When Safety is the First Priority

By Barry Goldstein

I believe most judges, if pressed would agree that safety should be the most important priority in custody decisions. This certainly should be the focus of domestic violence cases. Nevertheless when they seek assistance through evaluations, the investigation focuses on cooperation between the parents, emotions, psychological tests that rarely provide any information about safety, alienation and other issues that are far removed from safety. One of the reasons the evaluators concentrate on less important issues is that they don’t understand domestic violence dynamics, the research about batterer narratives, behaviors associated with increased risk of lethality or how to recognize domestic violence. But if these evaluators don’t have the knowledge or skills to assist courts in focusing on safety issues what is the point of having evaluations? Clearly custody courts will make better decisions when safety is the first priority and the experts they rely on know how to recognize dangerous abusers.

What Can We Learn from Batterer Narratives? 

Batterers tend to be very manipulative and this is especially true of the ones we see in contested custody cases. We regularly see inadequately trained court professionals treat complaints by protective mothers with tremendous skepticism based on the myth that women frequently make false allegations of abuse for litigation purposes. A recent Department of Justice study led by Dr. Daniel Saunders found that court professionals without the necessary training in domestic violence are more likely to believe this myth and in turn make recommendations that harm children. While valid complaints of abuse are routinely disbelieved, Judge Mike Brigner points out that men’s denial of abuse allegations which are often false are viewed without the skepticism faced by their victims. Some evaluators and other court professionals may have heard about batterer manipulations, but this knowledge is rarely applied to an individual case.

Dr. Molly Dragiewicz wrote an important book, EQUALITY WITH A VENGEANCE which provides substantial research to demonstrate how men and women are different because they are treated differently. The book contains an interesting chapter about the use of batterer narratives to recognize and understand their abuse. Significantly, we virtually never see an evaluator aware of this research in order to better understand abuser tactics and to avoid being manipulated. Much of the remainder of this section of the article is informed by this book.

“Though it makes sense to pay attention to what batterers say about why they use violence and what they get out of it in order to understand it better, batterers’ accounts of what happened should not necessarily be taken at face value. What batterers say about violence can help us understand why they use violence as well as how they justify and continue that violence in the face of nominal cultural disapproval. …The tactics of denial, minimization, justification and excuse are central to… batterer narratives….Batterer accounts of violence also support feminist and other research on the importance of patriarchy to violence.”

There is a fundamental contradiction between an early childhood lesson that “boys don’t hit girls.” and the many messages that encourage and justify men’s abuse of women. A better message would be that boys (and girls) should not hit anyone except in self-defense because the original message suggests that hitting is ok except in some exceptions. We often see abusers expand the exceptions so that he hit her because she is a (insert sexist slur) or some action she took or did not take can justify his abuse. This belief system is one of the reasons why verbal abuse should be treated seriously as his name calling later serves as a justification for physical assault and this risk makes his verbal abuse a more effective coercive tactic.

“Denial that the abuser perpetrated the violence is fairly straightforward. It may include denial that anything violent happened or more elaborate stories about how the victim came to hurt herself through no fault of the abuser. Batterers often deny that they are violent people or at least that they would ever hit a woman. In this way, batterers apparently seek to create the impression that nice guys like them simply could not have perpetrated violence. This form of denial feeds on stereotypes about batterers as instantly recognizable cruel monsters. Batterers often cultivate positive public images in order to conceal their violence and maintain their self-image as great guys. Batterers’ insistence that they are nice or not violent people is mirrored in public accounts of domestic homicide interviews with neighbors who invariably testify about what a nice guy the abuser was are a staple of news coverage.” Similarly we often find court professionals unable to believe such a nice guy could have done the awful things he is accused of.

Another part of denial is the frequent repetition of the myth that women frequently make false allegations of abuse. We often see attacks on the victim’s credibility as an attempt to distract attention from the facts presented and as a substitute for an objective investigation of the abuse allegations.

Knowledgeable experts can use internal contradictions in the abusers’ accounts to help understand what really happened. “…While one might expect batterers’ accounts to be internally consistent, they often are not. For example, even when batterers disavow violence they are often careful to emphasize their strength, size and capacity to use violence if they want to. These juxtapositions suggest that despite the men’s denial of certain forms of transgressive violence, their perceptions of normative masculinity call for the capacity to do violence.”

