funding for domestic violence programs. In addition to the $61.4 million increase already included in the spending bill, the House went above and beyond to pass an additional $39 million for programs created by the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) and the Victims of Crime Act (VOCA).
"On behalf of victims across the country, the National Network to End Domestic Violence thanks Representatives Jay Inslee (D-WA), Dan Burton (R-IN), David Reichert (R-WA), Christopher Murphy (D-CT), Ted Poe (R-TX), Jim Costa (D-CA), Dennis Moore (D-KS), Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV) and their colleagues for championing crucial new efforts to end domestic violence," said Sue Else, President of the National Network to End Domestic Violence (NNEDV). "These amendments, and the $61.4 million increase already included in this bill by Representatives Alan Mollohan (D-WV), Rodney Frelinghuysen (R-NJ), David Obey (D-WI) and Jerry Lewis (R-CA), will ensure that we can stem the tide of domestic violence in this country."
Congress unanimously passed VAWA in 2005, providing the necessary tools to empower communities to meet the needs of domestic violence, sexual assault and stalking victims. The amendments, passed Wednesday night with overwhelming support, enhance national and community efforts to end these horrific crimes.
"The National Census on Domestic Violence Services conducted by NNEDV showed that nearly 18,000 children and 30,000 adults were served by domestic violence programs in a 24-hour period," said Allison Randall, Public Policy Director at NNEDV. "Funding provided by these amendments will help break the intergenerational cycle of violence, ensure courts protect victims and hold perpetrators accountable, and continue providing critical services for victims in communities nationwide."
The following amendments passed the House Wednesday with strong support:
-- Inslee-Burton Amendment provides $6 million for programs serving children who witness abuse, $6 million for services to teen victims of dating and sexual violence, and $2 million to combat violence against Native women.
-- Reichert-Murphy Amendment allocates $5 million to train judges and create model court responses to domestic and sexual violence.
-- Poe-Costa-Moore Amendment prevents cuts to victims' services by raising the VOCA cap by $10 million.
-- Capito Amendment adds $10 million to support domestic violence and sexual assault programs in rural communities.
The National Network to End Domestic Violence (NNEDV) is a membership and advocacy organization representing the 53 state and U.S. territory domestic violence coalitions. NNEDV is the voice of these coalitions, their more than 2,000 local domestic violence member programs, and the millions of domestic violence survivors who turn to them for services. In 2000 and 2005, NNEDV members across the country played a crucial role in the reauthorization of VAWA. Through its extensive state and grassroots network, NNEDV continues to mobilize a powerful constituency to make their voices heard by policymakers. For more information, please visit HYPERLINK "http://www.nnedv.org/" www.nnedv.org.
National Network to End Domestic Violence
Senate Embarrassments Joe Biden and Larry Craig
Accuracy in Media
September 10, 2007
https://infoweb.newsbank.com/
Senate Republicans have suffered a lot of embarrassment over the antics of Sen. Larry Craig, a pro-family politician who played footsy with another man in a bathroom. But the Democrats have their own embarrassments, and one of them is presidential candidate Senator Joseph Biden, their leading foreign policy “expert.” His logic was on display on Sunday’s Meet the Press, where the long-time Delaware Senator, who now chairs the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, was asked by host Tim Russert about changing his position on setting a deadline for pulling U.S. troops out of Iraq. Two years ago he said that setting a deadline for withdrawal would “encourage our enemies to wait us out.” Now he says the war must “end now.” Biden replied, “Well, I have changed my mind, but I haven’t changed my mind in any fundamental way.”
Over a year ago this double-talker put his name on a plan by Leslie Gelb of the Council on Foreign Relations to get U.S. troops out of Iraq. Biden calls the plan, which is only three pages long, the “Biden-Gelb plan.” Biden has a habit of claiming credit for other peoples’ ideas. In this case, however, the main idea isn’t worth much. It is to turn Iraq over to the United Nations and the “international community” and divide the country up.
Biden’s knee-jerk response in support of the U.N. playing a larger role in world affairs is also reflected in his decision to push for Senate ratification of the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). He has reportedly scheduled a stacked hearing on September 27 to push the pact through. A full Senate vote could follow quickly thereafter. This treaty would turn over management of the oceans to the world body. It could jeopardize American access to oil, gas and precious minerals, and put the legality of U.S. Navy maneuvers on the high seas before foreign judges running U.N. tribunals and panels.
