The author(s) shown below used Federal funds provided by the U.S.

Department of Justice and prepared the following final report:

Document Title: Models of Community Coordination in Partner

Violence Cases: A Multi-Side Comparative

Analysis, Final Report

Author(s): Alissa P. Worden

Document No.: 187351

Date Received: March 21, 2001

Award Number: 95-WT-NX-0006

This report has not been published by the U.S. Department of Justice.

To provide better customer service, NCJRS has made this Federallyfunded grant final report available electronically in addition to

traditional paper copies.

Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect

the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
February 19,2001 

Models of Community Coordination in Partner Violence Cases: 

A Multi-Site Comparative Analysis 

NIJ 95-WT-NX-0006 

Alissa Pollitz Worden 

University at Albany 

School of Criminal Justice 

135 Western Avenue 

Albany NY 12203 I 

Final report to the National Institute of Justice 

Project Monitor: Angela Moore-Parmley 

FINAL REPORT ddThis document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Table of Contents 

Chapter 1 : Introduction ......................................................... 1 

Dimensions of Coordinated Community Intervention: 

What We Know About Process and Outcomes ........................... 7 

Goals and Objectives of the Study .......................................... 18 

Research Strategy ....................................................... 20 

Summary ............................................................. 22 

Chapter 2: The Dimensionality of Local Criminal Justice Practices and Policies ............ 24 

Intervention Strategies at the Community Level: 

Criminal Justice Policies and Practices ................................ 25 

Summary and Discussion ................................................. 39 

Cataloguing System and Community Variables ............................... 41 

Summary ............................................................. 53 

- ! 

Chapter 3: Toward a Characterization of Five Communities ........................... 55 

Key Dimensions ........................................................ 56 

Characteristics of the Study Sites: A Closer Look .............................. 59 

Community Responses to Domestic Violence: 

Findings from Qualitative Research in the Study Sites ................... 64 

Community Responses to Domestic Violence: 

Findings from Qualitative Study ..................................... 65 

Summary‘; ................................................ ............ 92 

Chapter 4: Comparison of Community Criminal Justice Responses to Domestic Incidents .... 99 

Case Data From Five Communities ........................................ 104 

Comparing Communities: 

Population-Based Estimates ........................................ 111 

Summary and Discussion ................................................ 115 

Chapter 5: Conclusions and Directions for Future Research ........................... 123 

SummaryofFindings ................................................... 124 

Conclusions and Implications for Future Research ............................ 134 

Tables ..................................................................... 140 

Appendix A: Survey Instruments ................................................ 178 

Appendix B: Case Data Collection Instruments .................................... 182 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Appendix C: Case Data Collection Notes ......................................... 183 

References ................................................................. 184 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Chapter 1: Introduction 

Coordinated community intervention is widely heralded as the key to achieving better 

outcomes in cases involving violence within families, particularly violence between partners. On 

the surface at least, the appeal of coordination is intuitive: people working together from 

different (and sometimes competing) bases of power and with different kinds of resources are 

-- more likely to improve the prospects ,for victims than are criminal justice agents or victim service 

providers working in isolation. However, although researchers and practitioners nearly 

unanimously recommend greater investment in community coordination strategies, there has 

been very little systematic observation of the process, problems, and products of local 

coordination efforts. The purpose of this project is to explore the dimensionality of community 

responses to domestic violence, and, through comparative case studies of five communities, to 

develop and begin to test hypotheses about the efficacy of different coordination experiences. 

This study began with some simple but important observations. First, single-site studies 

of community coordination efforts are typically designed to document progress over time toward 

‘Iparticular objectives, which may have been defined at the outset of the project by participants. 

However, a comparative study of coordination offers a somewhat different research opportunity, 

the opportunity to observe multiple dimensions along which communities vary, and assess those 

variables’ relationships with outcome measures. 

Second, preliminary research for this project suggested that practitioners are willing to 

describe, often with considerable confidence, the nature of their communities’ responses to 

domestic violence, although they do not always describe it in similar terms; but they express 

1 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
little awareness of, or interest in, the diversity of approaches that exist in other communities. 

Criminal justice remains a very localized set of structures and processes, and practitioners do not 

tend naturally to look beyond their city limits for ideas about how to do things differently. 

Further, they do not often think of their attempts to change or improve their practices as efforts to 

conform more successfully to outsiders’ expectations about progressive or effective responses, 

and sometimes appear bewildered that such expectations exist, or that anyone pays much 

attention to them. While they may be.more influenced by external recommendations or 

mandates more than they know, they see their strategies and policies, as well as their perceived 

-- 

successes and setbacks, as the business of their own communities. 

Third, current enthusiasm for integrated and coordinated responses may have distracted 

researchers as well as policy makers from thinking scientifically about the ways that community 

responses may be shaped, changed, or enhanced, as well as about the relationships between 

structures and programs, and desired outcomes. An understandable sense of urgency about 

improving local responses may have contributed to an environment in which any innovation that 

can be characterized as a coordinated response is embraced, and tangible evidence of success is 

impatiently sought. Perhaps as a result, we still do not know very much about the local political, 

social, and economic conditions that are associated with responses to domestic violence, we have 

limited understanding of the dimensionality of those responses, and we know even less about the 

associations among particular combinations of structures, programs, and policies, and the 

impacts and outcomes that result. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, researchers and policy 

makers are not always in agreement with local practitioners about what those desired impacts and 

outcomes might be. It is unrealistic to hope to achieve change in these outcome measures across 

2 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
diverse localities without a better understanding of the complex linkages among these 

community variables. 

This project was undertaken in an attempt to fill some of these research gaps, at least in a 

preliminary fashion, through a comparative study of community responses to partner violence. It 

is not a study of model cities, or of communities that have purposefully attempted to adopt model 

policies or blueprints for successful coordination, although all five cities that are the primary 

focus of this research have in place at least one domestic violence task force that engages both 

criminal justice and community agencies. It is not a study of the effectiveness of particular 

programs or program types; instead, it is an exploratory effort to identify some of the conditions 

that give rise to more rather than less comprehensive and coordinated community responses, and 

a cautious attempt to asess how various approaches create (or fail to create) real differences in 

communites' responses to the problem of partner violence. 

I 

At this point it is necessary to clarify the content of the term "coordinated response'' as it 

will be used in this report. As the following brief review of the research literature indicates, the 

term is often used to refer loosely to policies, protocols, and programs intended to alter the nature 

of relationships among agencies. Broadly conceived in this way, coordination might include 

something as simple as a short-term partnership between a police department and a battered 

women's shelter that facilitates transportation and referral of victims, as well as something as 

expansive as a multi-agency task force whose mission is to reassess all aspects of community 

reactions to offenders and victims. Because the term is used so casually and inclusively, it is 

important to define the meanings adopted for this project. 

A 

For the purposes of this project, coordination has two meanings. First, coordination 

3 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
implies the existence of an active interorganizational structure (that transcends criminal justice 

agencies, but that must include at least some of them) aimed at collaboratively improving the 

local response to domestic violence, usually (but not always) with a strong focus on changing the 

criminal justice response. Coordination, therefore, can be thought of as a collaborative project, 

the shared undertaking of community agents. This project can take many forms, involve many 

sets of actors (and sometimes only a few), and can be aimed at diverse goals. Second, 

coordination, or coordinated responses, may be the desired product of such collaborations; 

coordination of responses is the desired outcome of most such efforts. From a community 

-- 

change perspective, this product is the creation and maintenance of wider, stronger, more densely 

woven community nets of victim assistance, offender accountability, or both. In this sense, 

coordination is an attribute of a community’s social and political life, also variable, and also 

multidimensional. A community with greater coordination is one in which fewer victims remain 

unnoticed, unanswered, and unassisted; more offenders are apprehended, monitored, and 

sanctioned; or both. 

* 

Thought of in this sense, coordination is a characteristic of communities’ social and legal 

systems. Taken to its logical conclusion, greater coordination around the issue of offender 

accountability might be characterized both by stronger formal social controls (criminal justice 

policies and practices) as well as stronger informal controls (perhaps in the form of prevention 

education, outreach, and public awareness). Greater coordination around the issue of victim 

safety might include some of the same features, as well as more resources devoted to services, 

greater engagement of family courts and child protective services in helping adult victims of 

violence, and innovative programs that recognize the complexity of victims’ needs (such as legal 

4 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
assistance programs). The result, in theory, would be community norms that supported, not 

stigmatized, victims. 

Therefore, coordination is both a project, and a product.’ Coordination as a process or 

project directs researchers’ attention toward implementation, and toward interorganizational 

relationships, policies, protocols, and programs, as well as to informal practices, and in particular 

to low-visibility discretionary decisions (such as bail-setting, warrant execution, and the like). 

Coordination as the existenc4 of a community response network directs our attention toward 

aggregate outcome measures, with particular attention to measurements made at the community 

- 

level. It is sensible to assume that more coordinated policies, programs, and practices will yield 

measurably stronger and more tightly woven social and legal networks. However, the causal 

connection between the process of coordination and the outcome of a coordinated response is 

more often presumed than tested; so the primary objective of this project was to begin to map the 

relationships between these variables at the community level. 

This task is more complex than it first appeared. While some communities, most r^ 

famously Duluth, Minnesota, have constructed highly coordinated protocols for criminal justice, 

social service, advocacy, and health workers, and have demonstrated that such protocols can be 

It is important to note that the first definition of coordination is a relatively objective and 

empirically measurable one; the second is frankly normative. It is the opinion of the author, and 

probably of most readers, that given the historical indifference of legal systems and society to 

domestic violence, greater community responsibility for such violence is appropriate and 

desirable, although people will reasonably disagree over the exact forms of responsiveness that 

are most valuable. However, it must be acknowledged that not all would agree with this 

assumption, including a number of practitioners interviewed for this study, some of whom 

believed that domestic violence simply did not merit significant resources or energy compared 

with other crime problems, and others of whom sharply disagreed with view that the most 

common forms of violence (misdemeanors) should be treated as crimes at all. 

5 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
sustained over time, the small number of "success stories" offer little purchase for generalization 

and, maybe more importantly, replication in different types of communities. Meanwhile, with a 

few interesting exceptions, coordination efforts that have failed to improve the processing of 

family violence cases, and those that have simply dissolved, are very seldom recorded in either 

academic literature or professional reports. Hence the proliferation of local initiatives remains 

unexamined. Given the high level of commitment among victim advocates, some criminal 

justice agents, legislators, and funding agencies to the promise of coordination, it is imperative 

that we better understand the process and products of these diverse innovations.2 

It would be simplistic to expect that the results of this study would provide conclusions 

with immediate policy relevance. The criminal justice system has proven remarkably resistant 

to externally imposed reforms (Feeley, 1983), so it is more realistic to expect studies such as this 

to contribute to a long-term investment in community change, an investment that can, perhaps, 

be better informed by empirical knowledge. Therefore, the results of this study are of greatest 

value to two audiences: researchers, who might derive from this study hypotheses and concepts -?. 

that can be further refined and examined in other sites; and equally or more importantly, 

practitioners, who might derive practical lessons about the limitations of coordination efforts as 

well as their potential, and about the conditioning effects of local circumstances on the prospects 

' Of course, attempts to coordinate parts of the criminal justice system are not new; indeed, 

planning groups and coordinating councils have been around for a long time at the local level, 

but most of these efforts aimed at problems defined as primarily or exclusively the bailiwick of 

criminal justice. Efforts to coordinate the diverse approaches of criminal justice, victims' 

services, offender services, social and health services, and sometimes others as well (such as 

women's groups, law school clinics, and churches) are more properly defined as community 

efforts, and entail greater complexity and competition. 

6 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
for actual changes in criminal justice practices. 

Dimensions of Coordinated Community Intervention: 

What We Know About Process and Outcomes 

Intervention in Domestic Violence: Changes in Process, Practice and Policv 

Defining the dimensions of coordination involves identifying activities at the agency, 

interagency, and community levels; identifying both formal policies and informal practices; and 

assessing the character and quality of relationships of key actors and groups within communities. 

At a minimum, coordination simply means a departure in some direction from the fragmentation 

inherent in the criminal justice system, and from the lack of communication that typically 

characterizes case processing in the criminal justice system as well as exchange of information 

among criminal justice and other community agents. However, most recent innovations in 

responses to domestic violence constitute efforts to make criminal justice processes more 

inclusive and less resistant to treating these cases as crimes, and therefore are likely to be 

featured in some communities’ efforts to coordinate responses. 

s. 

Chapter 2 outlines the dimensions of agency and interagency practice and policy across 

which vary communities’ responses to domestic violence; the following paragraphs very briefly 

summarize these dimensions. What we have learned about the prevalence of practices and 

policies can be summarized in a simple but frustrating observation: communities have adopted 

a remarkable array of innovations and policy changes, in a wide variety of combinations, but 

very few of them have been systematically evaluated. Although recent federal efforts have 

7 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
resulted in the availability of several kinds of programmatic funding to encourage communitybased criminal justice innovations, the availability of specially targeted resources is only one 

element of such innovation, and perhaps not the most important one. The discrete policies and 

practices of individual criminal justice agencies vary greatly - this category of elements includes 

the dimensions of police report-writing and arrest policies, prosecutors’ arraignment and 

charging practices, judges’ decisions about pretrial detention, disposition, and post-adjudication 

-_ sanctions. The linkages among these agencies vary as well, as manifested in expectations about 

victims’ roles in the legal process, coordination of case:tracking and information access across 

agencies, use of resources for victim advocacy and assistance, whether or not legal proceedings 

take on an adversarial or consensual tone, and the timeliness with which complaints are 

processed. 

This study focuses primarily on the criminal justice process and its potential contributions 

to safer communities. Most believe that community change is unlikely without the active 

participation of programs that focus on victims, however, and although they were studied in 

much less depth for this project, their attributes are likely to be important variables in 

establishing stronger nets of safety. Such agencies may be dedicated specifically to victims of 

domestic violence, or to women victims, or to a more general population; they may be staffed 

largely by volunteers, or may have professional paid staff, or some combination; they may be 

well-established, or relative newcomers to serving domestic violence victims. 

always provide specific services to victims, but the array of services varies (probably in 

proportion to resources and perceived needs). Some, but not all, provide services to offenders in 

the form of batterer intervention programs. 

-’i 

They almost 

8 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Coordination within the criminal process is important, but it may be equally or even 

more important for criminal justice agencies to develop working relationships with other 

agencies in the community, particularly victim services providers. The nature of these 

relationships varies greatly. They vary in terms of the mechanism through which change efforts 

are undertaken; for instance, some communities have task forces or coordinating councils that 

perform diverse functions and, in principle at least, monitor, guide, and sometimes even create 

the protocols followed by social service and criminal justice agents. In communities lacking 

such formal structures, or where they are slow or even resistant to seek changes, informal 

-- 

networks built on trust and common understandings may operate. 

The impetus behind these task forces or councils varies as well: some are created in 

response to a particularly shocking case or to a civil lawsuit, others begin as an effort to thwart 

the practices or policies of an unsympathetic judge or prosecutor, still others may reflect the 

particularly skillful coalition building of advocates working in a local policy vacuum. 

Sometimes funding opportunities require the existence of a council. Task force participants do 7- 

not always share a definition of the problem of domestic violence, nor a vision of appropriate or 

desired changes. The membership, leadership, degree of decision-making power, and activity 

levels of such groups varies as well; some are dominated by criminal justice professionals while 

others are led by victim advocates. Finally, and importantly, the activities undertaken by such 

groups ranges from direct provision of services to victims, oversight of batterers' intervention 

programs, public education campaigns, legislative advocacy -- and, of course, activities that 

involve challenging tasks such as negotiation across agencies: trouble-shooting, cross-training 

agency workers, and oversight of policy implementation across organizations. 

9 

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of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Evaluation of Intervention Strategies: - What We Know 

The preceding paragraphs summarize the complex dimensions on which community 

responses vary, with emphasis on criminal justice responses. It is not difficult to abstract these 

dimensions, nor to find cities that illustrate specific elements. More challenging, however, is 

figuring out what combinations of attributes are associated with desired outcomes. Most 

criminal justice research has consisted of single-site evaluations designed to assess the impact of 

specific innovations on specific outcomes, and these studies, taken as a whole, argue for caution -- 

in adopting specific programs or policies, patience in expecting tangible results, and greater 

attention (on the part of both practitioners and researchers) to the structure and implementation of 

interagency policies and practices. 

The stated or implied hypothesis in much of the research is that agency-specific changes 

in policy or practice are less likely to favorably affect outcomes than are synthesized efforts, and 

there is some evidence that this may be true. Coordinated intervention efforts are associated with 

increased rates of arrests, convictions, and the numbers of offenders mandated to batterers' .r 

treatment program (Syers and Edleson, 1992; Gelles, 1993), although there is limited reason to 

believe that arrest, con~iction,~ or treatment measurably reduces recidi~ism.~ Some of the most 

A lively theoretical and empirical debate attends these issues. Despite initial enthusiasm 

about experimental findings supporting the hypothesis that arrest is more likely to deter than less 

formal police responses (Sherman and Berk, 1984), replications have cast doubt on this 

conclusion; arrest may reduce recidivism only in the short run (Sherman et al., 1992), while 

arrest followed by very brief custody may actually increase the odds of repeat violence (Sherman 

et al., 1992; Sherman et al., 1991). Another study indicated that arrest without temporary 

detention was actually associated with higher recidivism rates (Hirschel and Hutchinson, 1992). 

Moreover, the deterrent effect of arrest may be contingent upon offender characteristics, 

particularly socioeconomic status (Berk, et al., 1992; Sherman, 1992; Fagan, 1989). Less 

research has been conducted on the impacts of prosecutors' and judges' decisions; one of the very 

10 

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carefully crafted evaluation research claims increases in criminal justice system outputs 

following coordination of efforts by police, prosecutors, and the courts in conjunction with 

victim services agencies in communities such as Lincoln, Nebraska (Steinman, 1991), Seattle 

(Ferguson, 1987; Goolkasian, 1986), Duluth (Pence, 1983), and London, Ontario (Burris and 

Jaffe, 1983). However, it is important to note that these improvements occurred in small to 

medium sized cities with manageable crime problems, where slack resources may have made 

-- case tracking and referral ne$vorks affordable (see Hirschel and Hutchinson, 199 1). 

Although these evaluations are cause for optimism, other studies reveal little if any 

change in outcomes following changes in policy or practice (or uncover only short-term 

few studies of court decisions found that recidivism rates are somewhat lower when prosecution 

is attempted, and lower still among cases in which convictions are obtained, but that these 

effects, like those of arrest, may be conditioned by offenders' characteristics (Fagan, et al., 1984, 

cited in Elliott, 1989; Fagan, 1989). More recent research in a pro-arrest jurisdiction found that 

recidivism was associated less with legal interventions than with victim decisions to withdraw 

(Worden and Wallis, 1995). 

There is a large literature on batterers' intervention programs, which vary both in terms of 

how they define the problem underlying violenci (lack of control, patriarachal value systems, 

low self-esteem) and how they approach changing offenders' behavior (through anger control 

techniques, joint therapy with victims, improved communication, and resocialization toward 

more egalitarian gender roles)(see Gondolf, 1990; Adams, 1987; Edleson and Syers, 199 1 ; 

Treuhart, 1993). Many evaluations of these programs suffer from lack of random assignment, 

lack of control groups, and inadequate measures of success; problematically, these studies 

frequently lack controls for degree of entanglement with the criminal justice system (see Gelles, 

1993; Fagan, 1989). There is little evidence that such programs in general have a significant 

effect on recidivism; while participants often report satisfaction with or educational benefits from 

these programs, recidivism rates remain high (Harrell, 1991 ; Shepard, 1992; Hamberger and 

Hastings, 1990). While some studies indicate that program completion predicts lower recidivism 

(Chen et al, 1989; Edleson and Gruznski, 1989; Shepard, 1992), the profile of the drop-out has 

proven elusive (DeMaris, 1989). It is likely that carefully crafted and customized treatment can 

have some beneficial effects, but specifying the program type, the most likely candidates, and the 

conditions that might be necessary to ensure completion (such as probation) has proven very 

difficult so far. 

11 

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of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
differences; cf. Berk and Newton 1982); some researchers uncover unintended and possibly 

undesirable consequences (eg, Martin, 1997); still others cannot confidently attribute any change 

to the intervention. Furthermore, among criminal justice agents and victims' service providers, 

success is sometimes estimated not in terms of outcomes (which are difficult to measure) but 

rather, in terms of the implementation of coordination efforts themselves; once communication 

channels are open and meetings are underway, people understandably feel a sense of 

accomplishment that is prematurely translated into an assessment of the product rather than the 

process. In short, there are few true evaluations of coordinated community responses to domestic 

- 

violence; in fact, a recent National Academy of Sciences panel found no such research study that 

met its criteria for scientific rigor (Chalk and King, 1998). 

Studies of specific programmatic changes and policies, which may or may not follow 

cooperative reform efforts, have focused largely on recidivism as the dependent ~ariable.~ 

Beyond the on-scene arrest studies, research has found that issuance of arrest warrants in the 

many cases in which offenders are absent have a measurable association with lower recidivism a= 

(Dunford, 1990). Post-arrest "overnight'l detention may reduce the likelihood of revictimization, 

at least in the short run (Sherman, 1992), while very brief contact with detention facilities (two 

hours or less) may exacerbate the risk of recidivism (Sherman, 1991; Sherman et al., 1992). 