Batterers tend to minimize their abuse in terms of its severity, frequency and their responsibility for it. Interestingly, and counter intuitively, women also tend to minimize their partner’s abuse. The descriptions from both parties often confuse inadequately trained professionals and contribute to their misunderstanding of the seriousness of the father’s abuse.

One of the common ways abusers minimize their mistreatment of their partners is to compare what they did to what other more brutal batterers might commit or what they could have done if they wanted to. One of the unearned male privileges men are used to exercising is the power to define. Batterers often minimize their abuse by defining domestic violence or assault as something that requires a serious enough injury so that their assault would not qualify. They will also define what they did as justice rather than abuse.

“Because abusers rarely admit to the full extent of their violence or take responsibility for their violent actions, excuses and justifications are frequently part of their accounts (citations omitted). Hearn wrote, “Excuses and justifications involve the recognition of the violence but the denial of either responsibility (excuses) or blame (justifications). Whilst in some sense excuses and justifications are conceptual opposites, they are in practice sometimes closely interlinked.’ Hearn’s observation gets at the contradictions that are so often present in batterer accounts. Indeed batterers often say in effect, ‘I did something but it wasn’t my fault. And she deserved it anyway.’”

Many of the excuses deny responsibility by claiming it was caused by forces beyond his control. The excuses can also be based on alcohol or drug abuse. They may also blame abuse they suffered as children. Often the batterer will acknowledge some action he believes is acceptable while creating a disconnect between his actions and any harm he caused. Abusers frequently claim self-defense and claim to be the real victim. They may take something she said or her “misbehavior” as the cause of the incident and his violent response as self-defense or justified.

“David Adams argued that what batterers label self-defense is often violent retaliation for disobedience. Adams described how male abusers categorize even very violent acts including strangling, punching, and beating someone up as self-defense and therefore not violence. At the same time, abusers outline a very different standard for their partners’ behavior. Many abusers characterize their partner’s disagreeable speech as akin to a violent physical attack and justify physical beatings as self-defense against such perceived attacks. One study found that more than half of the batterers blamed their partner’s aggressive speech for their violence.”

“Equating very different kinds of aggression and violence is part of abusers’ ‘account-keeping’ mindset. Research on batterers suggests that they often keep a running tab of all the ways they feel their partners have disrespected, disobeyed or wronged them. Reasoning that they are simply settling accounts, abusers then use these transgressions as justifications for physical violence. For some batterers this kind of account keeping shades into looking for reasons to use violence. “I started looking for excuses; I’d do anything to get an excuse (to use violence).’ The pairing of excuses and justifications allows batterers simultaneously to deny their violent intentions and garner support or at least understanding of their violent actions.”

Batterers often use patriarchal explanations for their abuse. They expect their partners to conform to traditional women’s roles. Accordingly if she fails to fulfill her “sexual obligations” or doesn’t perform the household and child care duties the way he demands this would be used as a justification for abusing her. They usually would not directly say that women are inferior, but might call her names to justify his assault and suggest she asked for it. Abusers often have a low tolerance for their partner’s failure to submit. Batterers seek to take their abusive behavior out of context and to start the narrative at the point where they feel their partner did something wrong.

“The findings that batterers minimize their abusive behavior, blame the victim for their own use of violence and equate their partners’ failure to submit with violence all have serious implications for research” and I would add for custody court professionals. “Given what we know about how batterers talk about their violence, scholars and advocates are ill advised to take batterer reports at face value.” And yet this is exactly what we repeatedly see from court professionals with inadequate understanding of domestic violence and no knowledge of the research about what we can learn from batterer narratives. Before leaving this topic, I want to make sure to mention that there are exceptions and if a father does not use these tactics or explanations this does not prove he is not an abuser.

Professionals Without Understanding of Domestic Violence Dynamics are Unqualified 

Repeatedly we see cases in which court professionals conclude and judges decide that the alleged abuser committed one or two acts of domestic violence and then suddenly stopped for no apparent reason, there is no further risk because the parties separated or he hasn’t assaulted her since they separated and he has no access so there is no risk in giving him custody or unsupervised visitation. These are the kinds of mistakes unqualified professionals make when they do not understand domestic violence dynamics.

Men commit domestic violence against their intimate female partners because of a belief system that they are entitled to control their partners and make the major decisions in the relationship. The end of a relationship rarely changes their belief system. When their history is fully investigated, they usually have abused a series of partners. Evaluators rarely ask about past history of abuse even though that would be important information to determine the danger he presents.