One has to have sympathy for Biden, who has suffered through some terrible adversities, including the death of his first wife and a daughter, and a brain aneurysm. But sympathy should not translate into excusing or rationalizing his public record and utterances. To cite the most recent example, Biden has just released a book acknowledging that he wasn’t the sole author of the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA). This bill was Biden’s signature legislation. It resulted in tons of favorable publicity for him. But the book, Promises to Keep, reveals on page 240 that a female staffer was actually involved in drafting the legislation.
“The staffer, Victoria Nourse, and I wrote” the legislation, says Biden. However, his presidential website gives Biden sole credit for the legislation. It quotes Biden as saying that “What I’m most proud of in my entire career was writing the Violence Against Women’s Act because it is evidence we can change people’s lives, but the change is always one person at a time.” The term “writing,” as commonly understood, means that he wrote it. His office sent out a release calling the senator the “author” of the legislation. But “author,” like the term “writer,” has a definite meaning.
Some politicians take credit for the work that their staffers do. But when the politician is someone like Biden, who appears on Sunday talk shows as a foreign policy expert and runs the Foreign Relations Committee of the Senate, the matter takes on more importance and urgency.
It’s true that Biden “introduced” VAWA. It is also accurate to say that he sponsored it. But to have paraded around the country for many years claiming to be the “author” or “writer” of the bill diminished the work of the female staffer who had been doing the bulk of the work behind the scenes. Later in the book, Biden refers to Nourse as his “lead staffer” on the bill, but that description, too, diminishes her work in this area.
In my search for occasions in which Biden gave credit to Nourse for her role in the legislation, I found a 1993 Senate document in which the Senator acknowledged, “For the past three years, Victoria Nourse has served as my chief advisor on this issue, among others. She has played a critical role in the development and drafting of the Violence Against Women Act and has worked tirelessly to promote its passage.” This document was posted on an obscure University of Maryland women’s studies website.
So why would Biden admit the truth in the book? It was obviously because he didn’t want another controversy to haunt him as he campaigned for the presidency again. What’s more, Victoria Nourse, who is now a Professor of Law at the University of Wisconsin, says on her website that she “assisted” in drafting VAWA. So this had become an open secret. Clearly, she was far more than a mere “staffer.” She had the expertise on this issue that Biden so clearly lacked.
This controversy is relevant because Biden tries in the book to come to grips with the plagiarism that has dogged him throughout his career. For example, he says that he “botched” a paper in law school and that “one of my classmates accused me of lifting passages from a Fordham Law Review article…” Biden says that he had “cited the article, but not properly” and was told that he would have to “retake the course next year.” In other words, he flunked. This incident has been written up extensively and the facts are well-known. Biden had cited the article but had quoted from it extensively, making it seem as though the words from the article were his own. That’s not sloppy work. It’s plagiarism.
Biden also deals with the case which figured prominently in his withdrawal from the 1988 presidential race, in which he plagiarized a speech by a British politician, Neil Kinnock. Biden used Kinnock’s words to describe his own background and upbringing. Biden insists that he didn’t credit Kinnock on only one occasion, and this was the incident that the media jumped on. But why was he quoting from a biographical speech by Kinnock in the first place? Didn’t Biden have his own story to tell? In another case, a reporter asked about Biden using a Bobby Kennedy quote without attribution. Biden blames this on “one of my speechwriters” who “had inserted an RFK line” into the speech “without telling me.”
This is the closest Biden comes to admitting he doesn’t write his own material, and that he repeats what others put in front of him.
Another odd thing about the book, as noted by Christi Parsons of the Chicago Tribune, is that the senator offers only one acknowledgment at the end of the book. Biden says that a writer and documentary filmmaker named Mark Zwonitzer “helped to refine and arrange the stories I wanted to tell into an overall narrative.” Zwonitzer is credited with having “transcribed” and “polished” Biden’s stories in the book. Biden also calls him a fact-checker. It sounds like Zwonitzer was denied due credit as a co-author. Of course, it wouldn’t be the first time Biden took credit for the work of others.
Which is why it is amazing that the Bush Administration is using a flawed vessel like Biden in an effort to pass the Law of the Sea treaty and give the U.N. control over the oceans. Conservatives will remember that it was Biden who helped lead the effort to sabotage President Bush’s nomination of John Bolton as U.S. Ambassador to the U.N.
One hopes that somebody in the media will ask Biden and other senators whether they have read the 202-page treaty document and know who actually wrote it. For that answer, please go to this (PDF) report. This treaty, negotiated under the auspices of the United Nations, was written by advocates of world government.