Many experts have advocated specific changes in post-arrest criminal proceedings, 

' While recidivism is unquestionably an important concern, it remains difficult to measure 

(see Fagan, 1989; Lerman, 1992). Invariably, victim reports of recidivism are higher than 

official reports, while offender reports are almost always lower. Moreover, recidivism is 

sometimes measured only as repeat assaults, overlooking the frequent instances in which 

offenders commit property or menacing crimes that are of equal or greater concern to victims. 

12 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
changes that would make the system more accessible to victims. For example, Cahn and Lerman 

argue for a simplified complaint procedure that makes prosecutors rather than victims 

responsible for initiating and sustaining cases (Cahn and Lerman, 1991; Mickish and Schoen, 

1988); Goolkasian (1 986) argued that victim advocates, operating in collaboration with, but 

independent of, prosecutors may help overcome victims' lack of understanding about the process. 

Current interest in evidence-based prosecution stems from a desire to reduce the impact of 

.- victims' ambivalence on prosecutors' capacity to pursue and secure convictions, without 

adopting the potentially punitive response to victims represented in some 'ho drop" policies. 

In jurisdictions that route significant numbers of domestic violence cases to the courts, 

interim and final disposition decisions offer potentially important opportunities to influence the 

probability of recidivism. Orders of protection, for example, have been advocated as an 

important albeit underutilized tool when conscientiously imposed and enforced (Finn and 

Colson, 1990), although some research suggests that such orders, particularly temporary orders, 

lull victims into a false sense of security (Zorza, 1992; Grau, Fagan, and Wexler, 1984; and see 

Harrell, et al., 1993; Schollenberg and Gibbons, 1992). As an example of a mechanism that 

P. 

highlights the need for coordination, protection orders appear to be most effective when they are 

very specific, comprehensive, and concerned primarily with victim safety (especially when 

issued from family or other civil courts)(Keilitz, 1994; Finn and Colson, 1991)); it seems likely 

that they will prove most effective in jurisdictions where police have ready access to information 

on their existence, dates, and terms. 

These evaluation efforts suggest something of a menu of practices and policies that are 

often recommended as elements of coordinated community intervention. To them one might add 

13 

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Department of Justice.
the mandated use of standard booking procedures rather than appearance tickets in misdemeanor 

cases, prosecutorial "no drop" policies that reinforce the state's role in prosecuting domestic 

violence by foreclosing victims' withdrawal options,6 sentencing options other than BIP, such as 

intensive probation supervision and incarceration, and innovative efforts to enhance victims' 

safety such as the use of electronic monitoring devices to detect the presence of offenders in 

victims' homes (see Frisch, 1995). It is easy to understand how the number and complexity of 

-- strategies suggests the imperative for coordinating efforts. Still unknown, however, is the degree 

to which the use of such innovations makes a meaningful difference in case outcomes or victim 

experiences, much less community-level measures of accountability and safety. Moreover, while 

the examples mentioned above were primarily concerned with reduction of recidivism, 

coordinated community efforts frequently take on different and more ambitious objectives, and 

hence their effectiveness must be judged, in part, against the scope of their objectives. 

Problem Definition: Understandinrr Diverse Communitv Intervention Strategies 

Part of the difficulty in measuring effects of coordination efforts stem from the lack of PI 

consensus on exactly what communities should seek to achieve in these cases. There are at least 

three perspectives on the problems and solutions that coordination efforts might address -- 

perspectives that carry important implications for the direction of the coordination effort. 

David Ford's (1991) research addresses this topic from the perspective of one interested in 

victims' strategic uses of the criminal justice system; he concludes that family violence victims' 

decisions to proceed or withdraw are based not on stereotypical motivations to reconcile, but 

rather on rational judgements about the long-term costs and benefits of the likely outcomes of 

that process. This research, which unfortunately and surprisingly has not been replicated, casts 

doubt on the merits of "no drop" policies, which restrict victims' choices and may thereby 

discourage knowledgeable victims from accessing the system. 

14 

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Department of Justice.
One perspective identifies the problem as a failure of institutions - specifically, the 

failure of the legal system to appropriately criminalize family violence. This perspective 

attributes victims' limited involvement with the criminal justice system to the system's 

historically indifferent response to partner abuse. Where police seldom arrest suspects, and 

where prosecutors frequently drop charges, a victim quickly comes to understand that her 

victimization is not considered a real crime; if her friends, relatives, or neighbors have found 

criminal justice agents unconcerned or uninterested, a victim may never call the police in the first 

place, or may initiate action only to find that her abuser, like her, quickly learns that the courts do 

not punish family violence. If this perspective is correct, the problem and, to some extent, the 

solution lies within the system. The concrete objectives of coordination, then, should be to 

increase rates of arrest, prosecution, and conviction, as well as sanctioning, building consensus 

.- 

among police, prosecutors, and the courts on the importance of responding to family violence, 

and making these actors accountable for the outcomes of cases. Strong pro-arrest and proprosecution policies, development of effective sentencing programs for the convicted, 

accompanied by training for police, prosecutors, judges, and probation officers, would be 

3- 

pursued through coordination mechanisms designed to iron out differences in practices, 

priorities, and understandings that might stand in the way of a comprehensive law enforcement 

response. 

A somewhat different point of view -- one often expressed by practitioners -- holds that 

the criminal justice process is stymied by the reluctance of victims, who are reasonably fearful, 

uncertain, or dependent on their abusers, to enlist the aid of police and the courts, and to 

persevere once their cases have entered the legal system. If the objective is to minimize attrition 

15 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
(thereby increasing offender accountability), the solution may lie in the creation of a safer, more 

supportive, and more affirmative environment for victims, toward the ends of increasing their 

independence from violent partners and encouraging them to report violent incidents, follow 

through on charges, and maintain legal and safety barriers from abusers. Coordination efforts 

should be victim-centered, emphasizing advocacy, victim autonomy, economic and social 

support, and a responsive, "user friendly" criminal justice system. From this point of view, the 

problem is not so much the inadequate performance of criminal justice agents, but rather, the 

inappropriate or insufficient structure of the legal system itself. 

- 

A third and more complex perspective attributes the difficulties of handling family 

violence cases to a mismatch between the complex needs of victims and offenders, and the 

diverse and sometimes contradictory norms and missions of responding organizations and 

institutions. Encouraged by a shelter counselor to exit her abusive relationship, referred by a 

social worker to couples' counseling, reminded by a family court judge of her husband's right to 

joint custody of her children, urged by a police officer to sign a complaint, warned by a 

prosecutor that even conviction is unlikely to result in an end to violence, cajoled by a defense 

lawyer to "remember the good times," and mindful of the economic hardships of single 

motherhood, a victim may begin to realize that she is viewed as a very different kind of social 

and legal entity by different authorities -- as a battered woman, as a parent, as a wife, as a crime 

victim, as a provider. It is difficult to manage all these roles under the best of circumstances, but 

it may be impossible to manage them, and to be held accountable to them, in the context of an 

abusive relationship. To the extent that the official response -- the response that emerges almost 

unbidden from a community's criminal justice and social services agencies -- makes this more, 

+- 

16 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
rather than less, difficult, it is in need of realignment. Ideally, this realignment would prioritize 

these institutions' claims on victims, would reconcile or at least candidly address the 

contradictions among them, and by achieving cooperative agreements across agencies, would 

streamline access to both tangible and intangible resources. The form such a coordination effort 

might take involves something greater than enhanced victim services or increased involvement 

by criminal justice agencies: it requires that key actors in criminal court, family court, social and 

health agencies, and victim spbices agencies acknowledge the consequences of their inherent 

fragmentation, perhaps compromise their protocols or set aside their priorities in collective 

-- 

pursuit of a more systemic response, and, importantly, reach consensus on a working definition 

of victim needs. Such a coordination effort would require ongoing oversight, trouble-shooting, 

and communication. 

To summarize, these three perspectives on the nature of the domestic violence problem 

imply different prescriptions for effective community intervention. The first sees the primary 

problem as one largely internal to the criminal justice system, and therefore directs attention 

toward reorienting policies and practices within the system, usually in the direction of greater 

,. 

enforcement. The second calls for a model of coordination that emphasizes victim services and 

that yields greater control and resources to advocates who often take primary responsibility for 

attending to victims' needs. The third highlights the fragmentation of criminal justice, as well as 

the many cracks that lie between and across many community agencies that have a hand in 

identifying, helping, and protecting victims. Bridging these cracks requires true coordination, 

not just the announcement of new policies and programs, and can lead to fractious dialogue about 

who should (and shouldn't) be doing what. 

17 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
This third problem definition is consistent with the conceptualization of coordination as 

community nets of victim safety and offender accountability; it is also closest conceptually to the 

vision of many advocates and reformers. However, adopting it as a guide to action is 

problematic. To the extent that there is consensus about the goals of coordination, it is usually 

general rather than specific, and generalizations provide uncertain purchase for progress. 

Coordination, thought of in this way, aims to increase the consistency and intensity of responses 

to both victims and offenders -- objectives that are easier to agree upon in the abstract than in 

specifics. People are likely to disagree over what these changes will mean to individuals - will 

they give victims more time and opportunity to reconsider their involvement in violent 

relationships? Will they provide victims with support necessary to establish violence-free lives? 

Will they deter offenders who would otherwise recidivate, or will they provide a necessary 

system of rehabilitation for at least some offenders? However, most advocates of coordination 

efforts would probably agree that intensifying and broadening the safety and accountability nets 

is the first step toward pursuing and assessing those more specific objectives. 

- 

.e_ 

Goals and Objectives of the Study 

The first objective of this research was to develop a clearer understanding of the range of 

variation, and the dimensions of variation, in community responses to domestic violence, with 

particular attention to dimensions of coordination efforts undertaken by criminal justice and other 

community agents. Building upon this description, the study produced an etiology of key 

dimensions on which communities actually vary, with a particular focus on dimensions that 

appear to bear close relationships to the development of safety and accountability nets. Through 

18 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
comparative case studies of five communities, the project generated qualitative descriptions of 

five sites that vary on these dimensions, as well as hypotheses about the political and social 

conditions that affect the character of community responses. Finally, the project involved 

collection of a sample of case data in each jurisdiction, which were analyzed to permit 

comparisons of the breadth and strength of these nets against the backdrop of the 

characterizations of their community coordination efforts.? 

The site selected for this project was upstate New York. A single state was studied in 

order to ensure that all communities were operating under the same statutory conditions. New 

York is home to several large cities, many medium-sized towns, and large tracts of rural and 

mountainous terrain that are sparsely populated. This project focused on medium-sized cities 

(populations between 25,000 and 150,000), ensuring that all included communities had their own 

police departments and a large enough population base to justify at least minimal resources 

invested in victim services. The urban area of New York City was excluded, inasmuch as the 

size, complexity, and structure of the police and court systems in that area are not typical of the I^ 

rest of the state (and indeed, may not be very typical of most other highly urbanized areas). 

7These were ambitious objectives, in part because so little systematic knowledge of these 

issues exists to be used as a foundation. These objectives were feasible inasmuch as this study 

drew upon the PI'S involvement in a legislatively mandated evaluation of statutory reforms that 

began in 1994, and will be completed by 200 1. The purpose of that research, primarily an 

evaluation of the state's mandatory arrest law, was to assess the impact of new arrest laws (which 

"mandated" arrest in misdemeanor cases under specified circumstances) on recidivism. The first 

step in that project, which is a collaborative effort between the NYS Office for Prevention of 

Domestic Violence, the NY Division of Criminal Justice Service, and the University at Albany, 

was to collect background information on policies and practices existing prior to the new law. 

However, envisioning the potential to learn more about community (rather than just criminal 

justice) responses, the surveys were tailored to anticipate the study proposed here. 

19 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
This selection strategy has both strengths and weaknesses: the communities selected are 

probably much more typical of middle-sized American cities than are those represented in many 

studies, but the unique characteristics of highly urbanized and very rural areas are not captured in 

this research. Furthermore, because most upstate New York communities have quite small 

minority populations, this study does not address interesting and important questions about the 

challenges of responding to domestic violence in multicultural communities.8 

-’ Research Strategy 

The objectives described above involved four phases of work: 

1. Surveying criminal justice agents (police and prosecutors) from across the state, in order 

to gather baseline information on the diversity of local practices, policies, and problems 

ir, responding to domestic violence complaints. These data provided information 

necessary for (1) conducting descriptive analyses of criminal justice practices at the 

community level, (2) preliminary selection of sites that would be candidates for inclusion 

in the study, and (3) facilitating informed telephone (and in some cases, in-person) -+- 

* A brief note on the definition of community is in order. The unit of analysis selected for 

this study is the incorporated city. In New York, as in most states, law enforcement is organized 

at the level of, and accountable to, cities and towns, with the exception of county sheriffs who 

typically respond to citizens in unincorporated rural areas, while prosecution is a county function. 

Coordination of efforts therefore faces the same obstacle of fragmentation that confounds many 

attempts to provide efficient but comprehensive responses to criminal justice problems. This 

fragmentation is further compounded in New York by a complex judicial system that relies on 

city, village, and township courts to handle many misdemeanor complaints, while felonies are 

referred to county courts. By restricting the study to cities, the data collected from each site could 

be confidently attributed to the work of a specific police department, and a specific prosecutor’s 

office - which would not be the case had rural areas (or NYC, served by a mix of law 

enforcement agencies and courts) been included. 

20 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
interviews with criminal justice and victim advocacy agents in those sites to gather more 

detailed information. This work is reported in the first sections of Chapter 2 (see 

Appendix A for survey instruments). 

2. Developing a list of dimensions on which community responses vary, and from among 

these, identifying key dimensions that appear to (1) vary across jurisdictions and (2) 

appear proximate to the goals of establishing strong safety and accountability nets in 

domestic violence cases; based on these key dimensions, selecting five sites for study. 

This work is reported in the second section of Chapter 2. 

3. Interviewing and observing key agents and organizations, including police chiefs and 

administrators, criminal and family court judges, district attorneys, probation office 

directors, specialized domestic violence staff in those organizations, task force or 

coordinating council chairs and key members, domestic violence program directors, and 

leaders in other community-based organizations. The results of this information 

collection effort are reported in Chapter 3, as descriptions of each community’s response a 

to domestic violence. This descriptive and comparative work generated predictions about 

the associations between characteristics of the local criminal justice and community 

response, and performance measures of the criminal justice system that reflect the 

strength of accountability and safety networks. 

4. Developing community-level measures of criminal justice system performance that 

reflect the strength of accountability and safety networks, and collecting and analyzing 

case data from police and court records in each site to illustrate the hypotheses about the 

relationships between community coordination as a set of processes andpractices and 

21 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
community coordination as the existence of a set of safety and accountability nets using 

these data from five sites. These findings are reported in Chapter 4 (see Appendix B for 

sample data collection instruments). 

Summary 

Among practitioners as well as researchers, interest in coordinating criminal justice and 

- other community agents has developed at a much more rapid pace than has research on the 

process and outcomes of coordination efforts. This study is an attempt to begin to backfill our 

empirical understanding of community responses to domestic violence in a climate of heightened 

expectations about what criminal justice agencies can and ought to do. It proceeds on two 

premises: first, that while all communities have responses to domestic violence, those responses 

vary across several dimensions; second, a reasonable objective of any community response to 

domestic violence is the creation of stronger and broader nets of offender accountability and 

victim safety (and while such nets are the products of many forces in a community, the criminal 

justice system plays a key facilitating role in their creation). Previous research offers tantalizing 

*e 

but incomplete information about "what works" in reducing domestic violence, but often is 

focused on specific programmatic elements and on individual-level outcome measures (such as 

recidivism) that are not as inclusive as the objectives envisioned by most advocates of 

coordinated responses. 

This project documents the multidimensional nature of community responses to domestic 

violence, and based on qualitative information collection in five upstate New York cities, 

develops and illustrates hypotheses about the relationships among key dimensions of coordinated 

22 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
responses and performance of the criminal justice system in maintaining accountability and 

safety nets. The project is primarily descriptive and hypothesis-generating; many of the concepts 

that were explored for this research are already quite familiar in policy debates and local 

practitioner discussions, but have very seldom been subjected to comparative analysis. The 

primary contributions of this project, therefore, are to a more systematic understanding of how 

communities respond to domestic violence, and to future research aimed at more sophisticated 

-_ analysis of the role of comminity agents in creating change. 

23 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Chapter 2: 

Introduction: 

The Dimensionality of Local Criminal Justice Practices and Policies’ 

Coordination is often conceptualized as an aggregation of progressive practices and 

policies that protect victim safety and hold offenders accountable; and the implementation and 

efficacy of such practices is thought by many to be contingent upon the quality of the 

interactions, communication, and collaboration of actors in different agencies. Reformers and 

advocates often speak simultaneously of both the building blocks of a coordinated response - 

- .- 

model policies and practices - and the mortar that keeps them together - task forces, 

coordinating councils, or more formalized intervention projects. From the point of view of many 

people, successful communities are those that have both adopted a wide range of recommended 

policies and practices, and that have initiated a group process for implementing and overseeing 

these changes. 

However, we have limited knowledge about how local criminal justice systems stack up 

to these high expectations. Domestic violence has been on the public agenda for over a decade, 

and has been the subject of research, litigation, and policy leadership for even longer, so it is 

reasonable to take a look at the “state of nature” in typical communities, to better understand the 

dimensions of, and prospects for, the sorts of community responses that many advocate. Drawing 

9 The analyses reported in this chapter were originally reported in a conference paper 

(“Coordination of Domestic Violence Interventions: An Exploratory Study of Local Criminal 

Justice Practices and Policies”) presented at the 1996 American Society of Criminology meeting, 

authored by Alissa Pollitz Worden and Jennifer A. Wallis. That paper also provided the analyses 

reported in the Report to the Legislature on the Evaluation of the 1994 Family Protection and 

Domestic Violence Intervention Act, 1997. 

24 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
upon survey data from New York state prosecutors and law enforcement officials, this chapter 

reports on the variation and dimensionality of criminal justice policies and practices in 

responding to domestic incidents, and examines the relationship between criminal justice 

agencies’ participation in domestic violence task force, and adoption of progressive policies for 

dealing with those case. The descriptive data reported here include two important findings: first, 

the adoption of progressive and inclusive policies by police departments and prosecutors is 

.- multidimensional, not unidimensional. These results suggest that criminal justice agents sample 

from an array of innovations, but the adoption of a particular practice does not signal the 

adoption of others. Second, participation in domestic violence task forces is neither ubiquitous, 

nor is it associated with adoption of progressive policies and practices in domestic violence 

cases. 

Departing from this exploratory analysis, and drawing upon interviews conducted during 

the preliminary phase of this project, the second part of this chapter expands this description of 

the variation in community responses to domestic violence. The result is a set of system and 

community characteristics that emerged as vhiables in discussions with officials and advocates 

-5 

across communities. In the following chapter, key dimensions are extracted to form the basis for 

selecting the five sites that became the focus of systematic data collection. 

Intervention Strategies at the Community Level: 

Criminal Justice Policies and Practices 

The descriptive information reported here is derived from surveys of law enforcement 

agencies and district attorneys in all jurisdictions of New York State, commencing at the 

25 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
beginning of the study. These survey results are supplemented by the author's and project staffs 

interviews with police officials, prosecutors, judges, and ,victim services providers in nine 

communities during 1996-97 (five communities that ultimately were selected as study sites, and 

four others). The purpose of these surveys was to gather comprehensive information on local 

practices and policies in responding to domestic incidents, with the objective of assessing the 

prevalence of -- and ultimately, the conditions that might contribute to -- coordinated community 

responses. These surveys were designed to serve two purposes: to provide information about -- 

dimensions of practice and policy that could be used to inform an understanding of community 

coordination; and to provide baseline information on the diversity of practices, especially arrest 

practices, across jurisdictions as legislative reforms were enacted around mandatory arrest 

provisions. 

All police departments (n=525 j and District Attorney offices (n=62) in New York State 

were surveyed in late 1995 and 1996. Response rates on the surveys were strong. Of the 525 law 

enforcement agencies surveyed, 5 1 YO (268 j returned useable responses. Not surprisingly, 

response rates were stronger from communities with more substantial populations." Of the 62 

r'- 

county district attorneys surveyed, 68% responded. Again, more rural areas produced fewer 

responses. 

Law Enforcement Practices and Policies 

lo Because law enforcement has not been regionalized in New York state to any appreciable 

degree, these police departments and sheriffs departments include villages, townships, and cities 

and counties. Half of departments surveyed served populations of under 5000; the response rate 

for these departments (many of which employ only part-time officers) was 40%. The reponse 

rate from communities with at least 30,000 residents was 64%. 

26 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
The first issue to be addressed is the character of law enforcement policies and practices 

in domestic cases. A great deal of attention has been paid to arrest, as communities and states 

have adoptedpro-arrest and mandatory arrest policies in response to civil litigation concerns and 

victim advocacy. The New York state legislature passed into law a limited mandatory arrest 

provision in summer of 1994 (which went into effect in January 1996). This'law mandated that 

police arrest suspects in a specified range of misdmeanor "family offenses" -- a designation that 

-- legally refers to specific acts between .parties who are blood relatives, relatives by marriage or 

divorce, or couples with children in common -- when the officer had reason to believe the 

misdemeanor had taken place. Officially, the only justification for not making an arrest under 

these circumstances was the (unsolicited) request of the victim that no arrest be made, and such a 

request was not to be considered by police as determinative. 

Law enforcement agencies were surveyed after passage, but prior to implementation, of 

this law. Without doubt the legislation inspired changes in local policies even prior to 

implementation, although only a handful of departments that had changed their policies during 

the year preceding the survey reported current policies that mirrored exactly the state statute. 