Abusers are unlikely to change their beliefs unless they are held accountable and punished for their abusive behavior. Approaches that blame the victim for her partner’s abuse or suggest his abuse is mutual or that both parties contributed demonstrates a lack of understanding of domestic violence dynamics. The abuser deliberately took actions to frighten his partner because this coerces her to do what he wants. One of the worst mistakes of court professionals is when they blame or punish mothers for their fear or emotion caused by her partner’s abuse. Many court sponsored gender bias committees have cited this as a common example of gender bias, but the custody courts continue to make this dangerous error.

Most contested custody cases are domestic violence cases in which an abusive father who usually had limited involvement with the children during the relationship seeks custody as a tactic to pressure the mother to return or punish her for leaving. Untrained professionals usually fail to look at his motivation for seeking custody. They ignore evidence that the father uses visitation exchanges, phone calls to the children and other litigation opportunities to try to reunite with the mother or to harass her. He may use his time with the children to pump them for information about the mother or constantly ask to speak with her. This could help courts recognize the father’s motivation if only they understood the significance.

At the same time, even when they see evidence that he abused the mother, they rarely take effective steps to stop his abuse and protect the children. Domestic violence experts recommend that in domestic violence cases the best arrangement for the children is custody for the safe or safer parent and supervised visitation for the abusive parent. It is important that the abuser be held accountable for his abuse so requiring him to complete a batterer program or imposing other consequences should be part of the arrangement. I want to be clear that batterer programs do not by themselves change men’s behavior particularly long term. Only monitoring and accountability have been shown to accomplish this, but completion of the program can show the father is motivated to make the changes needed to become a safe father. In order to work towards unsupervised visitation, the father would have to convince the court that he will end his abusive behavior. The court can consider if the father acknowledges his abuse and does not try to minimize his responsibility or blame others. The father should express his understanding that his behavior harmed his children and make a commitment never to act abusively again. He must have stopped all coercive and intimidating behaviors. The court must make clear that if he commits further acts of abuse he will lose his visitation privileges. This is an approach that is based on the safety and well being of the children instead of the rights of the father. One of the present problems in the custody court system is in the rare cases when they order supervised visitation for abusive fathers they quickly want to move to unsupervised without any change in his belief system, but when they order supervised visitation for mothers who do not pose any safety risks, the courts appear happy to continue this burden on the children indefinitely.

A common mistake by court professionals occurs when the father has supervised visitation and the father’s ability to act appropriately while supervised is taken as proof he is safe for unsupervised visitation. This is based on the false assumption that abusers batter their partners because they cannot control their behavior. In fact abusers control their behavior and anger. This is why they do not assault people other than their partners because if they did they would face consequences and why they don’s assault their partners except in private so there are no witnesses. If they cannot control their behavior during supervised visitation they are unsafe for unsupervised visitation, but the ability to control their behavior is not surprising and should not be used by itself to assume the father no longer poses a danger.

Since men abuse women because of their belief systems and not anything the mother did, there is every reason to believe the father will continue to abuse future partners. This means that if he is given unsupervised visitation or custody, the children are likely to witness their father abusing future partners. This risk is often overlooked by inadequately trained professionals with little understanding of domestic violence dynamics.

Risk Assessment 

In custody cases involving allegations of domestic violence or child abuse the safety of the children should be the first priority. Accordingly it would make much more sense to order a risk assessment which would give courts the information it needs to make an intelligent decision instead of an evaluation that focuses on far less important issues. Few of the evaluators relied on by custody courts know the significance of the alleged abusive behaviors they are asked to investigate.

There are several common abusive practices that have been demonstrated to be associated with a higher risk of lethality or serious injury. It should be considered malpractice to make a custody decision without knowledge of these risks. One of the risks is strangling, choking or placing his hands around her neck. New York recently made this a crime because abusers sometimes do this without leaving physical injuries which was the previous requirement for prosecution, but this behavior is extremely dangerous. Other common issues that reflect an increased risk include hitting a woman while pregnant, rape or attempted rape, hurting pets or other animals, substance abuse, availability of guns, belief she has no right to leave, threats of suicide, homicide or kidnapping, violation of orders or laws and seeking custody as a tactic to maintain control.

For domestic violence advocates, risk assessment and safety planning are a fundamental part of their job. Their expertise could help courts make decisions that promote the safety of children. Nevertheless we repeatedly see judges refuse to listen to domestic violence experts because they believe they know enough, but no one in the courtroom has this vital expertise.

