welcome to the third annual production of belmont rising we are part of one billion rising global movement raising awareness around the globe about domestic violence against women the campaign has mobilized engaged awakened and joined people worldwide to end violence against women violence against women is a global human and public health issue not relegated to a country tribe class religion or race tommy olsen who was not able to join us today is our host and i'm maggie rose your co host also with us today is michelle pent and lieutenant christian dailly and we're going to open up some questions and share some information because we have had wonderful movement forward we're glad you're here with us today as we celebrate women the world's most valuable asset we intend to engage in light new some of the subject matter is difficult but it demands our attention and it may not be suitable life are poisoned at their source so we did make some great headway this year and in two thousand and fifteen governor deval patrick signed in a new  divest the new domestic violence legislation into law following the august two thousand and thirteen murder of jennifer martel by her boyfriend jared remy and wal am of course that is a neighboring and almost sister community you'd say so it got very close to home and i think it did help heighten our awareness and there were forty nine very interesting points that came out lie in there in the first one that i liked was that there is now a six hour cooling off period before those who've been arrested on domestic violence charges can be bailed or rain and then the second one prohibits reports of domestic violence rape or sexual salt in the public failing logs this is a always treated our sexual assaults that way that's the way they've always been they're always kept completely separate in the locked area and the reports that have to do with that however the domestic violence ones it's only been these past few years ago it was where we started not naming the arrestee who has been arrested for domestic violence we would just say maybe a belmont man or belmont woman or a watertown man but now no calls or domestic at all will go  into go into the police long at all so there's a we've always dealt with sexual assaults that way we haven't always dealt with the with the logs i know but the people i did it is controversial because they say well you know these domestic violence batters they need to be known they need to have their name but my feeling is people also forget that there is a victim and he's protected there's also children need to be protected or are these children just saw their parents beat a mother or father get arrested for domestic violence and  that week they see their name in the paper and everyone that they went to school with sees the name in the paper that their parent was arrested for domestic violence so it's also why it's also more of a protection not just for the victim but for also for the children who at times are victim at times are a victim you know they're victims from seeing it may not have been physically assaulted at the time that's excellent point thank you for sharing that with us and michelle talking about the batterer that brings us to i think a question that everybody has in their head is you want to know who's the bad guy you want to know what does he look like is there a typical bad or i guess the short answer to that would be no because the way that domestic violence  hits every level like you were talking about earlier domestic violence could be happening in a house next door down the street it really doesn't matter about the community and how people look so i think that people want to believe that you know you're going to notice and they red be on their shirt or something about them that you can say and i find that even when we are interacting with them and we have the information we have the police report it's still sometimes hard to believe that the person that sitting in front of you was capable of what has been disclosed or been documented about them because the thing about batteries is their private behavior and their public behavior is very different because when they're out in public we're not their target they don't have an issue with us and if anything they were very controlling and manipulative and they know how to behave around other people but for a lot of these men and i say men just because in our program we work with male perpetrators of domestic violence so a lot of the guys that we work with are very pleasant and are pro and have proper manners and act in such a manner in front of us that it's hard sometimes to realize what they do behind closed doors so what we need to know understand about domestic violence is that is part of the dynamic is that their private behaviors are very different than their public behavior it's really hard to call someone out and in kind of be able to point at them a big year out it's that person it's more about their behavior and a pattern of behavior then how they look and how they present themselves do you think that domestic violence this is something that is a learned behavior or do you think it's a psychological you know where does it come  go i think there's a couple of different avenues for example when we work with male perpetrators of domestic violence we will have up to fifteen men at one time and one group in each group is called facilitated by a man in a female facilitator and in the in the group of men there are in there at the time i'll typically ask them at some point during their forty weeks they're in the program for forty weeks of two hours if you weeks with a total of eighty hours of intervention and during that time i'll ask questions to try to get at the root you know and if i have fifteen guys in the group i'll say how many of you witnessed domestic violence as children and typically thirteen of them will raise their hand and there might be one guy that will say i swear you know my parents were very loving they got along great i didn't learn this from them and then there might be another person that maybe has sketchy memories about their parents but might talk about you know the environment that he grew up in as far as the city the violence that he was saw in the community media there's a lot of different exposures that people have but a lot of times it is from witnessing domestic violence as children not to say that that excuses their behavior because at some point if you are an adult and you realize that your past history is influencing you in such a way that you're hurting your loved ones you need to get that in check and there are services it interventions available but the sad story of that is typically perpetrators of domestic violence do not get services unless they're court ordered you know i've been doing better intervention group her nineteen years and men can come to the program voluntarily they can call us up and say i'm having a problem you know i'm disrespectful i'm aggressive towards my partner i need help so that can happen at any time and we will work with those individuals however in my nineteen years of doing group i've maybe had you know three