_I 

Hence the survey probably yields a fairly accurate picture of the array of policies in place before 

the statute (and perhaps of practices still current after its implementation). 

Most police departments (77%) reported having written policies governing handling of 

domestic cases. Regardless of whether the respondent claimed a written policy or not, most 

responded to questions that asked about two dimensions of arrest policy or practice: (1) the 

degree of discretion officers exercised in making arrests in domestic cases; and (2) the scope or 

range of interpersonal relationships that were deemed "domestic77 for the purposes of applying 

27 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
any policy, program, or practice in place. Table 2.1 reports the responses for the 207 

departments that provided full answers to these questions. 

About one in three departments reported that they had either no policy, or a policy that 

left arrest up to officer discretion, victims' decisions to sign complaints, or a small miscellany of 

circumstances that would guide arrest. An additional 35% of departments indicated that their 

policy was to mandate arrest unless the victim requested otherwise -- a close approximation of 

the state's new statutory requirements, At the other extreme, 33% reported policies that mandate 

arrest in misdemeanor domestic cases regardless of victim preference. In the face of legislative 

action that had already dictated mandatory arrest in at least some circumstances, it is interesting 

to observe that a significant percentage of police departments still held to practices that made 

arrest discretionary. 

Arrest policies vary not only in whether or not they direct officers to make arrests, but 

also in the range of circumstances to which such directives apply. Respondents were asked to 

identify the range of relationships that their policies considered as domestic for purposes of 

implementing their arrest policy. While all departments included the state's "family offense" 

2- 

(parties related by blood, marriage, or children in common) categories, 20% of departments (42) 

limited the application of their policies to those relationships. An additional 19% (40) included 

cohabiting couples; an additional 18% (38) included both cohabiting couples and same-sex 

relationships; and a plurality of all departments (42%, or 87) included all these relationships as 

well as dating partners in the scope of their domestic intervention policy. Importantly, at the time 

of the study the legislature had prescribed mandatory arrest only for family offense cases, 

remaining silent (and presumably, willing to accept local discretion) on incidents involving 

28 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
parties in other sorts of relationships, even though many argue that formal legal relationships 

such as marriage by no means encompass all or even most of domestic violence, and law 

enforcement officers themselves frequently allude to the difficulty of discerning the nature of 

relationships among parties in incidents. 

It is important to note that these two dimensions of arrest policy -- degree of officer 

discretion and inclusiveness of relationships among parties -- do not appear to be empirically 

.- related. Over half the departpents that have taken the strongest stand on mandatory arrest tend 

to apply that stand to the broadest array of relationships; however, departments adopting a 

conditional mandatory arrest policy (allowing victims some control over the decision in the form 

of a veto) are more conservative in their scope, while those departments that leave affirmative 

arrest decisions up to officers or victims define domestic cases broadly. In other words, these 

two very important dimensions of arrest policies - range of relationships covered and degree of 

discretion in arrest - do not appear to be empirically related. 

The survey collected information on several additional dimensions of police policy in 

domestic cases, including two aspects of arrest policies: prescribed practice when offenders had 

left the scene, and post-arrest release policy (see Table 2.2). As many as half of all offenders are 

absent when police arrive at a domestic call, but importantly, at the time of this research neither 

state law nor most departmental policies dictate what officers should do under these 

circumstances. Surveys indicate that 78% of policies directed officers to pursue the suspect offscene, a figure that probably overrepresents actual practice. The remainder dictate that 

responding officers should inform victims about warrant procedures, take reports, and the like, 

but do not create a responsibility to follow the suspect. 

29 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Policies vary as well regarding what to do with offenders once arrested. Two out of three 

departments state that they routinely detain suspects overnight (or until the next opportunity for a 

judicial hearing within twenty-four hours); the remainder offer desk bail or, in a few 

jurisdictions, make a practice of issuing appearance tickets in misdemeanor domestic complaints. 

These matters are particularly important from the perspective of those concerned about victim 

safety. Victims whose offenders flee the scene face the risk they will return once police leave; 

- those whose offenders are set free face the same (or perhaps a greater) risk. 

Departments varied as well on other practices listed in Table 2.2: the overwhelming 

majority of departments (90%) claim to require officers to write reports in all domestic incidents 

(consistent with legislative requirements), and most of those provide for supervisory review of 

reports. Only one in four, however, routinely refer domestic cases to detectives for follow-up 

investigations. 

Beyond arrest policies, police departments vary in their reported practices in dealing with 

victims (see Table 2.3). Most departments report that routine practice is to provide information 

on warrants and social services, and to transport victims to safety if appropriate; these forms of 

& 

assistance require few if any resources or commitments beyond the immediate scene. However, 

regarding practices that are more labor-intensive, far fewer provide for systematic follow-up in 

the form of assignments of cases to specialized units or assignment of a victim advocate; very 

few have a formally designated liaison with victim services agencies. Importantly, only one in 

four police departments participates in a local task force or domestic violence coalition. 

These data permit exploration of two interesting questions. First, are departments that 

participate in community task forces or coalitions more likely to have progressive domestic 

30 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
violence policies? Second, more generally, beyond arrest practices, are other dimensions of 

intervention practices associated with each other, or are they independent? The first question 

produces only an inconclusive answer. Approximately one in four agencies participates on a task 

force, and agencies that do are somewhat more likely to define the scope of family relationships 

more broadly and to provide for assignment of victim advocates. However, participation on task 

forces is unrelated to strength of arrest policies (mandatory versus discretionary), pursuit and 

detention practices, and assignment to a follow-up unit; participation is also unrelated to the 

comprehensiveness of training (measured as the inclusiveness of training requirements by rank, 

- -. 

ranging from rookies to managerial personnel). 

The second question is addressed in Table 2.4, which reports factor analysis results for 

eleven items measuring a range of practices, policies, and services. The analysis produced five 

factors with eigenvalues greater than 1 .O, preliminary evidence that progressiveness in domestic 

violence intervention is not unidimensional in police departments. The first and strongest factor 

appears to capture responsiveness to victims -- loading high on this factor are variables indicating 

broader definitions of domestic relationships, assignment of victim advocates, establishment of 

>. 

liaisons with victim services organizations, and provision of information about warrant-seeking 

in offender-absent cases. The second factor captures pursuit and detention practices. The third 

factor is driven by two variables -- one that indicates the provision of follow-up contacts with 

victims and a second that indicates the comprehensiveness of training. A fourth factor is driven 

by variables associated with arrest policies: mandatory arrest policies and inclusion of 

31 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
provisions regarding dual arrests (and/or cross-complaints)." Finally, a weak fifth factor is 

driven by the task force participation variable. This descriptive analysis seems to support the 

view that there is little patterning in the adoption of police practices. No single dimension of 

progressive policy adoption emerged from this analysis; departments that reach out to victims do 

not necessarily aggressively pursue offenders; departments that devote special resources to 

domestic violence in the form of training and specialized units may or may not have addressed 

.- dual arrest problems; participating in -a task force is not strongly associated with any of these 

dimensions. 

The results of these preliminary analyses can be summarized as follows: although most 

law enforcement agencies have adopted written policies for handling domestics, and a slight 

majority of departments prescribe strongly presumptive arrest practices, there is considerable 

variation still in the ranges of relationships covered by such policies, with a significant number of 

departments still limiting coverage to marital and blood relationships. Further, the zeal with 

which arrest is prescribed is unrelated to the degree of effort prescribed in apprehending suspects 

off-scene and ensuring their detention following arrest. In other words, perhaps the most 

-*i B 

important empirical observation to be derived from these data is that with the exception of a 

Of responding departments, 37% report that their policies address the issue of dual arrest -- 

whether or not both parties should be arrested in cases involving cross-complaints, or whether 

police should attempt to identify a primary physical aggressor or initiator. In New York, the 

mandatory arrest legislation did not explicitly address this issue, which has produced concern in 

some quarters that officers would interpret the mandate to require arrest of both parties if both 

alleged misdemeanors, a practice that would of course be at odds with the intent of the legislation 

in protecting victims. However, addressing the issue is not the same as expressly discouraging 

dual arrests; and of the 148 departments that returned copies of their policies (which were 

subsequently content-coded), only 15 included language that explicitly discouraged this 

outcome. 

32 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
modest relationship between pursuit and detention practices, these four dimensions of arrest 

policy seem to be independent. Given that contemporary police department policies and 

practices emerged from common historical prescriptions for mediation and informal intervention, 

one might have expected that departures -- in the forms of broader definitions of families, more 

liberal use of arrest power, and more aggressive treatment of offenders -- would occur together, 

so that departments could be arrayed along a single dimension of progressiveness or reform. 

While a very small handful of departments have in fact adopted strong practices on all these 

elements, there is little evidence to suggest that a department that adopts one reform is likely to 

- 

adopt others. 

Aside from arrest practices, departments vary as well in their ability or willingness to link 

victims to wpport networks; while most provide referrals and information, rather few provide 

follow-up contacts or direct connections with victim advocates. Finally, but importantly, there is 

little empirical evidence that these dimensions of proactivity are related to each other, or to 

structured efforts to coordinate responses within communities through participation in task forces 

and coalitions.’2 

‘j 

Prosecutorial Policies and Practices 

Prosecutorial behavior in domestic cases has been subjected to far less scrutiny than has 

law enforcement behavior, in part because the spotlight of policy reform has been trained on 

A possible explanation for the independence of these dimensions might be size of 

department: small departments may have a harder time achieving the resources, or the economies 

of scale, necessary to implement some reforms (such as specialized units, or assignments of 

liaisons). However, the survey data suggest that none of the key dimensions of arrest policy - 

scope, degree of discretion, off-scene pursuit, or post-arrest detention - were related to 

community size. 

33 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
police arrest decisions since the publication of the Minneapolis arrest experiment and its 

replications, in part because police behavior is in some ways more readily observed and assessed 

then prosecutorial decision making, and in part, no doubt, because early studies suggested that 

prosecutors rarely take any action on domestic cases. It is also the case that prosecutorial 

discretion, generally less subject to scrutiny than police discretion, is typically exercised in the 

absence of formal written policies and procedures. The survey of prosecutors inquired not only 

-_ about formal policies but also about unwritten practices and guidelines. 

Not surprisingly, only a small proportion of prosecutors' offices have written policies 

governing the handling of domestic cases (1 8% of responding offices). However, 62% of 

respondents indicated that they had office policies or guidelines, albeit not necessarily written 

ones, that governed domestic cases. As was the case with law enforcement agencies, the scope 

of these policies varied; while almost all prosecutors reported that cases involving married or 

divorced partners, and those involving partners with children in common, would be considered as 

domestic, only four out of five treated cohabiting partners similarly, and only half included 

dating couples within the scope of their domestic policies. 

3- 

Prosecutors were asked as well about routine practices in responding to domestic incident 

victims and suspects. The first column in Table 2.5 reports the percentage of prosecutors' offices 

that routinely engage in a variety of practices. These matters can be broadly classified as 

responses to victims, treatment of suspects, expectations about victim participation, 

specialization in domestic matters, and record-keeping. Most (but not all) prosecutors' offices 

refer victims to shelters and social services as a routine matter; however, only 14% have ready 

34 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
access to specially trained victim ad~0cates.l~ 

Suspects in domestic cases reportedly encounter tough treatment in many prosecutors‘ 

offices. Only 5% of respondents indicated that they routinely recommended pretrial release in 

misdemeanor cases; 83% reported routinely recommending jail terms for recidivists. One in 

three routinely refers cases to batterers’ intervention programs as a pretrial diversion, as much a 

reflection of the availability of such programs as of prosecutors‘ interest in utilizing them. About 

- half of prosecutors recornme& probation following adjudication. 

A topic that recurs in discussions about prosecutorial practices is the role that the victim 

is expected, allowed, or required to play. While conventional wisdom holds that cases are more 

easily prosecuted with an active complaining witness, victims of domestic cases confront barriers 

of fear and sometimes emotional entanglement with their offenders; therefore, policies that allow 

for, but do not require, victim participation in prosecution may better serve victim needs. While 

it is now uncommon for prosecutors to make a policy of requiring victims’ appearance at 

arraignment, it is also true that very few prosecutors rely on victim depositions in lieu of 

testimony. It is important to observe in these responses the persistence of practices that focus on 

*- 

victim’s action and inaction as the impetus for legal decisions: almost half require that victims 

sign a complaint in order to file charges, and almost two thirds require victims to sign affidavits 

to confirm their interest in having charges withdrawn. 

Two final dimensions of prosecutorial commitment to domestic cases are the use of 

specialized units or bureaus for handling these cases (sometimes grouped together with sexual 

Overall, 43% of prosecutors were unaware of any victim advocacy services in their county, 

either for domestic violence victims specifically or all types of crime victims. 

35 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
assault cases) and the management of information generated from police reports and 

investigations. One in three prosecutors reports having a specialized unit for handling domestic 

cases; not surprisingly, this is most common in larger jurisdictions. Even less common, however, 

are institutionalized efforts to track domestic cases for purposes of this sort of specialized 

prosecution (29%), to inform charging in cases involving recidivists (36%), or to inform 

sentencing recommendations (3 1%). 

Importantly, only one in four offices routinely receives copies of police reports on 

domestic incidents, and only slightly more than half of offices receive police reports when arrests 

are made in such cases. In a category of crime that entails high levels of recidivism and often 

escalating danger to victims, maintenance of records is a potentially valuable way of identifying 

high-risk offenders at an early stage in prosecution, at the point at which pretrial release decisions 

are made or later, when decisions about diversion or charge reduction take place. However, it is 

clear that prosecutors' management of information about misdemeanor cases varies broadly, and 

it is reasonable to predict that the way this sort of information is accessed and used has important 

implications for the outcomes of complaints. 

*- 

Two examples illustrate this point. An assistant district attorney in a populous 

jurisdiction, addressing the issue of reluctant victims, noted that it was common practice to 

summon alleged offenders into the office even in the absence of victim complaints, to make a 

strong statement about the seriousness of prosecution, and to open a case file (or, in some cases, 

add to one) even without an arrest or signed complaint. These files were routinely consulted 

when new complaints and arrests were made, and formed the basis for prosecutors' charging 

decisions as well as recommendations regarding bail and sentencing. In a quite different 

36 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
jurisdiction, the deputy district attorney, while expressing strong concern about domestic 

violence victims, nonetheless observed that all records for misdemeanor cases were located in an 

inconvenient area of the courthouse, and were seldom if ever accessed by prosecutors as they 

began new cases. 

Table 2.5 also provides descriptive information about prosecution practices across diverse 

jurisdictions. l4 One might expect that prosecutors in more urbanized jurisdictions are more likely 

to adopt innovative strategies, in partbecause of economies of scale (for example, a staff and 

caseload large enough to justify specialization), in part because of the availability of supportive 

resources in the community (such as shelters and victim services), and in part because more 

diverse urban environments are more likely to foster coordination with other change agents. 

Rural jurisdictions, on the other hand, are often characterized as traditional, lacking not only the 

resources and opportunities to adopt intervention strategies but also the interest in investing in 

what may still be deemed by many residents as mere family problems. These data offers some 

support for these predictions: prosecutors whose counties include at least one sizeable 

community are somewhat more likely to take an active role in responding to victims’ needs, 

aperhaps because those needs can be more readily met with community resources. However, they 

do not differ from others in their responses to offenders, and there are only modest differences 

among these three groups of counties in terms of expectations for victim involvement in 

prosecution and willingness to go forward without victim participation. Not surprisingly, more 

urban jurisdictions are more likely to have specialized bureaus and to make efforts to track 

l4 Rural counties were those with no communities of greater than 20,000 population; medium 

counties were those whose largest community had a population between 20,000 and 50,000; and 

urban counties were those with at least one community with a population in excess of 50,000. 

37 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
information. Finally, more urbanized county prosecutors are twice as likely to participate on task 

forces than are rural district attorneys. 

Table 2.6 reports the percentages of offices that engage in these practices, separated by 

the variable of task force participation. With only two exceptions (and uncommon ones, 

requiring victims to appear at arraignment and utilization of victim depositions in lieu of 

appearances) members of task forces engage in somewhat more progressive practices. Further, 

-- these patterns hold across types of activities that do and do not require resources; in general, task 

force participants not only are more likely to make referrals and track cases, but also are more 

likely to engage in a presumption of prosecution regardless of victim participation. 

Finally, Table 2.7 reports the results of factor analysis of prosecutorial practices. The 

results (which must be interpreted cautiously given the small n) suggest that proactivity is not 

unidimensional. The analysis produced one strong and five weak factors; the strong first factor is 

strongly driven by variables indicating attentiveness to victim needs and safety. 

The picture that emerges from this preliminary analysis of prosecutorial practices is _*. 

similar in some ways to that which emerged from examination of police department practices. 

First, there are multiple dimensions to policies and procedures; for prosecutors, these dimensions 

include responsiveness to victims, treatment of suspects, expec,tations for victim participation in 

prosecution, specialization, and information utilization. Predictably, prosecutors vary 

considerably in their adoption of practices and procedures across these areas; somewhat more 

surprisingly, however, adoption of more progressive practices does not covary among these 

areas. While rural counties are less likely to engage in more progressive policies than are more 

urbanized jurisdictions, they are also less likely to participate in task forces aimed at prompting 

38 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
more progressive practices. 

Summary and Discussion 

This chapter examines the dimensionality of police and prosecutorial policy, as a first 

step in mapping the diversity of practices and protocols that characterize communities and their 

efforts to respond to domestic violence. Although the survey data are limited insofar as they 

constitute self-reports of practices, under state political conditions that highlighted the salience of 

- domestic violence, they nonetheless constitute a rare statewide picture of local criminal justice 

policies. The significance of these analyses can be summarized in a few key points. 

First, despite strong policy interest in arrest, and numerous reforms at the state and local 

level that move in the direction of less discretionary arrest policy, the mandatory or discretionary 

nature of the arrest decision is only one, and arguably not the most important, dimension of law 

enforcement practice in domestic cases. Interviews support the implications of the survey data, 

that definitions of the scope of "domestic" matters, directives about how to handle offenderabsent incidents, and post-arrest decisions have the potential to greatly expand or contract police 

responsibility for these cases, and policies and practices reflect very different levels of 

investment across these dimensions. A parallel exists in prosecutorial policies that define in 

different terms the nature of domestic cases, as well as the expectations for victims' involvement 

and directives about how to handle cases with victims who prefer not to actively participate in 

the legal process. 

Second, these dimensions appear to be empirically independent; strong arrest policies are 

not predictably accompanied by attentiveness to victim needs, and aggressive prosecution 

policies in individual cases is seemingly unrelated to systematic efforts to track recidivism for 

39 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
future prosecution purposes. Third, and importantly, the connections between official 

participation in local task forces and coalitions -- the most common model of coordination or at 

least the most visible and formalized one -- are tenuous at best among law enforcement agents, 

and these relationships are confounded by population size at the county level for prosecutors. In 

sum, what we can learn from these community-level data indicates that while elements of 

progressive policies are not uncommon, the sorts of comprehensive policy packages that are 

-- often recommended by advocates are not in place in most communities. 

Informal interviews with officials across the state tended to confirm these findings: police 

and court officials frequently expressed commitment to one or two specific strategies, without 

expressing awareness or interest of companion strategies. For example, a deputy chief who was 

convinced of the wisdom of pursuing offenders who had fled the scene was reluctant to invest 

resources in post-arrest investigation or follow-up; seemingly he compartmentalized his 

responsibility for the case to the apprehension and arrest stage. On the other hand, officials were 

more likely to identify the problems that result from slippages across (rather than within) 

agencies, and often expressed the belief that fragmentation, lack of communication, and 

s. 

dissensus about appropriate and effective responses to domestic incidents across agencies 

accounts for many of the problems associated with processing these cases. Most commonly, law 

enforcement officials complained that prosecutors were unenthusiastic about carrying forward 

cases, especially without an actively invoived victim, while prosecutors, for their part, pointed to 

the lax adjudication and sentencing practices of both rural justice and city judges, practices that 

made them reluctant to press such cases ahead. Some prosecutors claimed as well that law 

enforcement practices were remiss in collection of evidence and documentation, necessary to 

40 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
sustain charges in court. When asked about the efficacy of systematic attempts to bring these 

officials to agreement on practices and desired outcomes, interviewees expressed a range of 

views, from ignorance about task forces and coalitions operating in their own backyards to 

sophisticated understandings of the workings as well as the history of coordination efforts in their 

communities. 

Cataloguing System and Community Variables 

The next phase of thdproject involved building upon the survey results regarding police 

and prosecutorial practices, to develop a more comprehensive catalog of dimensions on which 

criminal justice and community responses to domestic violence vary. These dimensions were 

derived inductively, from open-ended survey responses and from interviews with community 

agents in the ten sites that were potential candidates for more intensive study. Some, and perhaps 

most, of them could have been catalogued by any practitioner or researcher knowledgeable about 

this topic, but they are discussed here in some detail for the following reasons. 

First, practitioners sometimes perceive as a constant that which is really a variable; they 

assume that the ways things are done in their town are the way they are done everywhere. This 

.Iparochialism often goes unnoticed by researchers, especially when they are studying single sites. 

Practitioners at the local level may justify or explain local customs in terms of local history: they 

do what they do because it has always been done that way, and presumably, someone had a good 

reason for establishing that practice in the past. Information about alternative practices in other 

communities is seldom discussed. 

Second, although many policy discussions center on key points in the legal process, such 

as arrest, conviction, and sentencing, interviews revealed that low-visibility, interstitial practices, 

41 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
such as post-arrest bail-setting and the conventions adopted for filing warrants, varied at least as 

much. Interviews also suggested that, at the practitioner level, the work of coordination 

sometimes revolves more around these practices, which may significantly affect the way agencies 

exchange information, gather evidence, and respond to victims. 