Recognizing Domestic Violence 

Custody courts have no chance to respond properly to domestic violence if they do not know how to recognize domestic violence. It often appears like some court professionals are attempting to rule out abuse allegations because they disbelieve complaints based on many common situations that in no way contradict the allegations. We often see evaluators and judges discredit allegations because the protective mother returned to her abuser, sought a protective order but did not follow-through, failed to have police or medical reports or the children did not show fear when a court professional observed them interacting with their father. The first four situations represent a normal response by battered women for safety and other good reasons. In the final example the children understand their father would not hurt them in front of a witness, particularly someone he is trying to impress. Of course if courts discredit allegations based on information that is not probative they inevitably will get a lot of decisions wrong.

At the same time they are discrediting allegations for the wrong reasons; many court professionals do not know what to look for in order to use the available evidence to determine the validity of domestic violence allegations. Some professionals look only for incidents of physical abuse and therefore miss a lot of important evidence. Genuine experts understand that they need to look for patterns of coercive, controlling and intimidating behavior. They will look at psychological, emotional and financial abuse. They will look for isolating behaviors. The experts will consider if the alleged abuser is monitoring her such as checking her phone or the odometer on her car. They will look at his motivation for seeking custody if he had little involvement with the children during the relationship. They want to know if he is seeking custody as a tactic to pressure her to return or punish her for leaving. The experts will consider if he is engaged in litigation abuse. Very often judges who complain about a he-said-she-said case would have a lot of evidence to help them get it right if only they understood the significance of the evidence available.

Conclusion 

I believe the approaches that should be used in domestic violence custody cases are both logical and unassailable. The first priority and most important factor in deciding custody must be the safety of the children. No one can make an intelligent or informed decision about safety without knowing the factors that make an abuser most dangerous, how to use abuser narratives to recognize how abusers will describe their abuse, how to recognize domestic violence and an understanding of the dynamics of domestic violence. As Dr. Dragiewicz points out, professionals must learn not to take each incident or issue separately but rather look for patterns and always consider the issues in context of the whole relationship. If we ask court professionals if they understand or have sufficient expertise in domestic violence, they are likely to claim that they do and many believe it sincerely, but if we instead ask them about the specific knowledge and skills necessary to respond to domestic violence custody cases they cannot honestly claim to have this information. If they did, the courts would not repeatedly be sending children to live with dangerous abusers.

Barry Goldstein is a nationally recognized domestic violence expert, speaker, writer and consultant. He is the co-editor with Mo Therese Hannah of DOMESTIC VIOLENCE, ABUSE and CHILD CUSTODY. Barry can be reached by email at their web site www.Domesticviolenceabuseandchildcustody.com

Why Don’t We End Domestic Violence?

By Barry Goldstein

Society has the knowledge and ability to prevent a large majority of domestic violence crimes and especially murders. It is not like cancer or heart disease which would require some fundamental changes in human behavior to achieve massive reductions. We could easily put together a change in laws, policies and practices and quickly end the danger of domestic violence for most women and children. If we could as readily prevent most of the deaths from earthquakes, tornados, cancer or terror attacks, we would not hesitate to do so. Why should we continue to tolerate the enormous harm caused by abusers? Many of our leaders have spoken of and dreamed of a world without domestic violence. This is a worthy goal, but I am not naïve enough to believe we can end all domestic violence in our lifetimes. We can, however create a massive reduction in domestic violence crimes. I say let’s do it.

Background

Our publisher asked Mo Hannah and I to prepare a second volume of DOMESTIC VIOLENCE, ABUSE and CHILD CUSTODY. I decided to write a chapter for the book of a modern tale of two cities comparing Quincy, Massachusetts with Poughkeepsie, New York. I selected Quincy, Massachusetts because they had developed the Quincy Model which had resulted in a drastic reduction of domestic violence homicide. I selected Poughkeepsie, New York because they had been severely criticized for using approaches in custody court that strongly favored abusive fathers. The court system and particularly the judges reacted to the criticism in a defensive and retaliatory manner. Dutchess County has now had a series of domestic violence homicides including the last crime in which the abusive father also killed a police officer. The County Legislature created a committee to study and respond to the series of domestic violence homicides and I am interested to see if they make a connection between the murders and the pattern of mistreatment of protective mothers in the custody court system.