BIDEN Marks 13th Anniversary of the Violence Against Women Act, Urges Colleagues to Pass New Legislation to Help Survivors of Domestic Violence
Government Press Releases (USA)
September 13, 2007
https://infoweb.newsbank.com/
Washington, DC - In honor of the 13th Anniversary of the Violence Against Women Act being signed into law, its author, U.S. Senator Joseph R. Biden, Jr. (D-DE), former Chairman and current member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, issued the following statement today, urging colleagues to cosponsor and quickly pass the National Domestic Violence Volunteer Attorney Network Act, legislation that would create a streamlined national system to recruit and train volunteer attorneys and match them with domestic violence survivors.
"I consider the Violence Against Women Act the single most significant legislation I've drafted in my 34 years in the Senate. My commitment to ending and preventing domestic violence and rape remains as steadfast and unwavering as it was when I started this process in the early 1990's," Sen. Biden said. "The Violence Against Women Act and the National Domestic Violence Hotline have helped save hundreds of thousands of lives. I believe this legal network is the next step in stopping the violence."
Biden's original Violence Against Women Act, which was first signed into law by President Bill Clinton on September 13, 1994, established new federal crimes for domestic violence, sexual assault, and stalking. In addition, the law created and provided funding for the National Domestic Violence Hotline (1-800-799-SAFE), which has answered over 1 million calls, and helped train police and prosecutors to more effectively treat victims of domestic abuse and sexual assault.
"In the past 13 years, we've talked more about violence against women than anyone ever thought was possible. And, we have more legal, financial and technological resources than ever before," said Sen. Biden. "We have a responsibility to make sure every women, every survivor, has access to these resources until there is no more violence in our homes and in our communities."
The National Domestic Violence Volunteer Attorney Network Act, cosponsored by Sen. Arlen Specter, creates a streamlined national system to recruit and train volunteer attorneys and match them with domestic violence survivors. Under the bill, the American Bar Association would manage an Internet-based National Domestic Violence Attorney Network to help recruit and train volunteer attorneys; statewide legal coordinators would facilitate legal services in their individual states; and the National Domestic Violence Hotline would provide legal referrals to victims. This innovative project would not only increase the number of trained volunteer attorneys, but also quickly connect victims with the legal support they need to help repair their lives.
"This legislation addresses the dire need to increase legal services for victims of domestic violence by harnessing the skills, enthusiasm and dedication of volunteer lawyers to create a coordinated, nationwide referral system to help domestic violence victims," said Denise Cardman, Acting Director of the American Bar Association. "The ABA strongly supports the National Domestic Violence Volunteer Attorney Network Act and urges Congress to promptly enact this important legislation."
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Elizabeth Alexander - Press Secretary for U.S. Senator Joe Biden
Candidate for sheriff seeks jury trial in domestic violence case
Times and Democrat, The (Orangeburg, SC)
October 4, 2007
https://infoweb.newsbank.com/
The court case against 2008 sheriff's hopeful John Cokley was postponed Wednesday after a jury trial was requested at the 11th hour.
The former Orangeburg County narcotics investigator said he wants a jury to decide the criminal domestic violence charge against him.
"He has every right to a jury trial," said Jim Bogle, a prosecutor with the S.C. Attorney General's Office.
A letter was delivered to the Orangeburg County Magistrate's office apparently just minutes before the 10 a.m. start of criminal domestic violence court.
At about 10:20 a.m., a letter was handed to Bogle, who moments later escorted Latisha Cokley, John Cokley's estranged wife, from the courtroom.
A court date had originally been set for Oct. 17. However, Cokley opted for an earlier date of Oct. 3. He said last week, "I want to get this over with and get back to campaigning."
Cokley did not appear in court and could not be reached for comment. It was not clear who delivered the letter to the magistrate's office.
No alternate court date had been set as of Tuesday afternoon.
Typically, a domestic violence case would be handled by the solicitor's office.
But First Circuit Solicitor David Pascoe said that with John Cokley's law enforcement background and potential to be the county's top law enforcement officer, he passed the case to the attorney general's office.
The 45-year-old Cokley was charged last week with first-offense criminal domestic violence after an alleged altercation at his St. Matthews Road home.
Latisha Cokley told deputies that at about 11:55 p.m. Sept. 23, she went to their residence to retrieve some belongings.
Latisha Cokley alleged her husband pushed her into an exercise machine and began choking her. He later said, "I didn't do it; I would not do it. If anybody should have been arrested that night, it was Latisha."
Legalities surrounding the case gave rise to the question as to whether Cokley could continue his campaign for the sheriff's office in 2008 if he were convicted.