Third, although practitioners are keenly aware of the intangible obsiacles to cooperation, 

researchers are seldom in a position to observe them as variables; for example, the character of 

__ relationships among agencies is probably critical to the collaborative products of those agencies, 

but there are few opportunities to document variation in those interorganizational relationships. 

This is true both among agencies in local criminal justice systems, and across agencies in 

different domains within communities. Single-site studies have occasionally identified specific 

experiences or individuals as explanations for the failure of initiatives (eg, Berk et al, 1982) but 

seldom get the opportunity to test the more general hypotheses that emerge from these 

observations. 

Fourth, what practitioners describe to outsiders as “standard practice” or policy may in 

_I 

fact be routine only in a limited subset of cases: felonies, cases involving frequent recidivists, or 

cases involving particularly determined victims, for example. Cases that do not fit local actors’ 

profile of “meritorious” or deserving victims, or particularly dangerous offenders, fall off their 

radar screen. 

Finally, these variables are discussed in the context of their likely relationship to the 

outcome of safety and accountability nets. These relationships appear obvious in many instances, 

but are more subtle or uncertain in others. 

Interviews were conducted over a period ranging from late 1994 (as the proposal for this 

42 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
study was being conceived) through 1998, when the last data were being coded from criminal 

court files for finally-disposed cases. Interviews were typically unstructured or semi-structured, 

were conducted with police chiefs, deputy chiefs, and supervisors (eg, special unit supervisors, 

sergeants); City Court judges (who, in all communities, presided over arraignments and virtually 

all dispositions of domestic cases); Family Court judges (who have shared jurisdiction in 

statutorily defined “family offense” cases if the victim prefers); prosecutors, including 

specialized d.v. prosecutors in one site; court clerks; and victim services staff. l5 In addition, this 

project benefited greatly from ongoing conversations with researchers and staff at the NYS 

Office for Prevention of Domestic Violence and the state’s Division of Criminal Justice Services, 

who were simultaneously involved in the evaluation of the mandatory arrest provision of the 

1994 reforms, and in regular communication with local officials from across the state. 

.- 

Table 2.8 outlines attributes of criminal justice and other community agencies and agency 

relationships, as a guide for discussion of the variation across communities. 

& 

Criminal Justice Apencies’ Policies and Practices 

As discussed in the preceding paragraphs, police department policies vary across several 

key dimensions: the inclusiveness with which they define “domestic” cases for the purposes of 

applying arrest policies, the mandatory or discretionary nature of those policies, and expectations 

’’ Interviews were conducted by the P.I. and graduate students in the School of Criminal 

Justice, primarily Jennifer Wallis and Sarah McLean. Most interviews were conducted in 

person, although some were completed over the telephone. Interviews were not audiotaped, and 

all respondents were promised confidentiality. Cooperation with requests for interviews was 

excellent, perhaps because they were conducted informally and opportunistically, often when the 

researchers happened to be in the courthouse for data-coding purposes. 

43 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
about what actions should be taken when offenders flee the scene before police arrive. 

Departments vary as well in their rules about writing incident reports for domestic in some 

departments officers are instructed to complete reports on all incidents, but in others reports are 

written only when officers feel an offense has been committed, or when an arrest is indicated. 

These practices have obvious and important implications for both victim safety and 

offender accountability: when incidents are neither recorded nor investigated fully -- perhaps 

because they fall outside narrow definitions of “family” or do not provide compelling physical 

evidence of violence -- victims may lose faith in the legal, and offenders are likely to conclude 

.- 

that in the eyes of the law, their behavior was not a crime. In addition, when officers do not 

document incidents, or document them incompletely, no legal trace is left of the call or the 

incident for future reference by authorities. In one jurisdiction studied, a judge insisted that he 

very rarely saw repeat offenders, and that almost all domestic cases involved first offenders; it 

turned out that from the perspective of the bench that was correct, since police in that community 

only arrested offenders who had committed violent acts that resulted in injuries and medical 

treatment, leaving lesser offenses undocumented and unprocessed. 

.% 

The content of arrest policies themselves varies as well. Departments vary in whether, 

and how, they dealt with cross-complaints, and whether they have attempted to craft policies that 

directed officers to identify “primary aggressors” in these situations. In some jurisdictions, 

police authorities expressed the opinion that so many cases involved “mutual combat” that 

officers could not fairly be expected to determine who was most culpable; other departments 

strongly discouraged officers from ever arresting two parties in a domestic case. Practices about 

post-arrest treatment of suspects varies too: some departments utilize appearance tickets rather 

44 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
than custodial arrest for domestic offenses. Among departments that transport suspects to the 

station for booking, there is great variation in booking procedures and post-arrest release 

practices. Some departments fingerprint when booking misdemeanor arrestees, but some delay 

fingerprinting until conviction -- by which time charges may have been reduced to non-printable 

violations. 

When offenders are not present at the scene when police arrive, most departments do not 

.- believe that the “mandatory arrest” law is applicable, but nonetheless they adopt different 

policies: some require immediate follow-up, others activate warrants or summonses (depending 

on what the local courts deem appropriate); while still others leave the decision to activate the 

legal system in the hands of victims, who must choose whether or not to “go downtown” to file a 

complaint in the morning. Again, choices among these seemingly minor practices may have 

significant implications for victims’ immediate safety and their estimates of the likely 

helpfulness of the legal system; likewise, offenders may estimate the repercussions of their own 

behavior based on these immediate responses. 

+- 

The initiation of prosecution in arrest cases varies across communities: booking and 

arraignment may be conducted informally --- sometimes, in rural areas, in a magistrate’s living 

room; or alternatively, this phase of the case may involve fingerprinting, temporary detention, 

and a formal court appearance attended by prosecutor and public defender. Prosecutors may 

draw directly upon police reports for charges, or may modify charges downwards in anticipation 

of plea agreements or resistant judges. Court practices vary as well: when interviewed, most 

judges identified routine or standard practices regarding warrants, bail-setting, issuing orders of 

protection, conviction, disposition, and sentencing; and these practices differed across courts. 

45 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Routine practices were frequently justified by judges’ opinions about the dynamics of domestic 

violence, and characterizations of typical parties; in other words, it appears that judges’ practices 

conform to their own attitudes and beliefs. 

While officials in most communities rely on arrest warrants when suspects are not 

arrested, in a few places the courts do not issue warrants in misdemeanors, but instead rely on 

summonses. The distinction, while seemingly technical, is potentially significant. A warrant is 

served directly on the suspect and typically results in custody once he is apprehended (although 

the alacrity with which courts issue, and police execute, warrants varies greatly). A summons is 

-- 

mailed to the suspect’s address (which may be the same as the victim’s in domestic violence 

cases), and stipulates only that he must appear on a date, typically a few weeks later; no 

information is provided on the nature of the charge. Court reactions to no-shows range from 

dismissal, simple continuance, to the issuance of another summons, to issuance of a bench 

warrant. 

Likewise orders of protection issued by criminal courtsI6 are supposed to provide a 

2- 

measure of safety to victims, but practitioners recount many problems in issuing and enforcing 

orders: victims do not want them, victims place too much faith in them, offenders disregard 

them, and the terms and conditions attached to them must be tailored to individual 

circumstances, often complicated by child custody and visitation arrangements. Some police and 

l6 Most research on orders of protection has focused on civil court orders. While Family 

Courts are authorized to issue orders in some types of cases in New York, in the process of 

conducting this research there was very little evidence that criminal justice practitioners 

encountered, much less enforced, such orders very often. However, in all jurisdictions criminal 

court actors were quite aware of their own preorogatives in issuing criminal court orders, 

although they varied greatly in how frequently and enthusiastically they utilized this power. 

46 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
prosecutors expressed the view that the chief value of orders was that they sometimes provided 

-- 

unambiguous grounds for rearrest. Some judges interviewed indicated that they routinely issued 

protection orders, at least temporary ones; while other judges seldom used them because they saw 

them as unenforceable, unfair to defendants who had not yet been convicted of crimes, or 

incompatible with what they believed were victims’ wishes. 

Judges may hold up high standards for conviction, sometimes requiring physical evidence 

and victim testimony, particqdarly those judges who hold strong due process. Alternatively, some 

judges are reported to regularly rubber-stamp prosecutors’ recommendations. While in some 

jurisdictions, guilty pleas are the modal disposition, in others cases are reportedly most typically 

ended in adjournment in contemplation of dismissal, which consists of a six- to twelve-month 

suspension of the case, during which time the defendant may be instructed to fulfill conditions 

(such as counseling or drug rehabilitation, or refrain from further violence, or honor the terms of 

an order of protection), under widely varying levels of supervision or oversight. By law, if a 

defendant’s case is not reopened during the period of the adjournment, the case is closed and 

sealed, and all potentially public records (fingerprints, police reports, arraignment cards) are 

-irendered inaccessible. l7 

Court sanctioning practices vary as well. Incarceration, time served, probation 

supervision, mandatory counseling (of many forms), community service, and fines are all utilized 

although the menu of choices that any particular court adopts varies. Judges most commonly 

” In practice, however, sealing a case may consist of nothing more formal than placing it into 

another file cabinet; the author learned that one City Court simply refiled all sealed cases 

alphabetically (rather than by docket number). In other words, actual case information is not 

necessarily unavailable to interested insiders in the courthouse. 

47 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
reported that they thought defendants in domestic violence incidents should receive counseling, 

although they differed greatly in their views about the efficacy of different treatments and 

interventions; judges interviewed for this project expressed the widest possible range of opinions 

on this matter, from feeling that marriage counseling should be mandated in all domestic 

violence cases, to the view that batterers’ intervention should be reserved for first offenders while 

all others should be incarcerated. 

-- 

Characteristics of Local Criminal Justice Systems 

Beyond the practices and policies of specific criminal justice agencies, the criminal 

justice process has qualities that can be characterized and observed at the community level as 

well. One of the most important, but most difficult to measure, is its treatment of victims and 

complainants, and the consistency of the messages sent about their role in the legal process. 

What the criminal process teaches victims about their roles may make a significant difference, 

not just in case outcomes but in less easily measured (but perhaps more important) outcomes, 

such as victims’ sense of efficacy, trust in the legal process, and ability to secure personal safety 

.*- 

without making unacceptable compromises. This can begin as early as the initial encounter with 

police, certainly varies at the arrest stage, and becomes an even more complex matter in 

adjudication. Victims may be treated as if they were civil plaintiffs, and expected to act 

affirmatively in order to start and sustain prosecution; they may be treated as parties to the 

problem. now subject to authority figures who may criticize their behavior as well as that of their 

partners; they may be treated dispassionately, as witnesses to a crime. While it might appear that 

this is largely an area of prosecutorial discretion (and indeed, that may be the case in very 

48 

I 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
urbanized, bureaucratized courts), judges and court clerks played at least as important a role in 

defining victims’ place and responsibilities. 

Police, prosecutors, and courts are frequently encouraged to invest resources in two 

elements of a coordinated strategy: (1) improving case tracking and information collection, 

especially important given the high reoffending rate in these cases; and (2) providing a victim 

advocate in the courthouse. In theory, both might be relatively low-cost innovations, requiring 

- modification of routines in the first instance, and accommodation of victim services staff 

(including volunteers) in the second. Receptivity to both ideas varies, however, since they 

require changes in routines, and access to agency and court records and space by “outsiders”. 

Both ideas potentially provide greater information exchange (about the case, about victim needs 

and vulnerability, and the legal system itself); both potentially provide more sustained victim 

involvement in the case, as well as increasing the probability that the system will leave an 

accessible and factually accurate record of the offender’s behavior. 

In addition, communities vary in the norms of case processing - whether proceedings 

.I. 

tend to be adversarial, or consensual, or characterized by case-by-case negotiation; and also 

whether they are characterized by predictable lengthy delays. Where procedures take on an 

adversarial tone - where defense motions to dismiss are routine, where defense lawyers’ clients 

are advised to file cross-complaints, and the like -judges may impose higher standards for proof 

for conviction or any other disposition that involves sanctions or supervision; the defense bar 

may discourage the use of long-term counseling as a condition, or resist permanent protection 

orders. Where case processing norms are tolerant of lengthy delays between steps - between the 

issuing and execution of a warrant, or between arraignment and disposition - defendants may 

49 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
benefit. 

Victim services: policies and practices 

This project was focused primarily on the “criminal justice side” of community 

coordination. However, social services agencies, particularly domestic violence programs, most 

typically initiate coordination strategies. Agencies and programs vary in their missions and scope 

-- of responsibility. A general victims’ services agency, or a broad community agency (such as 

Catholic Charities or the YWCA) that has initiated services for a particular clientele may have a 

strong resource base, but must balance its investment in domestic violence issues with competing 

demands; such agencies might be more politically sensitive when conflicts with criminal justice 

agencies develop. An independent and exclusively-focused domestic violence program, on the 

other hand, while likely to be a small and low-budget operation (with few resources to spare, 

heavy reliance on volunteers) may pursue a more aggressive agenda for local change. While 

many programs serving victims run shelters and safe houses, the mix of other services for nonresidents varies. Likewise, domestic violence programs may initiate or oversee batterers’ 

& m 

intervention programs, which may exist alone, or side-by-side, or even in competition with other 

community agencies that receive social services and court referrals for violent men. 

Interagency relationships: coordination across domains 

The character and quality of relationships between these agencies and criminal justice 

practitioners may significantly affect the success of any efforts toward more coordinated 

responses. Coordination efforts may take the form of task forces or coordinating councils, or 

50 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

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Department of Justice.
may be based on unilateral relationships among agency leaders or activists; more rarely, a central 

non-profit agency coordinates, oversees, trouble-shoots, and assesses the activities of these 

groups (the Duluth model). Leadership of the initiative, whatever form it takes, historically has 

come from the victim advocacy organizations, although this may be changing as criminal justice 

agencies seek to take advantage of federal and state resources dedicated to violence against 

women, including domestic violence. The relationships of staff across these organizations may 

be close and informal, or more distant. Distrust and adversariness characterizes some 

coordination efforts (which would seem to make them destined to fail), but even when 

-- 

relationships are cordial and constructive they may not be symmetrical. When they are 

asymmetrical, it seems likely that power rests in one of the criminal justice agents’ hands. 

The style of information exchange and communication, as well as the character of 

collective products, also characterize variation in interorganizational relationships. 

Communication may be informal and frequent, or may take place almost exclusively in 

scheduled meetings; work may be accomplished largely through a handful of active individuals, 

or through committees. Likewise, outcomes of the collaborative process may be formalized into 

>. 

written protocols, or may be quietly-adopted policies and practices that are unnoticed by 

outsiders. 

Importantly, the official mission of any structured coordination effort might include 

problem assessment - a typical initial activity - but might also extend to policy planning and 

recommendations, policy development and implementation (which requires more energy, 

lobbying, and cooperation). Coordination initiatives may actively seek outside resources (grants, 

contributions, personnel), and some may have been invented solely to create eligibility for such 

51 

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resources. Coordination efforts sometimes include the task of problem solving in specific cases, 

usually those involving high reoffending rates. 

Participants in coordination efforts do not necessarily hold the same objectives or 

priorities, although that may not always be an impediment to changes in local practices. This is 

in part because practitioners’ decisions to participate vary - they may be protecting agency 

interests, attempting to appear “politically correct,” or interested in funding prospects. 

Practitioners may simply define the nature of the problem in different ways, and may assess the 

feasibility or value of particular interventions differently. Real differences of opinion on these 

.- 

matters may confine the scope of changes. 

Aside from the interorganizational characteristics that constitute coordination - 

structure, communication, the balance of contributions and power among participants, task 

orientation, and priorities - another component of community coordination is the exchange and 

rate of referrals across criminal justice and domestic violence agencies. More tightly coordinated 

settings are those in which police officers, prosecutors, judges, and victim advocates frequently 

send clients to each other: officers are quick to recommend and transport victims to shelters, 

.= 

advocates encourage victims to learn more about and perhaps seek orders of protection, 

prosecutors recommend strong protections for victims built into dispositions, and judges send 

offenders to domestic violence counseling programs. Hence coordination exists not just at the 

level of planning and policy - at the level of leadership - but also at the level of practice. 

The role of “communitv” in community coordination 

Finally, community initiatives vary in their connection to their own communities. The 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
term “community” is frequently used to describe any enterprise that involves agencies outside 

criminal justice, but the more important distinction is between initiatives that are focused 

predominantly on victims and offenders who come to officials’ attention, typically under crisis 

conditions, and those that reach out into the community for participation, legitimacy, resources, 

and change through education and prevention efforts. Task forces themselves often exclude 

members of the defense bar, for example; but others seek the involvement of lawyers, clergy, and 

-- educators. More diverse andflnclusive initiatives welcome spokespeople for gay and lesbian 

organizations, and they might also acknowledge the benefits of ethnically diverse membership. 

Outreach, especially in the form of prevention and education efforts (in schools, churches, and 

public health settings) and in the form of identifying unknown victims and offenders (for 

example, in probation caseloads, women’s health centers, and universities) requires levels of 

resources and legitimacy that are difficult to achieve. Those that succeed in these efforts may do 

so only by establishing ties to local media, political leaders, and even local businesses that 

support their efforts. .a 

Summary 

The purpose of this chapter was to examine the ways in which community responses to 

domestic violence vary, focusing particularly on criminal justice agencies’ contributions to those 

responses. 

prosecutors across New York state, conducted at the outset of the study. Those data suggest that 

police departments and prosecutors’ offices vary on a number of dimensions, but that there is not 

single dimension of progressive policy adoption that characterizes either sort of agency. The 

The first part of this chapter presented data from surveys of law enforcement and 

53 

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second part of this chapter draws upon interviews in several jurisdictions, conducted during the 

early phase of this project, to report additional dimensions on which local practice and policy 

vary, and to outline dimensions that contribute to the characterization of local responses as 

coordinated or fragmented. 

The following chapter reports the results of a qualitative study of five communities, 

selected on the basis of a parsimonious and pragmatic subset of these criteria, but analyzed in 

depth on all of them. The findings of the survey research results reported here highlight the 

importance of reporting on this extensive set of dimensions, inasmuch as neither the surveys nor 

previous research has provided sufficient guidance in identifying elements of policy or practice 

that are associated with effective responses, or community-level outcome variables. 

-- 

54 

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Department of Justice.
Chapter 3 

Toward a Characterization of Five Communities'' 

Introduction 

The preceding chapter provided some exploratory information on the state of local 

criminal justice policies about domestic violence. The most important observation to come out 

of these analyses is that, despite the fact that coordination is frequently conceptualized as an 

.- aggregation of progressive policies, aimed at both holding offenders accountable and maximizing 

victim safety, in reality police departments and prosecutors report having policies and practices 

that are a mix of recommended ideas. Perhaps equally importantly, the degree to which these 

criminal justice agents adopt recommended practices is seemingly unrelated to community size 

or urbanization, and is also unrelated to police and prosecutor participation in local task forces or 

coalitions -- the most common structure around which coordination efforts are organized. 

Finally, it appears that the high level of interest and concern devoted to reforming arrest policies 

may have diverted attention away from other significant, but low-visibility, police and 

prosecutorial practices that vary greatly from place to place. 

S" c 

These observations are drawn from surveys and interviews conducted during a discrete 

time period, and therefore should not be interpreted to mean that task forces and other 

coordinating mechanisms do not facilitate policy development over time. Longitudinal studies 

are needed to document the emergence, routinization, and success of different varieties of 

coordination approaches. However, these findings do suggest the possibility that at the local 

"This chapter benefited from the research contributions of Kim Nawyn, who contributed to 

the sections on demographic and crime profiles of the sites. 

55 

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level, comprehensive models or templates for community coordination may be of limited use to 

practitioners, who are more attuned to preserving interagency relationships, making incremental 

changes, and assessing the costs of even small alterations in existing practices and protocols. 

Comprehensive reforms are not common. Yet, because researchers and practitioners have tended 

to focus on ''success stories" and on describing the conditions that appeared to foster success, we 

have little knowledge, and few hypotheses, about the more general conditions that generate 

- coordination efforts, much less the relationship between those conditions, the resulting structure 

and policies, and achievement of desired outcomes for victims and offenders. 

The work reported in this chapter includes (1) identification of an economical set of 

dimensions on which to base site selection, (2) description of the five communities selected for 

the study, and (3) detailed profiles of the qualitative information gathered about each 

community's domestic violence response. These profiles are based on observation and 

interviews with actors in multiple domains in each site, conducted throughout the course of the 

study period. i 

Key Dimensions 

The preceding chapter described dimensions of variation that characterize communities' 

responses to domestic violence, toward the objective of constructing a more economical set of 

criteria, or yardsticks, by which a preliminary assessment of coordination approaches could be 

attempted. The premise that underlies this inquiry is that the quality of community coordination 

is best measured by the strength, density, and comprehensiveness of nets that provide victim 

access, safety, information, and resources, as well as nets that reliably apprehend and control 

56 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

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offenders. The next step in the research was to identify sites that, on the basis of survey 

information and preliminary inquiry, illustrated variation on key elements of such social and 

legal nets. 

The information available for making these selections included the surveys reported in 

the previous chapter, supplemented by surveys of task forces and domestic violence programs, 

and telephone interviews with local officials and domestic violence program staff. Selection 

criteria were adopted on practical, policy-relevant, and theoretically significant grounds. Some 

of the dimensions uncovered in the preliminary research simply could not be assessed across 

.- 

potential sites prior to site selection; for example, very little information was available regarding 

court dispositions of these predominantly misdemeanor cases. Some dimensions appeared, on 

the surface, to be constants rather than variables; for example, preliminary research suggested 

that almost all jurisdictions claimed to adopt a broad definition of "domestic violence" (although 

subsequent research revealed more selective definitions were used in practice). 