In the late 1970s around the start of the modern movement to end domestic violence, approximately three thousand domestic violence homicides were committed each year in the United States. The frequency of domestic violence homicides did not change significantly until society adopted policies and practices to hold abusers accountable, particularly with pro-arrest policies. The timing of the increased accountability with the reduction in domestic violence homicide supported the belief that these policies led to the reduction, but perhaps what was most convincing was the results in communities that were especially strict in enforcing domestic violence laws. Communities like Nashville, Tennessee and San Diego, California saw even more dramatic reductions in domestic violence homicide as a result of strong programs to prevent domestic violence. Quincy, Massachusetts adopted its model in response to a series of domestic violence homicides and for many years they had no domestic violence homicides in Quincy.

Achieving a Massive Reduction in Domestic Violence Crime

As part of the research for my chapter I have had the opportunity to read about the practices that were so successful in Quincy and elsewhere. I have also read some of the ideas for improving the conditions in Poughkeepsie. We also have the research to establish improved practices in the custody courts. This is particularly important for reducing domestic violence crimes because abuser rights groups have been particularly successful in using common mistakes and flawed practices in the custody courts to undermine the progress society had made elsewhere in reducing domestic violence. The result of the failures in the custody courts has been that more battered mothers are staying with their abusers because they are afraid of being separated from their children and some of them do not survive this decision. Although some have attributed the recent rise in domestic violence homicide after many years of reduction to the bad economy, I believe the problems we see in the custody courts is the more likely explanation. Based upon the research and experience, I believe it would be easy for a group of domestic violence experts to create a best practices model that would result in a drastic reduction in domestic violence crimes.

The basic reforms that would create a massive reduction in domestic violence crime should not be in dispute. Experts may differ about some of the specifics around the edges, but the decisions on those issues would not affect the positive outcome if we included the practices that have been shown to work. We are working on a more complete and detailed agenda for the second volume of DOMESTIC VIOLENCE, ABUSE and CHILD CUSTODY, but we already know the basics of what is needed. Here is what any reform agenda would include:

1. Coordinated Community Response: The communities that were most successful in reducing domestic violence homicide developed a coordinated community response in which all parts of the community came together to do their part in ending domestic violence. The professionals worked together to coordinate their response and included the domestic violence community as a key resource in the response to domestic violence. The communities had regular meetings to monitor how the campaign to end domestic violence was going and to make adjustments as needed.

2. Make it Easier for Victims to Obtain Protective Orders: Some people disparage protective orders as not worth the paper they are printed on and sometimes it is true, but women with protective orders are safer than those without. Society needs to make it less of a burden on battered women to obtain needed protection by having specified times when the court handles only protective orders so women can get in and out of court quickly. At other times judges should take protective orders before other cases because of the safety concerns. This is important because women may have work or family obligations that make it difficult to wait around the court in order to see a judge. Many judges get frustrated when women seek a protective order and then don’t return for the next court date. Reducing the burdens on victims will encourage them to follow through. At the same time there should be special clerks that help women fill out the forms and prosecutors’ offices should brief victims on the procedures they can expect. Finally judges should take domestic violence allegations more seriously, receive better training and make sure women who need protection can obtain the orders.

3. Strict Enforcement of Criminal Laws and Violations of Protective Orders: The heart of the programs that created a substantial reduction in domestic violence homicide was taking domestic violence seriously. This requires strict enforcement of domestic violence crimes and protective orders. Research demonstrates that abusive men tend to use a cost-benefit analysis in deciding whether to abuse their partners. That is why accountability and monitoring are the best ways to prevent domestic violence. The strict enforcement not only sends a message to the men held accountable, and their children, it sends a message to the entire community. The programs are often launched with important media coverage and those involved in the coordinated community response also help spread the message.

4. Lethality Assessment: The most important purpose of the laws, programs and practices designed to prevent domestic violence is the safety of victims and their children. One of the first things domestic violence advocates learn is safety planning and how to assess the danger. There are several common behaviors of abusers that have been shown to be related to an increased level of danger that domestic violence experts look at in making lethality assessments. These behaviors include choking, strangling or putting his hands around his partner’s throat, assaulting her while pregnant, raping or attempting to rape his partner, killing or hurting family pets, availability of guns, threats of suicide, homicide or kidnapping and a belief she has no right to leave. Incredibly, court professionals rarely use risk assessments or even understand the significance of these behaviors in making judgments about alleged abusers. Criminal courts should be using risk assessments to inform decisions about bail, protective orders and sentencing. Custody courts should use this information in determining custody and visitation arrangements that are safe for the victim and children.