The Federal Violence Against Women Act of 1994 says that anyone convicted of a state or federal domestic violence misdemeanor can no longer possess a firearm.
However, if an individual cannot carry a firearm, can he be elected sheriff?
"We just read that statute, and we have not opined on it in the past," S.C. Attorney General's Office spokesman Mark Plowden said.
Under S.C. law, "it does not say you are required to be a law enforcement officer" to be sheriff, he said.
Bottom line, if convicted, Cokley can still run for sheriff in 2008.
Sheriff Larry Williams said he would only comment about the case facing his opponent while "speaking as a human being" and not as an incumbent candidate for the office.
"First of all, and most importantly, let's take a minute and step away from politics and step into reality. John is charged with a very serious crime," Williams said. "The media nor the courthouse is the venue to settle their differences. They need counseling and prayer."
BIDEN/LUGAR Introduce the International Violence Against Women Act (I-VAWA)
Groundbreaking Legislation Integrates U.S. Efforts to End Gender-Based Violence on a Global Scale
Government Press Releases (USA)
November 1, 2007
https://infoweb.newsbank.com/
Washington, DC -Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Joseph R. Biden, Jr. (D-DE) and Ranking Member Richard Lugar (R-IN) introduced the International Violence Against Women Act, groundbreaking legislation which will, for the first time, integrate the United States' efforts to end gender-based violence into U.S. foreign assistance programs.
"From the trafficking of women in Eastern Europe, to "honor" killings in Jordan, to rape as a brutal weapon of war in Darfur and the Congo, violence against women is everywhere. It's a devastating and persistent truth in every country, in every community, and across every social demographic," said Sen. Biden.
"It is essential for the United States to work with non-governmental organizations and like-minded countries to end domestic violence. No woman, regardless of her income or education level, should live in fear or be made to believe that physical or emotional abuse is acceptable," said Sen. Lugar.
One in three women worldwide will experience gender-based violence in her lifetime, and in some countries, that's true for 70 percent of women. Every day around the globe, women and girls face domestic violence, rape, forced or child marriage, so-called "honor" killings, dowry-related murder, human trafficking, and female genital mutilation. The United Nations estimates that at least 5,000 "honor" killings take place each year around the world and more than 130,000,000 girls and young women worldwide have been subjected to genital mutilation. A 2006 United Nations Report found that at least 102 member states had no specific laws on domestic violence.
"The International Violence Against Women Act marshals together, for the first time, coordinated American resources and leadership to address this global issue. I believe the time is now for the United States to get actively engaged in the fight for women's lives and girls' futures, and we must begin by preventing and responding to the violence they face," added Sen. Biden.
"We cannot expect to reduce poverty and decrease the spread of diseases such as HIV/AIDS until we have more equitable treatment of women in developing countries. Empowered and educated women are the key to breaking these cycles," said Sen. Lugar.
Not surprisingly, violence against women and girls has a significant impact on the health and development of countries worldwide. Violence breeds poverty. It impedes economic development because it can prevent girls from going to school, or stop women from holding jobs or inheriting property, or shut down access to critical health care for themselves and their children. Efforts to wipe out AIDS and other diseases are compromised when women are beaten for telling their husbands they are infected. Girls are less likely to attend school when they fear being raped by their teachers.
"We've made tremendous progress in reducing violence against women here in the United States since we passed the Violence Against Women Act in 1994, but we cannot ignore women in other parts of the world - women whose lives are devastated by poverty, political and civic exclusion, disease, and violence. We cannot empower women to become active in civic life and promote peace, prosperity and democracy unless they personally are free from fear of violence. Taking an active stand against global violence against women isn't just moral, it's smart foreign policy," added Sen. Biden.
The International Violence Against Women Act has three main components. Specifically, the legislation:
1.Creates one central Office for Women's Global Initiatives to coordinate the United States' policies, programs and resources that deal with women's issues. Never before has there been one person who reports directly to the Secretary of State on issues related to gender-based violence.
2.Mandates a 5-year comprehensive strategy to fight violence against women in 10 to 20 selected countries and provides a new, dedicated funding stream of $175 million a year to support programs dealing with violence against women in five areas: the criminal and civil justice system, healthcare, girls' access to education and school safety, women's economic empowerment, and public awareness campaigns.