Table 3.1 summarizes the dimensions that were used for initial site selection. First 

among these was the nature of police department policy, including but not limited to arrest. 

liDepartments that had adopted strong pro-arrest or mandatory arrest policies, that mandated report 

writing in all domestic incidents regardless of arrest, that had made provisions for pursuing offscene suspects, and that followed arrest with thorough booking and bail procedures were 

considered high on this dimension. The second dimension reflects dedication of resources by 

criminal justice agencies in domestic violence case processing: retention of victim advocates, 

specialized practitioner training, dedicated units or officers, and development and maintenance of 

case tracking processes. A third dimension is the strength and stability of community domestic 

57 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

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Department of Justice.
violence programs. The remaining three dimensions gauge the character of relationships across 

communities. First, communities varied in the degree to which they had adopted formal and 

comprehensive protocols for domestic violence responses; some communities had adopted nearly 

contractual agreements across agencies, coordinated through a task force or council, that were 

designed to keep all parties accountable. Second, communities varied in the inclusiveness of 

criminal justice participation in coordinated response planning and efforts. Finally, community 

responses varied in their efforts to engage and address community prevention and education 

efforts; some communities’ energies were almost completely directed toward improving 

.- 

responses to cases that came to the attention of criminal justice and victim services agencies, 

while others adopted a more proactive approach. 

The common requirement for all five sites was the existence of a task force with some 

criminal justice representation. Beyond this, based on preliminary information sites were 

identified that varied from rating high on most dimensions, to quite low. Lakeport, Stocktown, 

and Morton represent communities that had adopted strong arrest policies. Among these, Morton 

evidenced a strong domestic violence program, an inclusive and well-established task force, and 

-5 

a visible commitment by criminal justice agencies to specialized treatment of domestic violence 

incidents; further, the domestic violence program played a visible role in the community. 

Lakeport was characterized by a seemingly broadly inclusive, active, and productive task force, 

with unusually high levels of participation in collaborative policy setting - but a more modest 

level of resources invested both in domestic violence programming by the community, and in 

specialized responses to domestic violence within criminal justice agencies. Stocktown 

resembled Lakeport, with two important differences: the task force operated on a more informal, 

58 

I 

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and less inclusive, basis - significantly, judges in Stocktown kept some distance between the 

courts and domestic violence innovations. The two remaining sites were selected from among 

the many communities that reported more traditional police arrest practices, but for the purposes 

of studying community responses they are distinctive in important ways. In Helena, the 

domestic violence task force engages the prosecutor, but little else in the criminal justice system; 

however, the local domestic violence program is independent, resourceful, and highly involved 

in community work, and its 16adership is outspoken. Carthage evidences little development of 

formal policies, domestic violence program activities, and criminal justice innovations; but it is 

- 

unusual insofar as its task force is very inclusive, meets often, and has full participation by local 

judges. 

As the table indicates, while the first three sites clearly are more invested in a coordinated 

response, at least as measured by these limited criteria, they vary amongst themselves. 

Moreover, the two communities that evidence less progress toward creating legal and social nets 

of safety, services, and accountability are different on two very important variables: criminal 

justice representation in the task force, and the viability of the local domestic violence program. 

-5 

The following sections provide demographic and economic descriptions of these communities, 

followed by the results of the field research that explored in more detail the location of these sites 

on the broader set of dimensions of coordination, and discussion of what was learned about the 

political and social conditions that account for the state of coordinated responses in each 

community . 

Characteristics of the Study Sites: A Closer Look 

59 

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The five sites examined in this research were upstate cities, not part of or immediately 

adjacent to the New York City metropolitan area. They are typical communities of typical sizes, 

with populations ranging from about 20,000 to 150,000. Outside New York City, New York 

state has a predominantly white population, and that homogeneity is reflected in most of these 

communities. l9 The following sections profile the demographic characteristics of each 

community (see Table 3.2), followed by a more detailed report of the community response to 

domestic violence as it existed during-the study period. 

Demographic Profiles 

- 

Lakeport is the smallest of the three sites, with an estimated 1996 population’ of slightly 

less than 25,000. Lakeport is a free-standing city, and the county seat, but many residents work 

in a larger metropolitan area located about twenty miles away. Lakeport is the least racially 

diverse and the most affluent of the five sites. Over 90% of the residents are white; 98% of the 

residents are native to the United States. Both the median household income and the median 

family income, each over $32,000 per year, are markedly higher than incomes in each of the 

other sites. Lakeport has the lowest percentage of households on public assistance. The 

unemployment for male residents over 16 years of age is comparable with the other sites at 6%. 

Stocktown is a small city, with a population of about 60,000. It is the county seat and 

encompasses much of the county’s population. Although the region in which Stocktown is 

located houses a number of state and local government agencies as well as numerous colleges 

l9 Much of New York state is rural, including the extensive, multi-county Adirondack Park; 

some of these counties have no communities larger than villages, and rely almost exclusively on 

county sheriffs, state police, and lay magistrates to process criminal justice matters. New York 

has several Native American reservations, which were not included in this study. 

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and universities, the city’s economic history is largely industrial. In the past few years the city 

has gone through an economic decline due to the relocation of a major industry. Currently, the 

city is working to rebuilt the economy and revitalize the downtown area. The population in 

Stocktown is predominantly white. The median household income is lower than that found in 

Lakeport, but higher than the other communities. 

Morton is the most populous city in this study with over 150,000 residents. It is by far the 

.- largest community and the county seat in its county, although it is surrounded by old and wellestablished, as well as newly developed, suburban villages, to which it has lost a significant 

percentage of its population (5%) in the first half of the 1990s. The economic history of the city 

is diverse, but predominantly blue-collar and industrial. Morton is working hard to create new 

jobs and attract commercial businesses to the downtown area in an attempt to revitalize the 

economy. Morton has also implemented a number of programs to take a stand against violence in 

the schools and on the streets of the city. With a 25% minority (20% African American) 

population, Morton is the most racially diverse site. The median household income and the 

median family income are at the lower end of the spectrum. Nearly 15% of the households in 

Morton receive public assistance. 

s. 

Helena is a small city with a population of about 50,000. It too is a county seat, in a 

small rural county that is rapidly becoming suburbanized, although the city’s population has been 

comparatively stable during this decade. Helena is similar to Stocktown in terms of income 

statistics. However, at 1 O%, the percentage of households on public assistance is slightly lower 

than that in Stocktown. Only Lakeport has a lower percentage of people on public assistance. 

Unemployment for males over the age of sixteen in the labor force is on par with that of most of 

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the other sites. 

Carthage is a small city with a population of about 60,000; it lost over 10% of its 

population during the first half of the 1990s. Carthage is not the county seat, but it is 

demographically very similar to that community. Significantly, therefore, it is the only site that 

is not home to the District Attorney’s main office or the Family Court judges. Carthage is the 

most economically depressed of the five sites. The median household income (below $20,000) 

-- and the median family income are markedly lower than that found in Lakeport, Stocktown, 

Morton, and Helena. More households receive public assistance and unemployment of males 

over 16 years of age in the labor force is higher than in the other areas. This site contains the 

lowest percentage of people with reports of at least some college education. While Carthage has 

a colorful and lively history as a center of vice and crime during the early part of this century, 

there is little evidence of that now, and the city has suffered from a significant decline in its 

downtown area, public housing units, and industry. 

Crime Profiles 9- 

Table 3.2 also presents crime profile information for the five communities. The overall 

index crime rates for these communities are generally consistent with what one might project 

from demographic data. Although the smallest and most affluent city, Lakeport, reports the 

highest crime rates -- a seeming anomaly -- otherwise, Morton, the largest city, has the highest 

rate and also the highest violent crime rate, followed by Helena and Stocktown (two cities that 

are demographically quite similar). Carthage appears to have the lowest crime rates, somewhat 

at odds with its high poverty and low education rates. It is not clear how useful these data are in 

capturing actual crime patterns, however. Carthage has a slightly older population than some of 

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the other communities, which contributes to low income rates but might also account for lower 

crime rates. 

Based on interviewing and observations in these communities, however, it appears that a 

more plausible explanation for this seeming variation is police reporting and data collection 

practices. Morton -- and more importantly, Lakeport -- have invested heavily in computer 

equipment and technology training, which may result in more complete recording and reporting 

to UCR. The other communities, especially Carthage, have very limited data collection and 

computerization capacity, and few personnel trained to maintain or analyze data, as well as 

seemingly casual approaches to booking, fingerprinting, and reporting cases to the state's 

Division of Criminal Justice Services. 

-- 

Interestingly, criminal justice agents in all communities except Morton seemed convinced 

that their towns suffered from serious and growing crime problems, mostly generated by 

"outsiders," who were often characterized as New York City drug dealers. Morton respondents, 

on the other hand, seemed satisfied with their long-standing reputation for having a low crime 

rate for a city of its size. Stocktown and Morton have significantly better-staffed police 

& 

departments as measured by the ratio of personnel to population. 

Summary 

These five sites were selected because they represented diverse adaptations to state and 

national trends toward criminalizing domestic violence, and all exhibit some level of interest in 

coordinating responses to domestic violence among criminal justice and social services agencies. 

Demographically, they are more similar than different, although they represent a range of 

population sizes. There is little about their historical, economic, or social characteristics to 

63 

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suggest different community orientations to a problem like domestic violence, yet preliminary 

surveys and interviews indicated divergent responses both within the criminal justice system, and 

across agency domains within communities. Three sites had police departments that had adopted 

policies and practices aimed at aggressive enforcement; one of these had the resources to create 

dedicated domestic violence units, reportedly had a task force that involved not only all criminal 

justice sectors but also many other groups in the community. The two smaller communities had, 

respectively, fewer resources but more visible and broad-based collaborative agreements, and 

more limited participation by a key set of actors, local criminal court judges. The two 

communities characterized by less aggressive police policies were distinctive in their own right; 

one of them had a high and inclusive level of task force participation and activity, while the other 

-I 

had a highly visible, successful, community-based domestic violence program. 

Community Responses to Domestic Violence: 

Findings from Qualitative Research in the Study Sites ._ 

The remainder of this chapter summarizes the comparisons and conclusions drawn from 

interviews, observations, and attendance at task force and committee meetings over the 

approximately two years of the project’s information-collection run. That information was 

supplemented when possible with newpaper reports on domestic violence or responses to it, 

newsletters distributed by domestic violence programs, and internal police department reports. 

Tables 3.3 through 3.7 summarize these observations for each site. They are reported in more 

detail below, organized around several broad themes: 

0 Typical case processing: all respondents were asked to explain how a typical case 

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would be processed, from 91 1 call to final disposition and sentencing (if any). 

The role of victims in the criminal process 

Local actors’ perspectives on the nature and appropriate prioritization of domestic 

violence 

Participants’ views on the challenges and problems they had confronted in 

responding to domestic violence - including both responses to cases, and 

experiences $working collaboratively with agents in other domains. 

Community Responses to Domestic Violence: 

Findings from Qualitative Study 

Lakepod’ 

The Lakeport Domestic Violence Task Force was initiated in 1993, and in a short time 

successfully constructed a comprehensive protocol document that they have disseminated 

widely; their products have been considered exemplary by the state’s Office for Prevention of 

Domestic Violence. The task force adopted a broad definition of family violence, so the protocol 

as it applies to all agencies includes all forms of partner violence as well as violence among 

_. 

2o Officials interviewed in Lakeport included the Criminal Court clerk, the city’s police chief, 

the Assistant District Attorney assigned to City Court, and a public defender assigned to the 

Lakeport City Court, the director of victim services at the local YWCA, which ran the domestic 

violence program, and an advocate who conducted training sessions with the local police 

department; as well as telephone interviews with the Director of Probation for the county, the 

City Court judge who handled criminal cases at the time, and a Family Court judge who did most 

of her business in the city. 

65 

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people in other family or household relationships. 

The first major change involved, not surprisingly, revising the arrest policy, at the 

initiative of the District Attorney but with the cooperation of the police chief. Police officers are 

encouraged to adopt a legalistic style on domestic violence calls, and are sensitive to the 

possibilities of lawsuits if they do not. The department’s arrest policy predated the legislative 

reforms, and was more comprehensive; therefore it was not affected by these legal changes. The 

- chief adopts a ”visible bruising or injury” standard for mandating arrest. While officers are 

encouraged to identify “primary aggressors” when there are cross-complaints, the chief believes 

that officers are uneasy with this responsibility and would be more comfortable making dual 

arrests. Arrested suspects are detained overnight, and weekends, pending arraignment. Suspects 

who flee the scene present problems for the police -- when there is sufficient evidence for a 

misdemeanor charge and the victim has signed a complaint, the officers arrest suspects if they are 

found. If they are not found, however, and a misdemeanor charge is pending, the officer takes the 

case to the court clerk to seek a warrant. 

Police officers are trained to look for sufficient evidence to support a misdemeanor 

charge, against the risk that the victim will later become reluctant to testify, so they try to secure 

written statements at the scene, look for property damage, take note of the possible use of 

household objects as weapons, and take photos of injuries and damage at the scene. The policy 

directs them to charge high, and take every opportunity to build a case that is not dependent on 

the victim’s later participation. Cases are routinely booked, including photographs and 

fingerprinting for misdemeanors. The chief exercises close supervision over the officers, 

requiring that reports be filed on all domestic incident calls and reviewing many of those reports 

66 

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himself (all are reviewed by a lieutenant or sergeant). The reports pass through many hands in 

this jurisdiction: beyond the police station, they are also disseminated to the court clerk and the 

District Attorney. 

There is dissensus over the issue of pretrial detention: the District Attorney’s office 

opposes the use of release on recognizance for misdemeanor cases, but is frequently not present 

at arraignment, where the judge typically releases defendants who commit to beginning 

.- counseling. Defense lawyers encourage clients to contact counseling agencies very quickly, to 

improve their standing with the local judge at all points in the process. However, few cases are 

dismissed at early stages. Orders of protection are routinely issued by the judge at this point. 

Most respondents seemed in agreement that while the victim’s active participation 

certainly helped make a case, prosecutors do not rely on it to pursue legal action. The 

prosecutor’s ‘ho drop” policy was not enforced to the point of subpoenaing victims. Neither are 

victims coaxed or pressured into testifying or appearing; it appears that they have relatively 

limited contact with criminal justice actors. ,- 

Cases are typically settled by guilty plea, according to all interviewees, and a significant 

minority of cases are adjourned in contemplation of dismissal (ACD). However, despite this 

seemingly common acquiescence to guilt, proceedings can be implicitly adversarial. The public 

defender’s office is quite critical of the judge’s reliance on counseling and the district attorneys’ 

tough charging stance, and they see the court as overly responsive to the DA; they are also aware 

of (and take advantage of) long delays as clients seek to begin counseling programs with 

waitlists. The DA’s concern with physical evidence is reasonable in light of the defense bar’s 

frequently expressed willingness to take cases to jury trials. The DA’s policy is to accept pleas 

67 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
to reduced charges for first offenders and for repeat offenders, but to stick to higher charges if the 

evidence and the victim's testimony 'seem likely to support them. With.most plea agreements 

come conditions, often counseling programs including (but not limited to) the local batterers' 

intervention program. Offenders' compliance is monitored by the court (through required 

reappearances, sometimes through probation). 

The domestic violence program is part of the city's YWCA, which runs a variety of other 

.- social and community programs as well. The program is dedicated to domestic violence (rather 

than including other forms of violence, such as sexual assault), and serves women in the villages 

and rural areas surrounding Lakeport. The program is not large -- three staff members at the Y 

itself, others at the shelter -- but the director has been involved in the program since before the 

task force was organized. The program provides a typical array of services for victims, mostly 

social services. Its identity appears to be strongly linked to the Y's standing in the community. 

All parties interviewed were quick to point out that Lakeport has created and formalized a 

coordinated community response protocol in remarkably short order, with a high level of 

participation from many sectors. The task force, initiated by the District Attorney, is inclusive; it 

appears that the District Attorney's office provides much of the initiative and leadership, with 

quite cooperative and supportive judges and police. At the time of the study, the role of the 

domestic violence program seemed supportive but not assertive; when interviewed, staff 

members were positive about the activity level in criminal justice sectors, but did not seem to 

feel that they had played a central role in developing the new policies and protocols. While 

several respondents characterized the state of the coordination effort as "exploratory", in reality 

the criminal justice agencies seemed to be well on their way to adopting formal policies, had 

Sd 

68 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
already collaborated on some grant proposals, and were planning more. Indeed, the entire 

enterprise seemed characterized by an unusually high level of formality, in the form of written 

procedures and explicit statements about proper practice, somewhat surprising given the smalltown setting. 

Hence, there is a bit of a paradox in Lakeport: highly formalized procedures have been 

created in an setting that looked, on the surface, informal and neighborly. The police department 

- and City Court are in the same building, only a block from the YWCA; the atmosphere in both 

places was friendly and open; the police chief is known to answer his own phone.2’ Because 

both the police department and the court have enthusiastically embraced computerization of 

records, retrieving information from either one is quite easy, and police officers freely wander in 

to check on the status of court cases. Beyond this, there seems to be a strong sense among all 

actors that full access to and exchange of information is important -- so, for example, the District 

Attorney requested, and got, judicial permission to have BIP and probation records of offender 

compliance sent directly to his office. In a similar vein, the police chief reported that routine in- ii 

service training by an advocate and an ADA had opened communication lines, so that police 

officers now routinely call the ADA directly for advice on new cases. More generally, with the 

exception of the public defender, all actors took pride in the community’s innovation, and were 

optimistic about its future development. 

There are some differences in opinion on court practices, especially practices of relying 

‘I So open, in fact, that when the PI and a team of graduate students arrived after a long drive 

from Albany for two days of data coding, the court clerk assisted her staff in clearing out offices 

for us to work in, including the judge’s chambers, and made sure lunch was brought in for us; she 

also held an impromptu training session on the court’s computer system. 

69 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
on counseling programs and willingness to ACD offenders. The police chief was unhappy with 

the requirement that his department expunge records when an ACD is completed, feeling that 

officers and prosecutors should be able to find out how often a suspect has been involved in 

violent incidents in the past. Few seem to share the judge‘s optimism about counseling. Most 

importantly, perhaps, the domestic violence program’s role seems limited, and this may account 

for the observation that the task force is more squarely focused on offender accountability than 

-- on victims’ needs. 

Like Lakeport’s, Stocktown’s domestic violence initiative is of fairly recent vintage. It 

was initkted by the District Attorney, with the cooperation of the police department, but with 

more active involvement of victim advocates from the YWCA than was the case in Lakeport. 

Interviews revealed that respondents were positively oriented toward recent changes, but quite 

willing to acknowledge that the changes were fairly new, not yet routinized, and that there was 

work yet to be done. 

3- 

Like Lakeport, the police department had a strong pro-arrest policy on the books well 

before the 1994 legislation (since 1988); they used the new legislation to refine their policy, but 

aimed to change as little as possible. Strongly motivated by liability concerns, police department 

administrators welcomed the new laws insofar as they reduced discretion and clarified police 

22 Interviews in Stocktown include the police chief, the deputy chief (on several occasions), 

the special prosecutor assigned to domestic violence cases, a county court judge who handles 

criminal matters, and several staff members at the YWCA domestic violence program. 

70 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
responsibilities, even if that meant more work for officers (in fact, their main complaint about the 

legislation was that it left too many questions still unanswered). However, the police department 

and prosecutor defined domestic violence more broadly than the state's "family offense" 

categories in their own policies and agreements. Somewhat to their disappointment and chagrin, 

city court judges did not adopt the same view, and continued to applp some provisions of the 

new law exclusively to "family offense" relationship categories. 

Consistent with this b$oad definition, police train and supervise officers to file detailed 

reports in all domestic incidents, regardless of whether or not they conclude that a crime has 

occurred or an arrest is in order. They are trained to identify primary aggressors in crosscomplaint situations. However, seemingly in anticipation of stringent standards in the local 

court, officers feel obliged to exhaustively document details in support of misdemeanor and 

felony charges, and fully expect cases to be dismissed by judges if they fail to do so. It appeared 

from interviews that Stocktown police take domestic violence offenders quite seriously if they 

commit offenses deemed worthy of arrest: routine practice is to detain arrestees overnight, and to 

file the next morning for warrants in cases where offenders fled before police arrived. The police 

sdepartment also has adopted a priority policy for domestic violence warrants: once one is issued, 

it is assigned to the next available officer for execution. Overall, police policy is to charge high, 

collect the maximum amount of evidence, and alert victims to the dangers of not pursuing legal 

action, or remaining at home if the suspect is at large. 

One of the challenged faced by Stocktown law enforcement is articulating statutory legal 

interpretations that serve both the interests of the domestic violence initiative, and the 

requirements of the courts. For example, police believe that they cannot fingerprint 

71 

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Department of Justice.
misdemeanor suspects unless the officer has signed the complaint (which, of course, requires that 

she witnessed the offense) -- an arguable legal position but one that is endorsed by some in that 

legal community. With the help of the District Attorney, the police department reached an 

agreement with the city court that applications for warrants for domestic violence incidents 

would receive top priority -- but judges then elected to prioritize only those that fit the narrow 

statutory "family offense" relationship and offense categories. 