5. Give Domestic Violence Cases the First Priority: Communities that reduced domestic violence crimes gave these cases the first priority. As discussed earlier this means making sure victims can get access to judges quickly so they don’t lose jobs or have to spend a lot of money on child care in order to protect themselves. It means local judges coming to arraignments after hours rather than releasing alleged offenders with an appearance ticket, but no protective order. It also means that custody courts must recognize most contested custody cases involve domestic violence and place a priority on the safety of the children and alleged victims.

6. Best Interests of the Child Should Mean Safety is the First Priority: The most important issue in deciding custody should be the safety of the children, but states usually have a list of factors to be considered and shockingly courts often focus on other less important issues. The second priority should be arrangements that give children the best chance to reach their potential.

7. Use of Current Scientific Research: When domestic violence first became a public issue there was no research to inform professionals about the best way to respond. When professionals modified their practices based on new research it has helped protect victims. Police departments went from practices of separating the parties and having the abuser walk around the block to cool off to a pro-arrest policy. Communities that created more accountability for abusers saw domestic violence crimes reduced. Child protective agencies that have partnered with domestic violence agencies and consulted with their advocates on potential domestic violence cases have been better able to recognize domestic violence and forge arrangements that protect children better. Police and prosecutors need to be aware of the frequency in which abusers involved in contested custody make deliberately false allegations and avoid wasting their resources persecuting their victims before fully investigating the allegations and speaking with the real victims. Custody courts have been particularly slow to modify practices based on current scientific research. They need to recognize most contested custody involve abusive fathers seeking custody as a tactic to maintain their control. They need to limit the role of mental health professionals to their area of expertise which is mental health and not domestic violence. They need to avoid inadequately trained professionals who continue to believe the myth that women frequently make false allegations particularly in sexual abuse cases. The court must also stop permitting unscientific theories like Parental Alienation Syndrome.

8. Retraining Court Professionals: A lot of unfortunate events have combined to create widespread beliefs in a wide range of misinformation about domestic violence. Domestic violence is often counterintuitive which leads to misinformation. The lack of research when court professionals started responding also contributes to the problem. The widespread use of unqualified professionals has encouraged an undeserved confidence in false notions that make them harder to challenge and correct. The media has done a lousy job of covering domestic violence and often fails to understand who the experts are. Accordingly we need to retrain court professionals both to prevent the use of misinformation and to help the professionals learn about current scientific research, domestic violence dynamics and best practices. The training must have the active participation of genuine domestic violence experts such as dv advocates. Professionals working in criminal court must learn the importance of taking domestic violence seriously, prioritizing domestic violence cases and holding offenders strictly accountable. They should particularly learn how communities have dramatically reduced domestic violence homicide. Criminal court professionals must learn that accountability and monitoring are the only approaches shown to reduce domestic violence. Domestic violence is not caused by substance abuse, mental illness or anger management issues. Some offenders may have mental illness or substance abuse and domestic violence issues and each problem should be responded to separately. Custody court professionals must unlearn the myth that women frequently make false allegations of abuse. They need to look at the motivation of alleged abusers and understand the harm to children. They must learn that allegations of child sexual abuse have been totally mishandled and learn best practices to respond to these painful allegations. They also must learn that the way to include both parents in children’s lives that most benefits children is to require abusers to stop their harmful tactics instead of asking their victims to get over their fear and concern.

9. Use of Domestic Violence Experts: We now have a substantial body of specialized knowledge about domestic violence. Courts must stop relying on “experts” unfamiliar with this research and ignorant of domestic violence dynamics and instead listen to genuine domestic violence experts. Courts must stop refusing to listen to these genuine experts and especially until this information is better known to court professionals allow these experts to testify in order to educate the judge and other professionals.

10. Early Domestic Violence Hearings in Custody Cases: A large majority of contested custody cases are actually domestic violence cases. The research is very clear that unless the victim is unsafe, she should have custody and the abuser supervised visitation because that is what works best for children. Accordingly, custody courts can schedule an evidentiary hearing at the start of the case on the domestic violence issue. There is no need for evaluators or GALs as it is a factual issue. This will permit courts to resolve cases in a few hours or less that otherwise would take months or years and provide a huge savings in money and court time. Children also benefit because they don’t have to spend years worried about where they will live. This also avoids less important and distracting issues that only make it more difficult for the judge to understand the issues. This practice is likely to help courts make better decisions as well as quicker ones.