3.Requires training, reporting mechanisms and a system for dealing with women and girls afflicted by violence during humanitarian, conflict and post-conflict operations. As the recent reports from the Congo make tragically clear, in situations of humanitarian crises, conflict and post-conflict operations, women and girls are particularly vulnerable to violence. Reports of refugee women being raped while collecting firewood, soldiers sexually abusing girls in exchange for token food items, or women subjected to unimaginable brutality and torture as a tactic of war are shocking in number and inhumanity. There is a dire need for increased training and reporting requirements for refugee workers to help crack down on these brutal acts of violence. In addition, the bill crafts a new designation of "critical outbreaks" and requires emergency measures when rape is used as a weapon of war or in conflicts where violence against women is sharply escalating with impunity.
"This strategy will be our government's blueprint on how to wisely tackle violence against women and girls," said Sen. Biden. "There were more than 27,000 reported rapes in just one province in the Congo last year. This legislation will give the State Department more tools to protect and treat women brutally attacked in this conflict."
The International Violence Against Women Act was crafted with the input and expertise of over 100 nongovernmental organizations here and abroad working on gender-based violence, human rights, health care, international development and aid. These groups include Amnesty International, CARE, Center for Women's Global Leadership, Center for Strategic and International Studies, Family Violence Prevention Fund, Human Rights Watch, Inter-Agency Gender Working Group (IGWG), International Rescue Committee Jewish Women International, Legal Momentum, Lutheran World Relief, Women's Edge Coalition, and Vital Voices Global Partnership.
"Violence devastates the lives of millions of women and girls and their families worldwide," said Larry Cox, Executive Director of Amnesty International USA. "We have seen the terrible consequences of mass rapes in Bosnia, the Congo and elsewhere. We grieve with the mothers in Juarez whose daughters are victims of an ongoing femicide. Violence against women, whether in the home or in armed conflict, destabilizes communities, undermines economic development and breeds poverty and despair."
"We express tremendous praise and gratitude to Senators Biden and Lugar for their outstanding leadership to address violence against women internationally," Mr. Cox continued. "Until now we have seen only sporadic efforts to stop violence in one or more countries. The problem is too widespread and deeply rooted for a scattershot approach. We need a consistent vision to stop violence. This bill sends that message."
"It's time for our nation to do much more to protect women and children worldwide," said Esta Soler, President of the Family Violence Prevention Fund. We commend Senator Biden for his 15 years of leadership in ending violence against women and children in the U.S. and abroad. We intend to put the same energy and resources into enacting the I-VAWA that we put into the (domestic) Violence Against Women Act."
"Working in conflict zones worldwide, we know firsthand that violence against women and girls devastates both the individual and her community," said George Rupp, President of the International Rescue Committee. "We believe firmly that women and girls have the right to lives that are free of sexual and physical abuse, and this legislation can help make that a reality. The International Rescue Committee applauds Senators Biden and Lugar for introducing this important legislation."
"Violence is one of the biggest barriers to women's economic participation. It's hard to work if you are fearing for your life," said Ritu Sharma Fox, Co-Founder and President of the Women's Edge Coalition. "The I-VAWA will ensure that our hard-earned tax dollars are supporting efforts to end this scourge, and that violence does not prevent women from going to work, getting an education and supporting their families."
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Elizabeth Alexander - Press Secretary for U.S. Senator Joe Biden
BIDEN Issues Statement on Saudi Rape Case
Government Press Releases (USA)
November 23, 2007
https://infoweb.newsbank.com/
Washington, DC - Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Joseph R. Biden, Jr. (D-DE) issued the following statement today:
"I'm outraged by the decision of a Saudi Arabian court to punish the victim of a brutal gang-rape. Rather than overturning the original sentence of 90 lashes for the victim, the court increased her penalty to 200 lashes and 6 months imprisonment, and said that it did so to penalize the victim for speaking to the media. The Saudi judiciary is attempting to silence not only this victim, but to prevent future rape victims from coming forward. This decision is an affront to basic human decency and an egregious violation of the victim's human rights.
"I call on King Abdullah to exercise his powers and overturn this sentence if the Saudi courts do not reverse their decision immediately. I also would urge him to undertake reforms to prevent similar miscarriages of justice in the future. I hope that President Bush made this same appeal directly to the King when he spoke with him yesterday. If he did not, I urge him to do so now.
"This decision is a startling reminder that around the globe women and girls are subjected to brutal violence and too often are victimized a second time for coming forward. Here in the U.S., we've seen a sea change in societal attitudes and the judicial system towards the crime of rape. Similar reform is necessary internationally.
"The Biden-Lugar International Violence Against Women Act, introduced last month, mandates an international strategy to tackle gender-based violence and provides support for community-based programs to reform laws, change social norms, provide services and give women greater economic and educational opportunities.