Tension between law enforcement and the courts is also manifested in pre-trial detention 

decisions. While the District Attorney opposes ROR for most domestic violence cases, police 

and prosecutors believe that judges more or less routinely grant it, or set bail at $500. Further, 

judges are reported to have high expectations for victim involvement in the process: victims are 

expected to appear at arraignment, or to apply for a warrant; further, they are required to appear 

before the court in order to be granted a temporary order of protection (although judges are 

reportedly quite willing to issue such orders to victims who make that appearance). While the 

police department strives to build cases that do not require the victim to participate or even sign 

the complaint, and the prosecutor pushes for investigations that produce enough evidence for 

A 

conviction without need of the victim's testimony, defense attorneys are said to frequently move 

to dismiss the case at a very early stage, and judges interpret the law at that juncture as requiring 

that the complaining witness -- who, they believe, must have actually witnessed the crime -- 

appear to sustain the charges. It is an effective ploy to derail prosecutions, but one that requires a 

judge with fairly strong due process orientations. In Stocktown, prosecutors need victims to 

make cases, and find little support from judges when they cannot produce them. 

Among police, prosecutors, and the local domestic violence program, however, 

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Department of Justice.
relationships appear to be mutually supportive and constructive. As in Lakeport, the district 

attorney’s office began ongoing training programs, and reportedly has developed such strong 

relationships with police that patrol officers do not hesitate to pick up the phone to ask for 

specific case advice. The police and victim advocates are quite open about previously negative, 

even hostile relationships, but both claim that they now work toward common goals. The police 

department has established an on-site victim advocacy office that draws upon the expertise and 

personnel of the domestic violence program; and victims are contacted a few days after the 

incident (at least in the case of serious assaults) in order to provide them with more information 

and another opportunity to contact an advocate, as well as to glean further evidence. The 

domestic violence program’s staff report high levels of cooperation from both administrators 

and patrol officers; for example, a victim advocate noted that officers have been known to violate 

(with impunity) department policy about transporting non-suspect civilians in order to get 

victims to the shelter or another safe location. At the time of this study, the police department 

was considering a plan to assign victim advocates to accompany officers into the field and speak 

with victims in their homes, although concerns about liability, risk, and citizens’ privacy remain 

unsettled. 

- 

Clearly, prosecutors are working in a fairly adversarial setting when processing 

misdemeanor cases. Standards for conviction (even for probable cause) are high: at least one 

judge was willing to claim that “serious injury” was necessary to support a misdmeanor 

conviction, and relied heavily on indicators such as provision of emergency medical services to 

entertain such claims. Defense lawyers are routinely appointed for defendants, even in violationlevel cases; and as noted previously, they have developed some successful strategies for inducing 

73 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
dismissals. While clearly frustrated with victims who do not participate in cases, prosecutors and 

certainly police reserve much of their frustration for city court judges. 

Despite their due process orientation, however (or perhaps because of it), judges are 

reputedly tough sentencers. Police and prosecutors feel that judges underutilize some counseling 

alternatives (reportedly because the BIP is run by the domestic violence program, and judges 

prefer that punishment not be administered by agencies with a stake in the outcomes of these 

cases and a strong view of the offender’s failings). However, judges reportedly are not unwilling 

to send domestic violence misdemeanants to jail. Interestingly, this retributive outlook is not 

fully shared by law enforcement; police administrators expressed little faith in such sanctions,and 

more optimism about individual-level interventions. 

__ 

The domestic violence program in Stocktown, as in Lakeport, is run out of the YWCA, in 

a tranqui1,campus-like setting just a few blocks from the urban police station and city court 

building. However, the YWCA’s domestic violence program is seemingly more extensive than 

that in Lakeport. Its staff includes victim advocates and administrators who have been working 

in that setting for a decade, and have good institutional memories. The program is seemingly 

adequately funded, provides a range of services for victims both within and outside the shelter, 

and hopes to expand its activities with more resources and criminal justice agencies’ support. 

-.- 

The task force that binds these actors together is an informal one, but not a flimsy one. 

Active participants include police, prosecutor, probation department, family courts, and of course 

the domestic violence program advocates; city court judges do not play a visible role. While the 

district attorney seems to have taken the lead in crafting new policies, including establishing 

cross-agency training, getting support for a specialized prosecutor, and the like, it appears that 

74 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
criminal justice actors are attentive to the advocates' voice, and welcome their proposals. 

-- 

Compared with Lakeport, prosecutors and police acknowledge an interdependency with victim 

advocates, and perhaps as a result have made greater investments in projects aimed explicitly at 

victim safety (such as a proposal to create a special response team that would include both an 

advocate and an investigator, and participation in the AWARE electronic alarm system for 

victims who are at very high risk). 

Perhaps as a result of this interdependency, relationships among practitioners appear to be 

informal, pragmatic, and project-focused. Like many communities, Stocktown is pursuing 

federal grant money for domestic violence-related initiatives, and has been moderately 

successful. Advocates expressed some concern that their organization's current viability might 

be in jeopardy if violence against women fell off the national funding agenda. At the present, 

however, it is clear that the police and prosecutor readily provide access to resources that 

streamline advocates' work (such as a small office in the department, a spare computer); while 

one program administrator chalked up such concessions to "personalities and networking," she 

later explained that she believed police administrators really believed in a common cause, and 

a 

were working in good faith. 

Significantly, all respondents interviewed concurred that the practical priorities of the 

community should be balanced between offender accountability and victim safety, and were 

candid about the tensions that these goals sometimes present in practice. Perhaps because they 

see the court as a problem that they share, participants expressed little tension or dissatisfaction 

with each other, and revealed little evidence of turf protection, competition, or ideologicallybased disagreements. It is likely that not all respondents shared a theory about the causes of 

75 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
domestic violence; but they spoke with one voice in agreeing that it was the result of offender 

attitudes, behavior, or problems -- not rooted in victims' characters, or in relationships, nor in 

overarching patriarchal conditions in society. 

Perhaps because it is relatively new, the task force's work remains largely focused on 

victims who come to the attention of criminal justice or social services agencies. While the 

domestic violence program gets referrals from many agencies outside criminal justice, staff 

indicated that most members of support groups and shelter residents had fairly extensive contacts 

with criminal justice. Criminal justice agents, especially police, complain that the prioritization 

of domestic violence cases (for investigations and warrants in particular) is time-consuming, 

albeit worthwhile; they feel that new policies, however valuable, stretch their resources quite 

thin. Therefore, task force members have little time or energy at this point for extending their 

mission further into the community. Perhaps because of the rather high levels of cooperation 

among them, participants have not sought media attention or community sponsorship for their 

activities. 

-- 

Morton 23 

Morton is unique among these communities insofar as its domestic violence program 

initiated collaborative efforts with local law enforcement almost twenty years before this 

23 Interviews were conducted with the police chief and deputy chief, DV Unit staff, the district 

attorney, the deputy DA in charge of domestic violence prosecutions, two intake prosecutors, a 

city court judge, and several staff members of the domestic violence program. These interviews 

were supplemented by both "ride-alongs" with police, as well as "follow-alongs" with the district 

attorney as well as the DV program staff. 

76 

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Department of Justice.
research began. The history of those collaborations it not one of swifi (and swiftly successful) 

organization and success, but rather, one of patience, compromise, and cooperation. 

Like the cities already discussed, well before the 1994 statutory reforms Morton’s police 

department adopted a broad and inclusive definition of domestic violence; this definition was 

embraced by the District Attorney as well. Morton respondents seemed indifferent, almost 

defiantly so, of the legislature’s decisions. Many of them were dismissive of the capital’s 

symbolic politics and the lobgying strategems of key agencies and interest groups involved in 

those reforms. In fact, one of the changes that cause the greatest controversy, and that generated 

the most discussion and concern among police in other sites; was the state’s requirement that all 

police departments use a special domestic incident report form (the DIR) rather than the variety 

of forms already used; Morton police blithely bypassed this problem by simply refusing to use 

the new form at all.24 

-- 

The Morton Police Department incorporated some other innovative law enforcement 

strategies by adopting mandatory arrest, as well as identification of primary aggressors, well 

before anyone suggested statutory requirements to that effect. The department has invested a 

great deal of effort in fine-tuning policy and practice: officers are trained to pursue offenders offscene, take depositions from witnesses (including victims) on the scene to support warrant 

,*. 

24M~rt~n officers echoed the concerns of others across the state during the late 1990s: the new 

form did not include all the information that they felt was necessary to successfully present a 

case to a prosecutor, and filling out both the old and new forms was needlessly time-consuming. 

This concern was credible in Morton, insofar as project data collection revealed that officers 

frequently used supplemental report forms, completed witness depositions in the field, and made 

multiple copies of each report, clearly not minimizing their paperwork requirements for domestic 

incidents. 

77 

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Department of Justice.
requests if necessary, and detain arrestees overnight. Arrestees are treated legalistically and 

bureaucratically, seemingly indistinguishably from other offenders in a busy, bureaucratized 

urban courthouse. 

Considerable resources are invested in domestic violence cases by both police and 

prosecutors. A special unit was established in the police department, not long before this 

research was initiated; a special prosecutor is dedicated to these cases. A victim advocacy 

program is located in the police department, easily accessible by newcomers; further, follow-up 

investigators call victims a few days after incidents, and repeatedly provide information on 

domestic violence programs. There is not much perceived need for legal advocacy for victims, at 

-- 

least in criminal court; criminal justice officials, at least, seem to believe that their own actions 

are well designed to anticipate and serve victims’ needs (although domestic violence program 

staff note that many of victims’ legal concerns involve family court issues, outside the purely 

criminal process). 

One of the most remarkable aspects of the coordinated response effort -- and one which i^ 

cannot be fully credited to concern about domestic violence -- is the simple but important fact 

that police, prosecutors, and the City Court use a standard case-numbering system, based on the 

incident number assigned when police first respond to a call. This same number is the key for 

the prosecutors’ filing system, and is linked as well as the court’s docket system. The 

implications of this simple innovation are significant, which researchers would swiftly realize. 

Getting information about a case -- from the police file, or the prosecutor’s file, or the court’s 

warrant file, or even cross-referencing names in order to search for other incidents involving the 

same suspect -- is almost effortless. By way of contrast, in most other jurisdictions this would be 

78 

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Department of Justice.
a painstaking and, ultimately, frustrating and incomplete effort, stymied by inconsistency in 

recording, the necessity of finding each agency's identifying code, the frequent absence of files 

matching a specific number, and of course, lack of access to paper files stored in unlikely places 

all serve as deterrents to even trying. Research project staff, after experiencing the complex and 

confusing docket systems in other communities, frequently noted how difficult and uninviting 

this sort of information search would be to busy practitioners in the majority of our sites, and by 

.- comparison, how simple it was in Morton. We had no way of measuring how much this system 

contributed to fruitful information exchange, but the fact that the District Attorney had an "intake 

prosecutor" stationed near the main police department office, and that both offices, despite 

appearing busy and bureaucratic, were quite open to outsiders, suggested that a curious 

prosecutor or inquiring judge would have no difficulty getting access to full information about 

incidents and suspects. 

Perhaps as a result of the long-term influence of the domestic violence program staff, 

Morton's offender-oriented approach -- mandatory arrest, no-drop policies, required reportwriting, full case documentation -- appears tempered by protocols aimed at serving victims' 

=_ 

needs. Victims are informed by the DV Unit when suspects are released on bail; victim 

advocates are routinely posted in the public safety building housing both police and the court. 

Orders of protection were reported to be routinely provided. At the time of the study, advocates 

were developing a computer program that would permit victims to directly contribute 

information (from the program's office) to the prosecutor's electronic records of the case; for 

example, victims could draft a brief explanation for their desire to see charges dropped, or not 

participate in prosecution. While the focus of criminal justice efforts remained squarely on 

79 

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Department of Justice.
offenders, few respondents would question the legitimacy or priority of victims’ claims on the 

process. 

Prosecutors reported that they seek convictions at the misdmeanor level, even in the 

absence of visible injuries; prosecutors stated that when police document property damage, 

threats, and especially violations of protective orders, they have a fair chance of securing 

conviction even without an involved victim/witness. However, prosecutors ran into controversy 

-- when seeking sentencing to the standard 26-week batterers’ intervention program, since judges 

reportedly found this unduly burdensome for misdemeanor offenders and defense lawyers argued 

that it was excessive punishment. 

A quick sketch of the Morton domestic violence program would reveal a long-standing 

organization that began as a Catholic charitable enterprise, but quickly became a more secular 

and independent advocacy organization. The program’s staff includes some members who have 

been involved since its inception; the organization itself preserves and respects memories of its 

founder, after which it is named. The program is almost exclusively dedicated to domestic 

violence, but adopts a very broad perspective on what that might include. The organization is a 

>’ 

community institution; a close look reveals careful use of resources, an extraordinarily 

committed staff (many of whom began as volunteers), and a reputation as an established, 

respected, and visible community agency. 

Consistent with this image, the domestic violence program appears to be the soul of the 

community coalition. It is very broadly inclusive, openly values the participation of survivors 

but also reaches out to established community institutions (churches, businesses, the media) for 

support; it publishes a newsletter with a wide circulation, and actively solicits the involvement of 

80 

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Department of Justice.
the gay and lesbian communities, as well as Hispanic and African-American organizations. In 

short, it is a community institution with broad-based participation that not only provides an array 

of services and support to victims, but also has become actively engaged in community education 

and prevention efforts. 

The relationships among criminal justice and domestic violence program staff appear to 

be informal, practical, cordial, and task-oriented. Members of the coalition come are drawn from 

various levels in participating organizations; they convene frequently to talk through protocols 

or problems; and members include a representative from the public defender’s office, as well as 

.- 

staff from alternative sentencing organizations. The domestic violence program cannot (and does 

not try to) unilaterally force decisions upon the group; instead, they appear to trade on their 

reliability, strong trust relationships with key personnel throughout criminal justice, and 

perseverance to achieve change. There is little doubt in anyone’s mind, however, that they are 

one of the key catalysts for change. 

The coalition is mature enough, and large enough, to have established committees for 

doing some work, but one gets the sense that the D.V. program staff are constantly aware of 

proposals, changes, and problems, while criminal justice participants are (not surprisingly) more 

reactive. Policy changes, other than the police department’s arrest policy, tend to remain 

informal and unwritten, and prosecutors as well as d.v. program staff are quick to warn outsiders 

of the risks of formal and written policies in an adversarial legal atmosphere. Communication is 

informal. and takes place largely at the mid-level administrative level; one advocate candidly 

observed that it was the coalition’s receptivity to ‘loutsidersll (including researchers) that defused 

many potential problems, adding that the coalition members who did most of the work all had 

81 

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Department of Justice.
each other’s home phone numbers. 

The coalitions’ task orientation is diverse, and broad. Aside from policy development, 

community outreach, a growing interest in individual-level casework (targeting high-recidivism 

households for special attention and problem-solving), the coalition has been active in seeking 

external funding to support existing projects (and new innovations). While all sites in this study 

were surprisingly open to researchers, Morton was the only one in which both the criminal 

justice and victim advocacy practitioners enthusiastically welcomed the idea of research, 

evaluation, and self-study. 

-I 

It would appear that the coalition itself is built upon a foundation of good will and 

cooperation, a foundation that predates most criminal justice practitioners now involved in its 

efforts. While the police department and prosecutor maintain fairly conventional objectives -- 

managing the incidence of cases, getting offenders out of homes --- their efforts are influenced 

by the broader concerns of the domestic violence agency. That agency seems to have the 

experience and perspective that permit taking a long view of the problem, and the investments 

necessary for solutions. 

*- 

Helena*’ 

Helena differs from the other four sites insofar as the police department has never played 

2s In Helena, interviewees included the police chief, the police commissioner, the sergeant 

responsible for reviewing incident reports, the city court judge who handles all criminal cases, 

the city court clerk, the domestic violence liaison stationed in the district attorney’s office, the 

Family Court judge, a staff member in the Probation Department; and telephone interviews with 

the District Attorney. 

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a role in local coordination efforts undertaken by the prosecutor and victim advocates?6 Further, 

although the department's formal written policies do not look much different from those of many 

other departments, their interpretation and practice is described quite differently by those who 

administer them. In interviews with police department leaders, it became clear that they held 

traditional viewpoints about domestic violence as a criminal justice priority, about the merits of 

legislative reform efforts, and about the accountability of officers to victims or others in the 

criminal process. For examp$, like Morton, Helena resisted the imposition of new standardized 

domestic incident reports, but adapted to the change not by ignoring them, but by completing 

.- 

them as well as the standard incident reports. However, this increase in paperwork reportedly 

was the source of much complaint among officers, who were reluctant to complete written 

reports for domestic cases in any incident that did not result in an arrest. 

Police officers were reported to hold to a high standard -- the presence of visible injuries - 

- for the purposes of arrest on misdemeanor charges; one respondent indicated that weapons as 

well as injuries were required to support an off-scene arrest warrant. Police interviewees, as well 

.'- 

as the criminal court judge, strongly opposed "primary aggressor" provisions, and instructed 

officers to arrest both parties in cases of cross-complaints. They pointed to resource limitatiocs, 

frequently backed-up calls, and frivolous complaints as explanations for these limited responses. 

Virtually all suspects were released on desk-bail (about $200) following arrest; the chief and 

commissioner maintained that it is unfair to hold defendants overnight pending arraignment in 

26 The commissioner and police chief are both members of a Mayor's Task Force that 

addresses family violence, but neither reported much activity within this group, and it is not 

inclusive of most of the other key actors. 

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these cases. Several police officials indicated that when it was not clear that a suspect would be 

able to raise bail immediately, he was transported to a rural magistrate in the outskirts of the 

county, who was willing to summarily arraign him on the spot, therefore justifying release on 

recognizance. 

Prosecutors reportedly file the charges police recommend, and the city judge typically 

arraigns on those charges. Interestingly, the judge prefers to set high bail at misdemeanor 

-- arraignments, but frequently releases -on recognizance a few days later. The victim’s role in this 

process is important: not .only do police expect her to sign the incident report, but the judge is 

reluctant to convict without a complaining witness, despite the prosecutor’s attempt to implement 

a no-drop policy. In fact, victims in Helena were described, by several interviewees, with open 

skepticism, even derision; domestic violence was characterized by some as a matter of 

personality conflict and victim provocation, and legal interventions (such as protection orders) 

were described as unfair weapons in the hands of manipulative women. 

Perhaps because of this orientation, and police practices consistent with it, there is little 

information exchange among police, prosecutors, and the courts. The domestic violence liaison, 

who works out of the prosecutor’s office, tracks arrests and repeat offenders, but there are few 

opportunities to make use of this information and police officials speculated that the purpose of 

this activity was to build evidence for future lawsuits against the department. Data are not 

recorded electronically in a way that facilitates retrieval or use, in either the police department or 

the court. Criminal justice practitioners appear to rely almost completely on paper copies and 

files, not all of which are readily accessible. 

Likewise, there are few resources devoted to victim assistance; there are no specialized 

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Department of Justice.
units or training, and the police department is disinclined to pursue such options, or to pursue 

grant partnerships. Victim advocates, stationed at the prosecutor’s office, correspond by letter 

with victims in arrest cases. The local domestic violence program appears to be more integrally 

involved with Family court, where advocates are routinely on hand to assist victims in seeking 

orders of protection (however, although no figures are available, several respondents believed 

that Family Court serves predominantly the non-city population, while most domestic violence 

I cases that originate within Helena are -processed through criminal court). 

On the other hands, the criminal court judge routinely issued orders of protection in 

criminal court, even when victims do not request them or object to them. Although police are 

very skeptical of protection orders, especially those that do not mandate separate residences, the 

judge sees them as a minimal level of security for the victim. 

Proceedings in misdemeanor prosecutions are sometimes adversarial. Most defendants 

have counsel, who advise against quick guilty pleas. Cases are often postponed several times, 

sometimes because victims do not appear; the judge explained that he takes advantage of this to 

encourage the defendant to go ahead, plead guilty to reduced charges, and end the case. Perhaps 

it is the court’s tacit reluctance to convict at the misdemeanor level without victim participation 

that leads the judge to enthusiastically seek conviction on (or incarceration for) charges pending 

in other non-domestic cases, when the opportunity presents itself; court files frequently indicated 

that diverse incidents were combined into single cases, with an ultimate conviction for the nondomestic charge. 

Interestingly, sometimes plea negotiations revolve around treatment programs. Although 

the probation department (which routinely makes both pre-trial release and sentencing 

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recommendations in serious misdemeanor cases) frequently recommends counseling, as does the 

prosecutor, these recommendations tend to be non-specific, and the judge, while aware of the 

local BIP, seldom recommends it. Meanwhile, defense attorneys do not see much value in 

having their clients sent to counseling, and counsel them against agreeing to it in pretrial 

proceedings. 

In this unsettled and somewhat contentious criminal justice context, the local domestic 

- violence program operates as a well-established, quite visible, diverse, and well-staffed 

organization. It runs a number of programs for victims of family violence, embraces a broad 

definition of the term, has non-sectarian origins, and is politically active. It is quite similar in 

many respects to the domestic violence program in Morton, with one important exception: the 

Helena program is openly critical of the local criminal justice process, especially of the police, 

and relationships between those agencies are quite strained. 

Therefore, it is hardly surprising that the police, as well as the criminal court, while aware 

of the domestic violence agency and of its ties to the district attorney’s office, have little 

knowledge about its activities, nor much interest in them. The district attorney and domestic 

violence program coordinate strategy for some purposes, and are in agreement on priorities -- 

both place a strong emphasis on victim safety, and getting offenders into treatment while under 

supervision. 