11. Use of Victim’s Advocate: The advocates are used by law enforcement to help and support the victim and provide information and training for law enforcement personnel. They are used in the prosecutor’s office for similar purposes and to acquaint the victim with the procedures. These practices should make survivors more comfortable and thus more likely to cooperate and press charges. In the court clerk’s office the advocate can help victims fill out forms and documents and explain the procedures. These procedures will help provide law enforcement and the courts with needed evidence while encouraging the complainant to continue to participate.

12. New Approach to Child Sexual Abuse in Custody Cases: Although most allegations of child sexual abuse made by mothers are true and deliberately false allegations are rare, 85% of sexual abuse allegations in custody cases result in custody for the alleged abuser and frequently little or no contact with the mother who sought to protect her child. This is a result of the difficulty in proving abuse of very young children and deeply flawed practices. Based especially on the new Department of Justice study led by Dr. Daniel Saunders, we should start by eliminating court professionals who believe in the myth that women frequently make false allegations. Professionals should be trained in best practices that would include understanding why a child might be reluctant to reveal sexual abuse or recant truthful allegations, use of play therapy for young children, avoid giving abusers additional opportunities to silence children and give children a chance to develop trusting relationships with therapists or other investigators before expecting them to discuss the abuse. We particularly need to abandon approaches that retaliate against mothers for good faith allegations.

13. Limit Role of Mental Health Professionals to their Area of Expertise: Mental health professionals are routinely used for evaluations and other services in domestic violence custody cases despite limited and often distorted information about domestic violence. This has contributed to the frequency in which courts place children in jeopardy. Mental health professionals have a role to play when a parent has a serious mental disorder that interferes with the ability to care for the children or other issues related to their field of study and practice. They should be limited to roles they are qualified for and at the very least consult with domestic violence experts on cases involving possible domestic violence.

14. Gender Bias: Over forty states and many districts have conducted court-sponsored gender bias committees that have found widespread gender bias. Other scientific research supports these findings. Women who kill their partner receive seventy percent longer sentences under similar circumstances as men who kill their partner. Women are given less credibility, higher standards of proof and are blamed for the actions of their abusers. Courts cannot do an effective job of responding to domestic violence as long as it continues to unconsciously favor male litigants. Court professionals must be trained about gender bias, attorneys and litigants must be protected and encouraged to raise concerns about gender bias, judges and other court professionals should be transferred, retrained or otherwise disciplined for continued gender biased practices and appellate courts must reverse cases based on gender bias.

15. Improved Police Role in Ending Domestic Violence: Police should make domestic violence cases a high priority and conduct an evidence based investigation instead of just relying on the victim’s testimony. Police must be trained to understand fathers involved in contested custody cases are 16 times more likely than mothers to make false allegations. This means they should take complaints from mothers seriously despite ongoing litigation, but have some skepticism of father’s allegations. They should always speak with the mother to understand the context before making a decision to make an arrest or bring charges. The police must also be aware that abusers tend to be very manipulative, but sometimes the police can use abusers’ sense of entitlement to encourage them to make statements that are actually admissions. Police departments must take precautions to respond to male officers who abuse their partners and particularly use their influence and relationship with other officers to undermine any investigation. There should be no tolerance for domestic violence or covering up domestic violence complaints. Departments should have a procedure for women to have someone in the department they can safely complain to about their partner’s abuse and any assistance other officers provide him.

Can Society Afford to Continue to Tolerate Domestic Violence? 

Politicians sometimes justify their failure to do more to stop domestic violence by citing the costs, but the reality is the costs are much greater by tolerating domestic violence. In reviewing a report about the response to domestic violence in Dutchess County, New York, I noticed how often they undermined substantial parts of the plan to prevent domestic violence in order to save small sums of money. The problem is when they are budgeting; they fail to consider the extra money that will be expended as a result of the increase in domestic violence encouraged by the cutbacks.

Children who witness domestic violence are more likely to engage in a wide range of harmful and costly behaviors including crime. Large majorities of the prison population were directly abused as children or witnessed domestic violence. This creates huge added expenses in police, courts, prosecutors, defense attorneys and prisons. It also creates more expenses in substance abuse treatment. This is in addition to the extra similar expenses in directly responding to domestic violence crimes and custody cases based on domestic violence.