"The Saudi case is a reminder that we can't sit on the sidelines. Violence against women is wrong. It cannot be excused or justified or ignored. In some places, it remains an engrained social norm, but one that we can dismantle over time with determination and sustained political will. The International Violence Against Women Act is the first step."
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Elizabeth Alexander - Press Secretary for U.S. Senator Joe Biden
Women's abuse of domestic-violence laws
WorldNetDaily (USA)
November 23, 2007
https://infoweb.newsbank.com/
Radical feminists have devised a scheme to cash in on the flow of taxpayer money in a big way. Their good buddy, Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del., has just introduced Senate Bill 2279, called the International Violence Against Women Act.
The act earmarks at least 10 percent of its program funds to be granted to a certain type of women’s organizations. Biden’s press release identifies the favored groups: NOW’s Legal Momentum, Family Violence Prevention Fund, Women’s Edge Coalition, and Center for Women’s Global Leadership.
The act would create a new Office of Women’s Global Initiatives that would control all foreign domestic-violence programs and funds in the Departments of State, Justice, Labor, Health and Human Services, and Homeland Security.
Radical feminists who would be the recipients of the act’s awesome bureaucratic and money power are very selective about the kinds of violence they will target in 10 to 20 foreign countries. They have no interest in speaking up for the hundreds of thousands of unborn girls in China and India who are victims of sex-selection abortions.
Feminist ideology about the goal of gender-neutrality and the absence of innate differences between males and females goes out the window when it comes to the subject of domestic violence. Feminist dogma is that the law should assume men are batterers and women are victims.
How this malicious ideology plays out in U.S. courts every day is described in a revealing article in the November Illinois Bar Journal (available at the Eagle Forum website). Titled “Sword or Shield: Combating Orders-of-Protection Abuse in Divorce,” the article spells out how petitioners can gain unfair advantage in divorce and child custody by using the Illinois Domestic Violence Act.
Political correctness requires that the Illinois Bar Journal use gender-neutral words, but anyone familiar with this subject knows that “petitioner” overwhelmingly means wife and “respondent” means husband.
Orders of protection were designed to be a “shield” to protect against domestic violence. This article bluntly describes how a petitioner can use an order of protection as a “sword” to obtain child custody in an expedited manner, to restrict a father’s visitation with his children and to gain exclusive use of the home.
The petitioner simply bypasses the Illinois Marriage and Dissolution of Marriage Act and instead goes to court under the Illinois Domestic Violence Act because that statute has a clear bias. As artfully described in the Illinois Bar Association article, it is “petitioner-friendly.”
Orders of protection, available at any courthouse, are easy to file even by non-lawyers and rarely require any fees. The Illinois Domestic Violence Act permits non-attorney domestic-abuse advocates to sit at the counsel table and give confidential and privileged advice to the petitioner.
It’s also much easier to get an order of protection, and once granted along with exclusive possession of the home, the law clearly favors the wife maintaining child custody and the home unless the husband is able to present a preponderance of evidence that the custody arrangement is a hardship to him. The divorce act gives no such preferential presumption.
Accusations of abuse and demands for an order of protection are extremely useful in denying child custody to the respondent. The Illinois Domestic Violence Act includes “a rebuttable presumption that awarding physical care to respondent would NOT be in the minor child’s best interest.”
The Illinois Domestic Violence Act requires that a petition for an order of protection be expedited, and judges typically allot only 15 or 20 minutes to each case, which is not enough time to hear all the relevant evidence. Resolving a custody decision in a divorce proceeding usually requires many months.
The Illinois Bar article concludes: “If a parent is willing to abuse the system, it is unlikely the trial court could discover (her) improper motives in an Order of Protection hearing.”
Under the divorce law, a parent is entitled to “reasonable visitation rights.” But he loses those rights in an order of protection hearing under the Illinois Domestic Violence Act because the standards of evidence do not apply and the court has “wide discretion to restrict visitation.”
The greatest potential for abuse of the system is that a petitioner can circumvent the divorce law and thereby restrict visitation by the other parent. The longer a parent is able to retain temporary custody, the greater her opportunity to obtain permanent custody.
The use of orders of protection is a “high stakes matter,” not only because it can irrevocably affect the lives of the children, but because violating an order of protection is a crime for which the respondent can be jailed.
The law journal’s advice to lawyers on how to prevent their clients from being railroaded as a victim of order of protection is pretty pathetic: “Spend time and money.”