*- 

Further, communication and cooperation across these agencies seems unlikely given the 

current leadership of the police department and entrenched attitudes toward victims and 

advocates. It is clear that police leaders see domestic violence as an overly dramatized problem, 

and question the credibility of victims. The department is very concerned with liability and 

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workload, but sees the domestic violence program as an antagonist on both issues. 

As a result, despite the efforts of the District Attorney and domestic violence program, 

Helena is a long way from achieving a coordinated response. An energetic prosecutor's 

approach can make only limited headway with a suspicious police force and a judge who strives 

to handle domestic cases no differently from any other misdemeanors. Therefore, while the 

domestic violence program reaches out to the community, and is a recognized presence in the 

surrounding county, it has had a very limited impact on criminal case processing in the city itself. 

Unlike Helena, Carthage has for several years had a task force that is exclusively devoted 

to domestic violence, and that has broad membership from both criminal justice and victim 

advocacy agencies. Like Helena, however, many key actors, including task force members, hold 

very traditional attitudes toward domestic violence victims and offenders. As a result, the 

community coordination effort is characterized by small forays into policy change, but is 

somewhat limited by the fact that the key actors with the greatest investment in the effort -- the 

district attorney's office and the victim services program -- are based in the county seat, about 

sixty miles away. 

Unique among these communities, the Carthage Police Department holds to a narrow 

271nterviews were conducted in Carthage with a police captain who played an active role in 

the task force; several police officers including the sergeant who kept track of reports, files, and 

records; two of the three city court judges who rotated criminal court duty; the deputy district 

attorney responsible for felony domestic violence cases; the court clerk; the deputy court clerk; 

the director of the small forensic evaluation unit, to which judges sometimes referred defendants 

for assessment for counseling; and staff from the YWCA victim services program. 

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definition of domestic violence for the purposes of interpreting the state's mandatory arrest law: 

only cases that involve "family offense" relationships are subject to presumptive arrest. A high 

standard for misdemeanor assault is also imposed: the victim must have suffered "visible 

injuries". Incidents in which the suspect had fled the scene and that produced visible injuries 

(and a victim who wanted arrest) typically ended in an application for a summons, not a warrant; 

summonses were issued at the court's discretion, were typically mailed to suspects, and provided 

-_ little information about charges or penalties for non-appearance. (Not surprisingly, summonses 

often resulted in non-appearances, which then resulted in arraignment postponements, or 

issuance of a new summons). 

Outside of the statutory mandate (which, despite its narrowly drawn parameters, or 

perhaps because of them, was believed by many to be fully enforced by officers), arrests and 

indeed, any form of legal action appear rare. Carthage was the only jurisdiction that 

acknowledged using appearance tickets rather than standard custody arrest for violations and 

occasionally, misdemeanors. Police officials explained that suspects who were brought to the 

police station were quickly booked, but were not fingerprinted, and routinely released on 

#. 

nominal bail. Fingerprinting occurred in misdemeanor cases only if the suspect followed the 

instructions of the judge on his way out of the arraignment hearing, and stopped by the booking 

office voluntarily for the procedure. 

Judges rely heavily on victims to sustain cases, at many stages. This is in part due to the 

judges' philosophy (discussed below), and in part due to the fact that the assistant district 

attorney assigned to the courtroom rarely has access to the police report when he walks into 

arraignments, and police officers do not routinely attend court for that purpose, so the victim and 

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the defendant are the only sources of information about probable cause. The judges are strongly 

inclined to release on recognizance; both judges interviewed explained that they thought this 

practice not only was fair (allowing both sides to state their case) but also maximized the chances 

of the couple reconciling. In a similar vein, they expressed the view that ACD was the most 

appropriate disposition for most cases, since convictions were likely to aggravate tense marital 

relations, and that orders of protection were inappropriate in most cases, for the same reason2* 

The ADA’s lack of c&e information at arraignment is part of a more general pattern of 

minimal communication and data sharing, one about which some task force members were quite 

concerned. The reasons were in part simply geographic: ADAs maintained no case files in their 

home office in the county seat, and seemed to rely on local court files for information; court files 

were sometimes incomplete and difficult to access; and police files and reports, although located 

in the same building, were awkward to access as well. While Carthage’s criminal justice 

practitioners seemed quite welcome in each others’ quarters, the fact remained that tracking 

down any particular piece of information about a case or a suspect (his prior arrest record, his i. 

appearance or non-appearance on a summons, whether an order of protection had been issued) 

was often a frustrating mission. 

While this lack of information flow clearly frustrated some police, the court clerk, and the 

district attorney, it was not problematic for the judges in most cases. The three judges appeared 

to share goals in misdemeanor domestic violence cases: they prioritized preserving marital 

28 Another interviewee, in a separate interview, accurately forecast these judges’ perspectives, 

and interpreted them as a sustained attempt to rebalance the power relationship between partners 

which had been knocked askew by the arrest of the man. 

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relationships, and the violence that brought defendants to their courts was less problematic as a 

legal issue, in their minds, than as evidence of family dysfunction. Detailed information about 

evidence or testimony was not a priority in cases where the most appropriate disposition was one 

that restored the relationship to a better state. Both judges interviewed expressed support for 

counseling programs, particularly counseling programs that involved both partners. 

Not surprisingly, there is little evidence of victim advocacy in the courthouse. However, 

-- the judges concurred that victims would benefit from legal advice, and one judge expressed 

dismay with victims who, in his view, looked to him for legal information, indicating that any 

responses on his part compromised his impartiality. Perhaps because of the court’s non-punitive 

stance, legal proceedings were characterized as almost uniformly non-adversarial: cases were 

dismissed when victims failed to appear, defendants were routinely ROR’d, judges planned on 

ACD with a recommendation for counseling, and explained that they often advised the couple 

together on how to get along better. Both judges opposed sending defendants to the batterers’ 

intervention program in the next city, citing not just the geographic distance but also the belief 

that the BIP, and the program with which it was associated, was likely to motivate the victim to 

end the relationship. They much favored marital counseling, and one judge claimed to routinely 

instruct both parties to meet with the court’s forensic evaluator, to be assessed for the most 

appropriate counseling program. The deputy district attorney expressed dismay at this practice, 

but faced structural and attitudinal barriers to changing it, even within her own task force. 

While representatives of the YWCA domestic violence program participated in task 

force meetings, they had only recently established a victims’ program in Carthage. Most 

program resources remained in the county seat, and it appeared that their work was focused on 

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Family Court in that community. However, the staff who participated in the Carthage task force 

seemed pragmatic but optimistic about improving victim services in Carthage, and establishing 

an advocacy program within the criminal court. It appeared that they were not very involved, at 

the time of this study, in providing direct services to victims, and certainly not offenders, in 

Carthage. 

As the foregoing description suggests, relationships among task force participants appear 

-- to be cordial, but the task force is not all of one mind about the most appropriate community 

responses to partner violence. Meetings are well-attended, by a diverse group of practitioners, 

and outsiders are welcomed. The task force appears to be largely driven the the deputy district 

attorney, who sees the energetic court clerk, domestic violence service providers and a few key 

police officers as allies. It is not quite clear what motivates these participants; there is little 

discussion of plans for seeking outside funding or resources, nor, one would suppose, much 

political gain in sponsoring this particular cause. A police captain described himself as a 

"liberal" on the subject, contrasting himself not only with his community and department, but 

also with the task force's general member~hip~~. 

Not surprisingly, initiatives that are discussed and pursued by the group tend to be small, 

interstitial changes, although potentially important ones. For example, a key issue for over a year 

29 Some of the motivation for the group comes from an unlikely source, the county sheriff, 

who presides over a very large geographic area filled with villages and farms, and of course 

shares that jurisdiction with the district attorney. This particular sheriff has been aggressive in 

pursuing support for new computers, software, and equipment to improve rural service delivery, 

and has included domestic violence in that agenda. It is possible that the Carthage city officials 

are attempting to follow in his seemingly successful footsteps. 

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was whether or not to routinely have police officers make an extra copy of their incident reports 

in time for the court clerk to hand them off to ADAs before arraignments - seemingly a noncontroversial issue, but nonetheless one that required considerable discussion and debate. The 

philosophical opposition of the judges, and the lukewarm participation of higher police 

administrators, creates few open avenues for change in the direction of more attention to victims, 

or more accountability for offenders. 

Against this backdrop, it is not surprising that the scope and scale of the task force is 

limited to assessing and improving criminal justice responses to known incidents, rather than a 

broader focus on the community, prevention, or education. Given the police department’s refusal 

to embrace a broad definition of family relationships for the purposes of arrest, expansion of task 

force attention to diverse groups seems unlikely. 

Summary 

These community profiles reveal a diversity of circumstances in local responses to 

domestic violence, and in their efforts to work cooperatively toward more coordinated responses. 

The five sites selected for this research have in common the simple fact that someone in their 

community had initiated an effort to work across agency and political lines in order to change the 

way domestic violence was handled, especially by criminal justice agents. In this respect, they 

are not necessarily typical of communities of similar size and demographics; it was not the 

purpose of this research to generate generalizable statistical data about coordination activities. 

Rather, the purpose of this research was to observe and document what happened, and with what 

effects, when coordination efforts were undertaken under varying conditions. Those conditions 

.e. 

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include differences in police department arrest policy, differences in the levels of criminal justice 

resources and energy dedicated to domestic cases, differences in the stability and visibility of 

domestic violence programs, and the character and quality of interagency relationships that 

developed around the issue. 

The observations made in the field reveal some simple truths that would come as no 

surprise to researchers or many practitioners. First, case processing practices vary tremendously 

across sites. Communities adopt different standards for writing up incidents, arrest, for 

misdemeanor charging, for pretrial detention, arraignment, issuing warrants, issuing protective 

-- 

orders, conviction, and sentencing. Second, and relatedly, expectations about victims' roles in 

the process vary as well: in some places cases move forward only if victims remain fully engaged 

and available; in other places genuine efforts are made to facilitate evidence-based prosecution; 

prosecutors' "no drop" policies seldom extend to the point of subpoenaing or sanctioning 

victims, but may send messages to ADAs and others regarding the value of cases that do not 

involve active victims; finally, in some communities it appears that victims are expected to i_ 

participate in resolving the case by cooperating in the offender's rehabilitation through couples 

therapy. 

These very diverse perspectives on what, exactly, victims are expected to do after 

incidents are reported may reflect the core attitudes and beliefs of those doing the expecting. 

Where key actors at least publicly express the view that official responses to domestic violence 

should revolve around increasing offender accountability, expectations for victim engagement in 

the legal process are restrained. Where, on the other hand, key actors hold to the view that most 

domestic violence is a symptom of a problematic relationship - as was the case with judges in 

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Carthage - or where they were openly skeptical of women victims' veracity - as were police 

officials in Helena - key officials have little stake in reforming practices toward the goal of 

increasing offender accountability or even, sometimes, victim safety. The same holds true for 

the question of how to prioritize domestic violence on the local criminal justice agenda. Where 

violence is seen as a family dispute, where misdemeanor-level physical assault or other violent 

behavior is seen as "normal" there is little reason to reallocate scarce resources toward the 

.- problem. Where officials arrive at the.conclusion that low-level violence is a precursor to serious 

attacks, and that the core cause of violence resides within offenders, not victims or relationships, 

they may be motivated to invest more effort in interventions. 

Further, the people interviewed for this study expressed varying perspectives on the 

promises and limits of coordination efforts themselves. While one might assume that such 

perspectives would be grounded in personal experience, instead there was greater optimism 

among actors in Carthage - a community where significant changes in practice were not favored 

by local judges (and therefore, perhaps effectively blocked); meanwhile, in Morton, respondents 

were measured in their optimism about the likely impacts of their efforts, even though they 

F. 

clearly felt justified in adopting them. It may be that greater experience with collaboration leads 

to greater realism, and more restrained expectations. With the exception of Helena, criminal 

justice officials spoke positively of their experiences working together and with domestic 

violence program staff; they seemed to feel they were doing good work, even if they could not 

predict the outcomes very confidently. 

Finally, it appears that criminal justice agents' perspectives on the constraints and 

possibilities surrounding their work are bounded by their own local experience; and this limited 

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perspective may affect how open they are to recommendations to change practices or policies 

based on the reported experiences of other communities. On numerous occasions practitioners 

expressed frustration with particular elements of law, seemingly unaware that the same statute 

was interpreted quite differently a few counties away. For example, police in Carthage assumed 

that all communities relied on summonses rather than warrants in domestic violence 

misdemeanors, even though in fact that practice was extremely uncommon. Likewise, 

practitioners tended to define#he scope of domestic violence in terms of the caseload that 

reached their own desks, with little sense of the size or diversity of the problem in the 

population; importantly, these beliefs seemed grounded in the assumption that practitioners at 

earlier points in the legal process were executing their enforcement roles with little or no 

discretion. For example, several judges expressed wonderment at the national and state attention 

.- 

given to domestic violence, given that they saw relatively few such cases in their courtrooms, 

and clearly assumed that most victims reported, most offenders were arrested and brought before 

them. .. 

Table 3.8 summarizes the field observations made during the course of this study, 

revisiting the original and exhaustive list of dimensions on which communities vary, and 

providing a somewhat more parsimonious set of variables on which these five communities 

varied: police department practices and policies, prosecution and court practices and policies, 

characteristics of the coordination efforts themselves, strength of the local domestic violence 

advocacy and services program, and the nature of community outreach and involvement in 

responding to domestic violence. These are imperfect categories, to be sure, and the assessments 

made in the field are not only subjective, they are comparative. Moreover, that communities 

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.- 

exhibit or adopt particular attributes, policies, or styles of collaboration does not necessarily 

imply that they perform in predictable ways, and that question will be addressed in the next 

chapter. However, these attributes arguably have implications for the outcomes identified as 

important for this study: the strength of community nets of offender accountability and victim 

safety. Therefore, a brief summary of each community is an appropriate prelude to analyses of 

the impacts of community coordination behavior on outcomes. 

Morton emerges from the field research as advanced on most of the dimensions identified 

in the research. Police department practices are progressive and sophisticated, calling for high 

levels of report-writing, arrest, pursuits, and case documentation. Notwithstanding a '!no drop" 

policy in the District Attorney's office, prosecution and adjudication practices were aimed at 

protecting victims, increasing the probability of convictions, and expediting case processing 

(despite an assertive public defender and private defense bar). Judges not only participated in the 

local task force, but also expressed concern for victims. A well-established domestic violence 

program provided motivation and focus for the task force, which was active and included diverse *- 

participants. Morton emerges from this description as an example of rather well-established, 

pragmatic, and comprehensive coordination. 

Stocktown shares some key attributes with Morton: a progressive police department 

concerned about improving the quality and thoroughness of officers' response to domestic 

incidents, and contributing to prosecutors' efforts to "make cases" in the courts. While local 

criminal court judges are protective of defendants' rights, they are not indifferent to victims' 

safety and the importance of accountability; hence police and prosecutors see some payoff in 

their efforts to document criminal behavior. The staff of Stocktown's domestic violence 

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program is energetic, sincere, and cooperative, appreciative of the efforts of the local police and 

prosecutor; despite the program’s limited resources its members seem optimistic about future 

progress. The focus of Stocktown coordination efforts is on respecting victims’ wishes, and 

keeping cases in the system if those objectives are consistent, so attention is devoted to 

scrutinizing and adjusting low-visibility discretionary decisions (such as warrant-filing 

processes) that might discourage victims from seeking help. Stocktown appears to be a 

-- community with an emerging, pragmiitic coordination strategy, operating in a legalistic and 

sometimes adversarial context. 

Lakeport shares some attributes with Stocktown: a willing police department, an 

enthusiastic prosecutor; but differs in several ways. Lakeport’s criminal court appears to stress 

victim safety more than accountability, and Lakeport’s judges are more involved in the task force 

than is true in Stocktown. On the other hand, the domestic violence program, while seemingly 

grateful for the criminal justice agencies’ interest, does not appear to play a central role in the 

task force, despite the impressive formal interagency protocols that the community has 

developed and disseminated. Lakeport represents an example of coordination that is dominated 

by criminal justice agents, with an acquiescent domestic violence program. 

Helena represents the obverse of Lakeport. Not only do police refuse to participate in the 

local task force, but criminal court personnel seemed completely unaware of it; the District 

Attorney alone had adopted domestic violence as a reform issue. A strong, well-established 

domestic violence program maintained adversarial relationships with the local police and courts: 

there was little conversation, much less agreement, on either the prioritization or the appropriate 

response to domestic violence. Helena appears to be an example of a highly polarized 

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community. 

Finally, Carthage exhibits few progressive policies, against the backdrop of a set of 

judges who expressed strong resistance to the contemporary trend toward criminalizing domestic 

violence. Police and prosecutors alike attributed specific case outcomes as well as more general 

policies to anticipated judicial responses, and judges confirmed their complaints. Interestingly, 

the local task force had the active participation of staff from all sectors, including a relatively 

.- new domestic violence program that was struggling to get established in the community. If 

Stocktown is to be classified as an emergent community, Carthage might be appropriately 

characterized as pre-emergent: it is not at all clear that a critical mass of interest, energy, and 

collaborative will exist in the community to either assess or change the criminal justice system’s 

seemingly indifferent response. 

The dimensions on which these communities vary might be thought of as variables that 

are plausibly related to important outcomes: the strength of community nets of victim safety and 

offender accountability. In general, Table 3.8 identifies practices that in theory, at least, 

contribute to or detract from such nets. More inclusive definitions give local officials 

r. 

responsibility and control over a larger proportion of offenders; better case documentation and 

information exchange contribute to tighter cases and therefore greater odds of conviction. Better 

case documentation reduces the need for victim involvement, and may contribute both to 

victims’ safety and case retention. Higher prioritization of domestic violence cases (in terms of 

scheduling, resources, and responsiveness to victim needs) may contribute to higher rates of case 

retention, 

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Chapter 4 

Comparison of Community Criminal Justice Responses to Domestic Incidents 

The foregoing discussion characterizes five communities that share a common feature, a 

domestic violence task force, but that were selected because they varied on a .set of policy 

relevant dimensions on which information was available -- dimensions that had particular 

salience for the construction of community nets of victim access, services, and safety, and 

offender accountability and control. Subsequent, more intensive assessment of these 

communities’ coordination efforts by and large corroborated the sketches obtained at the early, 

selection phase of the research, but also offered insight into the activities of these task forces, 

and, importantly, revealed local factors that, in the opinion of community agents, added to, 

detracted from, or blocked attempts to change responses to domestic violence. 

The portraits that emerge are probably a fairly typical sample of middle-sized cities’ 

investments in responses to domestic violence. The findings reported in this chapter offer some 

empirical information about the way criminal justice agencies in these communities report, 

SA 

record, process, and conclude partner violence incidents. These decisions and practices would 

appear to have important implications for victims’ well-being and safety as well as offenders’ 

accountability. 

This chapter reports the final phase of this research: comparing the performance of local 

criminal justice systems’ responses to domestic violence, against the backdrop of our 

understanding of agencies’ practices, policies, and collaborative undertakings. The analyses are 

guided by the general hypothesis that greater coordination activities and more progressive 

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policies and practices will result in higher levels of offender accountability (and, possibly, victim 

safe& and support). This hypothesis is simple, but it is also so resistant to conventional research 

strategies that it remains virtually untested. Numerous process evaluations have documented the 

implementation of new practices; a handful, of outcome evaluations have compared rates of 

specific activities before and after implementation; some studies have assessed, at the individual 

offender level, differences in probabilities of recidivism across groups exposed to different 

criminal justice interventions. These are all important issues, but they differ from the questions 

r 

I 

addressed here. These questions are as follows: First, do communities with more coordination at 

the agency and policy level have tighter accountability nets? - in other words, do perpetrators in 

such communities face higher probabilities of detection, apprehension, supervision, and 

conviction? Second, to the extent that these probabilities differ, are they associated with 

particular combinations of practices, histories of collaboration, or other elements of 

coordination? These questions are addressed in an exploratory fashion, with full recognition of 

the limited comparisons that can be made in only five communities, and understanding that 

confident attributions of causes for variation cannot be made. The most important objectives 

here are, then, to pilot a strategy for addressing this research question, to illustrate the sorts of 

inferences that might be drawn, and to generate more parsimonious hypotheses for tests in future 

research. 

The analyses reported here use “official data””-- police and court records of domestic 

incidents -- as indicators of the performance of the criminal justice process. From the 

perspective of one concerned about offender accountability and victim safety, more successful 

communities are those in which violent behavior has higher probabilities of being detected, 

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reported, and processed; where practices make it more rather than less likely that a paper trail 

will follow an incident; where defendants face greater prospects for post-arrest supervision - in 

short, where more offenders are controlled, more often, at more points in the system. The 

analyses reported here examine outcomes in two ways. 

The first analysis examines the characteristics of samples of cases on which police 

completed written incident reports during the study period (1 996), and compares these samples in 

.- terms of the characteristics of cases themselves (eg, frequency with which weapons were 

possessed on the scene, frequency of injuries), as well as official actions in response to these 

matters (rates of arrests; proportion of arrests that lead to arraignments, and the like). These sorts 

of statistics are the stuff of which many evaluations are made, especially pre-post evaluations of 

new programs or policies. These data tell us something about the consistency of police and court 

behavior across communities. However, they are limited, inasmuch as they include only the 

subset of incidents for which police write reports, and report-writing practices may vary greatly. 