An increase in domestic violence crimes also increases health care costs. Not only is the health care system used to heal the immediate physical wounds, but it leads to other medical problems based on the stress of living with domestic violence as well as emotional and psychological difficulties. If the woman has medical insurance his abuse is paid by all of the policy holders through higher premiums. If she does not have insurance she may not be able to pay for the care so that the rest of the public and the government ultimately pays. Many of the health costs are borne directly by various governmental entities.

When victims miss work it harms the economy thus reducing tax revenues. The same is true when women lose jobs because of injuries or repeated court dates. Government programs like unemployment insurance and crime victim compensation may also be triggered. Significantly domestic violence interferes with the ability to reach their potential. It is hard for women to reach their potential when dealing with domestic violence even if the injuries do not prove fatal. Men who commit domestic violence crimes can’t reach their potential if they are in jail and even if they are not jailed the time they waste abusing and harassing their partners can interfere with the ability to reach their potential. Children who witness domestic violence are significantly less likely to reach their potential and if the children grow up to hurt others these third parties also lose the ability to reach their potential. We don’t know if society will miss out on someone who would have discovered a medical cure, developed a patent, created a major new business or is just a productive member of society. All of this represents a massive loss of economic activity that translates into a huge loss of tax revenue.

While the proposal described above would include some additional expenses, it also includes plans that would save substantial tax dollars. Conducting early evidentiary hearings on domestic violence would help courts make better decisions, but also save substantial sums of money and judicial time. A large majority of contested custody cases which are the cases that take most of the court’s time are domestic violence cases. Since mothers rarely make deliberately false allegations of abuse, a hearing for an hour or two will avoid cases that often take many months or years. There will be no need to spend money on evaluators, GALs or other professionals who provide no help in recognizing or responding to domestic violence. Furthermore, as the practices outlined in this article become better known, abusive men will be less likely to commit domestic violence crimes and children will be sent an important message that domestic violence will not be tolerated. This will save significant sums initially and much greater amounts over time as the message resonates.

We don’t have figures on the full cost of domestic violence or the amount of money this proposal would save, but it has to be at least in the hundreds of billions of dollars. In that context attempting to save thousands of dollars by cutting local programs or a few million on programs nationally is counterproductive based on the financial costs and insane based on the human costs.

How to get Started Ending Domestic Violence

It is common rhetoric to say we should end domestic violence. We may not be able to prevent all domestic violence tactics or even all domestic violence crimes, but we know how to quickly create a massive reduction in domestic violence crimes and especially domestic violence homicide. How do we get from here to there?

Just as people in Quincy, Massachusetts, Nashville, Tennessee and San Diego, California came together to make ending domestic violence the leading priority other communities can do the same and it is easier because they have the successes of those communities to look at and a lot of additional research. Individual states can take the lead by adopting the needed law changes and provide funding to implement a program like the one discussed in this article.

This can also be done on a national basis. The President can announce that we will no longer tolerate domestic violence and create a program to encourage communities to implement the practices that work. Grants and other support can be provided to set up pilot projects around the country to demonstrate that these practices will work. Eventually the federal government can make implementation of these practices a requirement if states wish to receive any federal funding for law enforcement and the judicial system. This should be done on a non-partisan basis. Democrats claim to be supporters of women so they should certainly wish to free women from the fear and risk of domestic violence. Republicans regularly propose spending millions of dollars to promote abstinence for children. If they don’t want children having sex with their peers they certainly will wish to protect them from sex with adults. The bills to end domestic violence should be House 1 and Senate 1 to make them the first priority.

Several years ago I gave a presentation with Mo Therese Hannah at the NCADV Conference in Atlanta. I spoke about the success of Quincy, Nashville and San Diego in implementing these practices. After the workshop, a woman came up to me and told me what I said was no longer true. It seems a new administration took over in Nashville, dismantled the successful program and the domestic violence homicide rate went back up. This was disappointing news, but it also confirmed that it was these practices that are the difference between a substantial reduction in domestic violence crime and requiring women’s lives to be impacted by men’s abuse of their intimate partners.

Domestic violence is not inevitable. It can be prevented. Our daughters and granddaughters can grow up in a world in which domestic violence crimes are rare. The worst crime would be if we take the knowledge, research and ability we have to substantially reduce domestic violence crimes and instead find some excuse to force women and children to continue to suffer.

Barry Goldstein is a nationally recognized domestic violence expert, speaker, writer and consultant. He is the co-editor with Mo Therese Hannah of DOMESTIC VIOLENCE, ABUSE and CHILD CUSTODY. Barry can be reached by email at their web site www.Domesticviolenceabuseandchildcustody.com