guys in my group over the years that will call and a lot of times it's hard for them to follow the row in stick to you know completing that eighty hours so it now with the domestic violence law that has changed the consequences for the individuals that perpetrate domestic violence in there is more of a mandate now that they have to through the court be referred to batter intervention programs so all good news violence i imagine that this is very important you're trying to get early intervention and sort of redirecting the anger issues that may come up for children or how to deal how to interact when you have a bad feeling absolutely is that yes in our home for children through the family safety project we have a couple of different components we have a you know services for men that have been violent and abusive to their female partner and we also have the services for children who witnessed domestic violence and the nice thing about the children's program is completely free for everyone we have funding through d c as well as through the mass office of victim assistance so if anyone calls me and wants to get involved in the children services i diagnosing isn't an issue insurance isn't an issue is a long as there's been some sort of domestic violence that's happened in their family in our home is called children who witness domestic violence but it's really kids who have been subjected to it they could know about it they could have maybe they want a home the night of the incident but they know what happened so it's really if they have any information that's good enough for us because what we are trying to do is counteract that and those negative impacts of witnessing and being around domestic violence we're hoping you know if we work with the kids that have been subjected to it that maybe they won't be in the perpetrator or the victims group when they get older not to say that every child that witness is domestic violence or to be a perpetrator or a victim there is a higher likelihood but what we want to do is work with those kids and has helped them be able to process it understand it and be able to put it behind them in a way that they feel good about and can truly move on because the other part of the thirteen guys in the group that will say yes you know i witnessed some sort of domestic violence when i was a child i've never had one guy that went to services for it never and had one guy say went to college selling we you know talked about this is a family typically it's something that gets swept under the rug and what the guys will say is that they remember that when they were children they remember the impact they remember how devastating it was her that their mom their dad everyone involved and they thought that making that promise would be enough you know to say like i've had this experience i will never do this to my partner and then ten twenty thirty years later here they are in a perpetrated group so what that tells me is it's just not enough like something else needs to happen between the point of you know being subjected to it and that and you know treating their partner like that they have to learn new behaviors or they have no focus for that energy however negative it might be why it is understanding that there's another way it doesn't have to be like that i mean for a lot of issues they say if we have you know some some sort of history with it that's going to be like our default if we don't address it and that's how domestic violence is so even though they've made these promises to themselves a lot of times they do end up mimicking that behavior well they i know the most recent statistic i read while i was researching for overwhelming number and to so often if in a violent situation you want to get the family to safety is it and it sounds like possibly the i know the answer to this one i'm not sure is it ever was to put the family there i mean are there degree is the violence or there are men that you think you can enter gary back into the family and situations where you know that this woman's got to get to s putting together some protocols and trying to figure out why are the most individual the most dangerous individuals that are you know within our program and in the community because there are a lot of different factors that need to be considerate but a lot of these families do stay together in so part of it is hard sometimes working with families when there's either ongoing domestic violence or they're at a point where things are calm and they believe it's over and behind them in the below as though they might not need any service or intervention because things are calm in that moment and they're not thinking well well you know in that what what resources are you going to pull from to deal with these feelings in the next  time you have this kind of anger or rage come up and would you say that's a good another question would you say that this is a rage that same said the domestic violence goes way beyond just being  angry it seems to be some blank rage that can't get satisfied or we thought oh the deal with the model we have a curriculum that we use with the men in the duluth model is based on the domestic violence wheels and if you look at the middle of it's about power and control so it's really not an anger or rage issue they can be elements of bad but it really is about inequality in the relationship about one person having power control over the other person in utilizing whatever techniques and tactics they need to keep that person there ok that that's interesting i really thought it was an anger issue and just behavior out of control but it's the age old our power structure really is in for a lot of you know up until recently with this new law courts would think that they were doing people favors by saying you know what i'm not going to send you to that forty week program like that's really law it's really expensive and listen to the anger management and anger management it's a wonderful program many of these men need that as well but it doesn't address the issue of domestic violence you know it's really you know it could be like a side but it really doesn't address that power control that inequality all of those things that are occurring in the domestic violence i'm glad you brought that up i know we're running out of time but i just have one more question i wonder if you could shed some light on when you say power struggle now that always says to me that there's it takes two people to have a toggle or so is their behavior pattern then it can be taught to the victims that help them let go this is definitely a situation where the behavior is the response to the abusive behavior is the responsibility of the bad are and a lot of times batters will think like only if i had the perfect better she was cuter then i wouldn't be as angry and then they go from partner to partner always going to looking for that perfect person and it's you know it's down that's the common denominator know we have some senior issues coming up on the domestic violence that when i know you do good deal work with that thank you everyone and i hope you are in my den informed and we'll see you