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Prof’s book examines domestic violence paradox
“He shoved me, hard, and knocked me down, so when he shoved me again, I just hit him,” Nicole said. During their marriage, she added, “He hit me a lot. I hit him back, but actually I can’t hurt him. He’s bigger than me. I can only sting him ... get him away from me so I could leave.” Nicole, who with her former husband was arrested for the fight in the mall, is typical of many of the women interviewed by Susan L. Miller for her new book, Victims as Offenders: The Paradox of Women’s Violence in Relationships. Miller, professor of sociology and criminal justice at UD, said her research has found that law-enforcement policies designed to protect victims of domestic violence are instead often making their situations worse. “When I started this research, I was totally shocked to find that victims were being arrested as often as they are,” Miller said. “It was really eye-opening to me, and it was fascinating as a policy issue. It seemed to be an example of a policy that was implemented to be beneficial but that turned out to have unintended and harmful consequences.” So-called mandatory arrest policies, which gained nationwide popularity in the mid-1980s, were seen as a way for police to treat domestic violence more seriously, as they would in an assault by a stranger, and to act more aggressively in protecting victims. Previously, police often separated a couple--perhaps telling the man to leave the house for the night--but did not necessarily make an arrest, especially in cases where the victim hadn’t been seriously injured. That procedure came under criticism, however, particularly after some high-profile cases in which perpetrators returned home after police left and committed more serious assaults or even homicides. New policies, designed not only to protect victims from further violence but also to protect police departments from lawsuits, encourage officers to make arrests. Unfortunately, Miller said, officers often arrest both parties, even when there are important differences in their behavior, the injuries inflicted and the situation that led up to the violence. Since mandatory arrest policies became widespread, the number of women arrested on domestic violence charges in the United States has grown substantially, but Miller said her research indicates that much of the increase is due to the policies and not to a real change in women’s behavior. “There are certainly some violent women, but it’s a myth that women are as aggressive or almost as aggressive as men and that there are as many male victims of domestic violence,” she said. “That really has been discredited by all scholars who have studied the issue.” In contrast, she said, her research on women arrested in domestic violence cases and required to attend a treatment program found three general categories: generalized violent behavior, in which the women frequently used violence in domestic and other situations, which accounted for only about 5 percent of those arrested; frustration response behavior, which often followed a history of being a domestic violence victim and accounted for about 30 percent of the group; and defensive behavior, in which the women were trying to protect themselves or their children, accounting for about 65 percent of the women. “If a woman’s using violence because she’s afraid for her kids or herself, that’s not the kind of aggressive, controlling pattern of violence that we often see men engage in,” Miller said. “To arrest both parties, regardless of the context, isn’t solving the problem.” In such “dual arrest” cases, police often charge the woman with a less serious offense than her partner--based on the circumstances and on the extent of each person’s injuries--but Miller said the very fact of being arrested can have long-lasting and detrimental effects on women in that situation. Because they may not be facing jail time and because they are usually desperate to get back home to their children, women often forgo having an attorney and plead guilty to an offense that will place them on probation, Miller said. “But, she’ll still have a criminal record, and that can have some very negative consequences,” she said. “If she violates her probation, she can be rearrested and locked up. She might lose her public housing or her job, and she can be required to attend a domestic violence treatment program that takes times away from her job or her children. And, the fact that she’s been arrested and the threat of having her arrested again can be used against her by her partner as just another way he has of controlling her.” In fact, she said, men familiar with the police policy sometimes manipulate the system by exaggerating or even causing their own injuries in order to have their partner arrested. Even the treatment program the researchers observed, which had a victims’ perspective and gave the participants useful information and support, was unfair to most of the women because they were required by court order to attend, Miller said. Working with undergraduate and graduate research assistants, she gathered data through three channels. The research team interviewed a variety of professionals who work with domestic violence, including social workers, police and other law-enforcement officials and emergency shelter operators. The research assistants also rode along with police officers from different departments and in different types of communities, and Miller and graduate assistant Michelle Meloy sat in on all the meetings of three 12-week programs for women who had been arrested. Observing police officers as they answered domestic violence calls showed some significant differences among departments, Miller said. While some officers seemed “almost robotic” in their decision to arrest both parties, she said, others had been trained and encouraged to determine which party was the “primary aggressor.” “Identifying the primary aggressor makes a dramatic difference in the outcome, and some departments are clearly better at this,” Miller said. “They consider the context and sort out the circumstances of an incident.” As a result, she said, women who were actually victims who resisted their partners’ aggression were less likely to be identified as criminals and arrested. “I would never say that police should go back to the way things were handled before mandatory arrest policies began, but I would like to see police trained to identify a primary aggressor, to look not just at the outcome but also the factors that led up to it,” she said. “I hope this research opens people’s eyes to the problem so that we can work on refining mandatory arrest policies.” Miller, who has a doctorate from the University of Maryland, began working as a volunteer with domestic violence shelters while a graduate student. She joined the UD faculty in 1996 and teaches courses on gender and crime, criminal justice policy and victimology and victims’ rights. A previous book, Gender and Community Policing: Walking the Talk, was the first to address the issue of gender and its relation to community policing. Article by Ann Manser |
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