The second set of analyses compares the incidence of criminal justice responses to these 

cases, standardized by population. Assuming that domestic violence occurs at a fairly regular 

rate across the population, a population-adjusted rate of response suggests the relative 

probabilities of victims and offenders becoming, and remaining, engaged in the system at various 

points and in various ways3' 

30 An example of this difference in research inquiry is the following: given official data on 

characteristics of domestic incidents, two questions could be asked: What are the differences 

among these cities in the incidence of domestic violence involving drugs or alcohol? Or, 

alternatively and quite differently, are police more likely to note drug or alcohol use in some 

communities compared with others? The former question is often asked in community samples, 

in an attempt to describe the problem of domestic violence and assess its correlates. There are 

fewer opportunities to turn it around and ask the latter question, for it requires for an answer that 

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This analytic strategy rests on some important assumptions. The first assumption is that 

the oficial responses of criminal justice agents are socially constructed - they are the products 

of discretionary decision making that result in varying patterns of records of events, official 

actions, and conclusions about criminal culpability. Police, prosecutors, and court officials have 

tremendous discretion, not only to make formal decisions such as arrest, but also to selectively 

report, record information, and make recommendations. Thus aggregate patterns in official data 

-- may tell us more about what criminal justice agents do than about the character, incidence, or 

severity of partner violence in a community 

The second assumption is that the prevalence and nature ofpartner violence does not 

vary signzficantly across the communities included in this study. This assumption cannot be 

directly empirically verified, although given the demographic similarities among these 

communities this assumption is plausible, with some qualifications. Areas with higher levels of 

poverty are likely to have higher levels of citizen-reported crime of many types, since people of 

limited means are more likely to call police for help than are more affluent people. 

The third understanding is that comparing outcome variables with coordination 

characteristics permits one to draw some infirences about the elements of coordination that play 

important roles in achieving social goals. This assumption - that we may learn something about 

the promise of coordination strategies from this sort of comparative study - must be 

accompanied by a less obvious corollary, that we may also learn something about the limits of 

coordination efforts. Therefore, one objective of these analyses is to identify characteristics that 

one be able to compare across communities, and presumes that the true baseline cannot be known 

from these sorts of data. 

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may be necessary, but not sufficient, for good outcomes, as well as characteristics that, despite 

their seemingly critical importance, may be associated with lower levels of offender 

accountability and victim safety if they are not accompanied by other elements. 

Table 4.1 summarizes general predictions about seven sets of outcome measures in each 

community, based on the findings of the qualitative research reported in the previous chapter. 

They include: 

0 Reliability of police report-writing practices - predictions based on the presence 

of absence of a policy, and evidence of implementation and review of reports. 

Quality of report-writing - predictions based on PD policy, expectations of other 

actors (including detectives, prosecutors, judges) for detailed reports. 

0 Police chargingioffense identification - predictions of police recommendations for 

charging based on quality of reports, support for high charges from other actors, 

requirements for victim appearances at arraignment. 

0 Arrest and arraignments - predictions based on PD and DA policy, judicial 

-_ 

attitudes toward domestic violence. 

0 Orders of protection - predictions based on judicial attitudes. 

Dispositions - predictions for rates of conviction and dismissal based on 

prosecutors’ and judges’ orientations toward domestic violence, aggressiveness of 

defense bar. 

Sanctions - predictions based on presence/absence of criminal justice consensus 

on seriousness of domestic violence; judges’ attitudes. 

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While these predictions are based partially on the logic that particular policies art. 

supposed to produce particular outcomes (for example. policy that mandates written reports for 

all incidents should result in high rates of reports written). three other considerations are 

important. First. some predictions are based on the hypothesis that ke!, resistant elements in a 

community will yield IOW levels of particular outcomes (for example. a cornmunit! v, hose judges 

are philosophically inclined to "preserve" marriages are likel?. to generate 101s le\.els of 

protection orders). Second. outcomes in the early legal phases have a ripple effect on later 

stages: so, for example. where police are reluctant to inten7ene in domestic incidents. courts \sill 

have fe\ver cases to handle. This is particularl!. true ishen decisions hinge on the qualit! and 

quantity of information recorded at earlier points: more coordinated systems arc also more 

information-rich systems. at least in theon. since without information and documentation. cases 

are lost. and criminal histories do not get written. Third. these outcomes ma!. be contingent on 

the interactions and mutual expectations of actors -- fcor example. police nia~ \\.rite niore 

thorough reports because prosecutors want to conirict on higher charges. and also hccmrsc 

defense lawyers hold prosecutors accountable for such e\.idence 

Case Data From Five Communities 

Data were collected in the sites during 1996. These data consisted of a sample of 

domestic incidents recorded by the police in incident reports. augmented by data on arrests. 

\i'arrants. and summonses that might result. as well as prosecution and court data for each case in 

which any legal action was initiated. (See Appendix C for details of case data collection 

procedures.) For the purposes of this research. the on1l.r incidents examined in\vlved adult 

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parties who were, or had been, partners: married, divorced, and separated couples; couples who 

were living together, or dating (most often identified by police as “boyfriend/girlfriend”), and 

couples who had children in common. These cases constituted about 80% of all incidents in four 

of the cities, although far fewer (57%) of all incidents reported by police in Morton. 

Table 4.2 provides descriptive information about the incidents included in the study, as 

described in police reports.31 On the first few variables, which describe the victim and offender’s 

relationship and location of the offense, there are few dramatic differences across community. 

Officers in all jurisdictions routinely recorded the parties’ relationship, although not always 

accurately or consistently. Over a third of all incidents were described in categories that fall 

under the state’s “family offense” classification for mandatory arrest in misdemeanors; about one 

in four couples is married; scarcely half (and far fewer in some places) share a residence, 

although well over half are reported to be in “ongoing relationships” as described by the police. 

By far, most incidents are reported to have occurred in the victim’s home (virtually all of those 

involving cohabitants, and over half of those involving non-cohabitants). 

iThe age distributions of offenders and victims track together, with victims typically 

slightly younger. In Stocktown, Helena and Carthage, police report somewhat younger offenders 

” Sample sizes vary across communities. The goal of this project was to gather information 

on at least 300 cases in each community, an objective that required almost a year in two cities. 

Carthage and Stocktown were both sites shared with the mandatory arrest evaluation, and were 

the two first sites in which data were gathered, so the samples here are more generous for them. 

Morton, with a larger population and many more police reports, routinely generates 300 domestic 

incident reports in a single month; in order to stretch the data gathering period over a longer time 

period and to take advantage of the necessity of collecting all data “from scratch” on-site, without 

the benefit of DCJS’s DIR collection, the data in Morton constitute a stratified sample: all arrests 

over a period of three months, and approximately one in five (every fifth) incident that did not 

produce an on-scene arrest. For analyses, these data are appropriately weighted to reflect this 

sampling strategy. 

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than in Morton and Lakeport. More striking, however, are the race differences in police-reported 

incidents, which are more pronounced than racial differences in populations. Lakeport’s low 

population of non-whites is reflected in an 17% non-white offender rate; in Carthage, Stocktown 

and Helena the police report rate for African-American suspects is three to four times that of the 

population. In Morton the same ratio holds, at much higher numbers. 

There is an inherent temptation in reporting data such as these: to make a case that the 

-I communities are either basically similar, or different in significant ways. Given the demographic 

variation in these cities, these variables do not tell us much that could readily be interpreted to 

support either contention. However, there is little to suggest that in some communities but not 

others, police selectively file reports on cases; for example, it would have been reasonable to 

predict th.at less progressive communities would adopt a conservative strategy of filing reports 

only for casing involving legal “family offenses” as mandated by the state, but that prediction is 

not supported by these data. 

There is little reason to expect that, if officers are not systematically selectively reporting, 4. 

that they will produce different city rates of some case characteristics. However, these data 

reveal variation in many situational variables at the community level. For example, alcohol or 

drug use is reported in almost 25% of Morton reports, but fewer than 10% in the other cities. 

Reports of weapons are higher in Helena (1 6% of all cases, compared, for example, with 5% in 

Lakeport). Children’s presence is noted in 24% of Morton incidents, but only 10% of Helena’s. 

On the other hand, victims’ reports of physical attacks, property damage, threats, and injuries are 

all lower in Morton. 

Offenders are, by police reports, more likely to be on the scene in Morton (56% of 

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incidents), and rather unlikely to be present in Stocktown and Helena -- a factor that may be 

related to whether or not the scene takes place in offenders' and victims' shared homes (a factor 

that does vary across communities). It is impossible to discern from these data whether suspects 

in places where arrest is more common are wise enough to make themselves scarce when a 

victim or neighbor calls 91 1. 

Importantly, officers' reports of the incidence of protection orders varies: in Lakeport, 

.- Stocktown, and Helena (wheje judgesxreport routinely issuing such orders) at least 20% of 

victims are recorded as having such an order; in Carthage and Morton the percentage is much 

lower, although judges in these two communities seemingly have quite different philosophies 

about routinely issuing orders. 

In summary, what one can learn from a comparison of these reporting patterns across 

communities is limited, but it appears that there is some, although not a great deal, of variation in 

some descriptors, but importantly, there is variation in some critical situational variables, 

although not in directions that one would have predicted from the qualitative analysis. 

." 

Table 4.3 provides additional information about these samples of cases' legal status and 

outcomes. Regardless of whether arrests were made or not, incident forms provide a box to 

specify what, if any, offenses the officer believes were committed or are alleged by a non-police 

complainant. As noted previously, felony notations are very rare; and outside of the 

business of report-writing involves settling on either misdemeanor or violation offenses. (Again, 

32 The high (63%) '!no offense" rate in Morton is almost certainly due to the difference in data 

collection. All domestic incidents for which reports were written were subject to sampling for 

this study; DCJS staff eliminated reports that were labeled as "unfounded" in the other cities, and 

typically those reports had virtually no information recorded anyway. 

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it is important to note that the notation of an offense has no necessary implications for legal 

action. It might support a victim’s attempt to file a complaint at a later date, but does not 

obligate the police or the courts to take any action.) In contrast with its police department’s 

seemingly indifferent orientation toward domestic incidents and victims, Helena police seem to 

lean somewhat more strongly toward misdemeanor charging than the other cities. 

Based on police reports, these communities seem to vary in police arrest rates in on-scene 

cases. Again, Morton exhibits a low rate; Helena, surprisingly, produces a high arrest rate, while 

Lakeport’s, Stocktown’s, and Carthage’s are much lower (the latter is half the rate of Helena’s). 

_. 

Off-scene follow-ups are a different matter, however: the percentages of offender-absent 

incidents that results in a warrant, summons, or arrest following a search is high (up to 40%) in 

T,akeport, Morton, and Carthage, lower in Stocktown, and very low (7%) in Helena. Overall, the 

percentage of all incidents, regardless of suspect’s presence, that result in legal action by the 

police (arrest, or filing for a summons or warrant) vary from 30% to 47%, but they constitute the 

averages of very different on- and off-scene behavior patterns on the part of police. 

Much early research on domestic violence indicated very high drop rates or “no charging” 

rates, suggesting that arrests were seldom consummated in further legal action. These data do 

not support that picture: most suspects who become the target of law enforcement efforts to 

consummate an arrest end up in the courthouse, arraigned on charges. Virtually all suspects are 

arraigned in Lakeport; Helena has a very high arraignment rate (perhaps due in part to the fact 

that most candidates were arrested on the scene, not the subject of warrants or subsequent offscene arrests). In the other communities, over 75% of all suspects were arraigned within the 

study’s data collection period (which extended for at least a year after the last incident date). A 

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more finely grained analysis would answer the interesting question of what becomes of the 25% 

who are not arraigned: depending on the site, these individuals were either lost in the summons 

or warrant process, or their files simply never made it to the criminal court. Some percentage of 

these cases may have been routed to Family Court, but it is likely that this accounts for only a 

small number of "lost cases."33 One must assume that in some fraction of these cases, the 

prosecutor found or constructed reason to simply not press charges, leaving no notation or 

-- explanation for that decision. 

Of those who are arraigned, disparities exist across communities in patterns of pretrial 

detention. More often than not, judges in Lakeport and Carthage ROR the defendant (or else the 

case is disposed the same day, making pretrial detention a moot point). Stocktown and Helena, 

both characterized by judges concerned with defendants' rights and liberties, are about equally 

inclined to offer bail, but nonetheless detain about one in five suspects. (Data on bail decisions 

were unfortunately not available for Morton cases.) 

Discretionary decisions such as arrest, arraignment on charges, and bail represent not only 

i, 

interim punishments in and of themselves, but also, arguably, efforts to control suspect behavior 

through deterrence and incapacitation -- in short, efforts to construct a safer environment, at least 

temporarily, for victims who may be at increased risk of harm after invoking authorities. 

j31n New York, complainants in family offense matters may choose to have misdemeanor 

cases heard in Criminal Court, Family Court, or both concurrently. It is generally believed by 

practitioners that most cases that begin with a call to the police end up in criminal court, if 

anywhere at all; that victims avoid (reasonably, in many cases) having the case heard two places 

at once; and that Family Court is most commonly accessed in criminal matters in areas where no 

city court operates (and where the alternative would be to have the case processed by a lay 

magistrate). This project did not produce any evidence that contradicts these beliefs: the cases 

that disappeared between incident and arraignment were no more likely to be legally classifiable 

as "family offenses" than any others, and hence would not be eligible for this alternative. 

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Likewise, orders of protection constitute an opportunity to construct a legal safety zone for 

victims, and at a minimum, empower victims to activate police under conditions of threat and 

risk, not imminent harm. Judges in Lakeport and Helena, with very different community 

responses to domestic violence, nonetheless provide orders of protection to three out of four 

victims they see in court. In sharp contrast, Carthage judges, true to their word, very rarely 

provide such orders. 

Finally, courts’ dispositions and sentencing again show somewhat disparate patterns, but 

not in the ways one might predict from knowing their legal cultures. Few cases are dropped or 

dismissed outright, although Carthage’s records indicate that almost a third of arraignments fail 

to produce a guilty verdict or an ACD (adjournment in contemplation of dismissal). Also not 

surprisingly, very few offenders are placed on probation -- fewer than 10% in all cities -- and 

although one in five serves at least a brief jail sentence in Lakeport and Stocktown, that fate is 

quite unlikely elsewhere. 

In summary, a preliminary comparison of descriptive statistics on comparable samples of 

?- 

cases suggests that the legally constructed picture of domestic violence differs across 

communities. At first glance, Table 4.3 appears to offer the surprising suggestion that Helena’s 

police force responds aggressively to domestic violence incidents, at least in terms of identifying 

offenses and making on-scene arrests; while Morton would appear to have an indifferent 

response. The off-scene legal action rate (issuance of a warrant or, in Carthage, a summons) is 

surprisingly high for most of the communities; according to these data, the odds of apprehension 

are not dramatically different in some places for offenders who remain on the scene, and those 

who flee. Arraignment rates are also high, in some contrast with earlier research that suggested 

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that prosecutors fail to file charges in many or most domestic cases; although more than one in 

five cases slips out of the system before arraignment in most of these communities, probably 

through the failure to execute a warrant, or possibly through diversion toward Family Court. 

Comparing Communities: 

Population-Based Estimates 

Table 4.4 reports measures of.the strength of accountability and safety nets by adjusting 

the data reported above by community population.(Figures 4.5 through 4.1 1 graphically depict 

this information.) These analyses present the numbers of cases (or suspects) subjected to various 

legal interventions, standardized by community population. If one makes the assumption that the 

actual incidence of domestic violence is similar across communities, then the incidence of legal 

interventions at the population level tells us something about an offender’s likelihood of being 

entangled in a legal net, and a victim’s likelihood of being the recipient of protective legal action, 

at various points between initial detection and reporting, and final court action.34 Hence these 

graphs offer some insight into how intensively criminal justice agents engage in the seven 

_c_ 

activities outlined above: 

Report-writing: Table 4.5 suggests some significant differences in report-writing rates, 

which are consistent with the predictions offered above (Table 4.1). Morton and Stocktown 

34These tables should be interpreted in light of two factors. First, Morton, as noted, has a 

higher UCR rate than the other cities; Morton and Schenenctady report higher violent crime 

rates. However, as previously discussed, there are reasons to believe that UCR rates do not 

necessariiy reflect real differences in offense rates, or even rates of offenses that reach the 

attention of the police. Second, domestic violence is not driven by the same factors that drive 

index crimes. 

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write twice as many reports as Carthage and Helena, adjusted for population; Lakeport is more 

similar to Carthage than to the others. 

Quality of report-writing: Table 4.6 provides information about the legally important 

case facts recorded in those reports. These variables -- victims’ report of a physical attack, 

threats, property damage or theft, injuries, and the presence of weapons -- constitute the evidence 

necessary to sustain charges, and without them “evidence-based” prosecution strategies are 

unlikely to succeed. Weapons are noted at a quite stable frequency; injuries are more frequently 

noted in Stocktown than elsewhere; the same pattern holds for property damage or theft. One 

.- 

inference to be drawn from these data is that Stocktown police, faced with a cooperative 

prosecutor but a challenging judge and defense bar, appears to have adapted by thoroughly 

documenting cases, against the risk of losing them for lack of evidence or lack of a complaining 

witness. 

Police chargingloffense identification: Table 4.7 summarizes how police describe legal 

offenses, again adjusted for population. Again, it should be noted that police in all jurisdictions 

sometimes record offenses even when they make no arrest; the reasons for this include the 

*- -, 

absence of the offender, but also some unknown number of cases in which victims may prefer 

that no arrest be made. Perhaps the most important observation to be made from this table is that 

in Stocktown, again, police offically record more legal offenses than is true elsewhere; 

interestingly, Morton, with a well-coordinated criminal justice response, produces no more 

police-identified offenses than Helena, and fewer than Carthage. Interestingly, while felony 

charges are very rare everywhere, they are most common in Morton and Helena, where generally 

reports of legal offenses are less common 

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Arrests and Arraignments:. Tables 4.8 and 4.9 summarize the initiation of legal action 

by police and prosecutors: the incidence of cases in which police initiated legal action, by onscene arrest, off-scene warrant or (in Carthage) summonses; and arraignments contrasted with all 

police-initiated cases. Lakeport, Morton, and Stocktown have similar arrest/warrant rates; 

Carthage’s off-scene rate is almost entirely comprised of summonses, not warrants, so it is not 

directly comparable. Again, it appears that Helena is distinctive insofar as there is seldom any 

legal follow-up in cases wherb the offender has left the scene. Notably, however, in the other 

four communities there are about as many offender-absent cases initiated by warrants or 

summonses as there are cases arrested. 

The first three cities have corresponding levels of arraignment, although as was noted 

previously, Lakeport arraigns nearly every case involving arrest or a warrant, while Stocktown 

and Morton have significant levels of attrition between these two points. Again, Helena’s 

arraignments are comparatively low, largely due to the fact that off-scene cases seldom result in 

any legal action. Carthage also has significant attrition; one reason for this may be the use of 

summonses, which are reportedly difficult to serve, and often result in no-shows. 

-cI 

Orders of protection: Table 4.10 depicts the population-based rates at which criminal 

court orders of protection are generated. Again, criminal courts in Lakeport, followed by those in 

Stocktown and Morton, provide more orders. Given that orders are issued in criminal court only 

after arraignment, it appears that the Lakeport court is particularly prolific, and also that Helena’s 

court uses them frequqently. Carthage judges, true to their expressed philosophy, issue a small 

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fraction of those produced by other cornmunitie~.~~ 

Dispositions: The information reported in Table 4.1 1 further reinforces the picture of 

Stocktown as a community whose efforts have concrete objectives in response to accurately 

identified problems. One might infer that the tough standards imposed by judges have prompted 

police (and prosecutors) to “do their homework” when initiating a case, and the payoff is a low 

level of dismissals and a high level of convictions despite the adversarial atmosphere in which 

such convictions must be obtained. Lakeport looks similar, except that the court dismisses more 

cases outright; this might be a consequence of the judge’s concern for lenient treatment of first 

offenders. Interestingly, despite Helena’s low level of police activity, that court produces almost 

as many convictions as does Morton or Carthage. Not surprisingly, in Carthage over half of all 

cases are dismissed or ACD’d, as one would predict from the judges’ orientations. 

Sanctions: Table 4.12 reports two types of post-conviction sentences, jail and probation. 

It appears from these data that only very rarely does anyone in any of these communities go to 

jail for a domestic violence offense, and probation sentences are even more uncommon (these 

data exclude sentences designated by judges as “time served” while awaiting disposition,, 

.?- 

typically consisting of less than a week). However, to the extent that differences among such 

small numbers are meaningful, Lakeport and Stocktown impose more jail sentences; they are 

about equally uncommon in the other cities. Moreover, consistent with community policies that 

emphasize the use of probation supervision, Lakeport and Morton judges hand out more 

35 Family courts may issue orders of protection as well, and it is possible that in some 

communities criminal court judges refrain from issuing new orders when they learn such orders 

are in effect. It was impossible to ascertain who among these cases’ victims held such orders, 

however, and the absence of such notations in police, prosecutor, and court files suggests that 

these actors were generally unaware of such orders as well, or perhaps indifferent to them. 

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probation sentences. Data on other sorts of sentences were not uniformly available in all 

communities, but it appears that Helena and Carthage, in particular, made frequent use of fines in 

misdemeanor and violation convictions, including domestic violence cases. 

Summary and Discussion 

Two sets of outcome measures were examined for this comparative analysis of criminal 

.- justice responses to domestic violence. The first are simply the rates of specific legal actions 

taken by police, prosecutors, and courts, using as a denominator the number of incidents or cases 

known to have been presented to each criminal justice agency over the data collection period (the 

number of reports written). Because of unavailability (in two communities) and inconsistency in 

dispatch codes (in the other three), 91 1 data were not helpful for creating more accurate baselines 

of the number of incidents to which police were summoned. However, because report-writing 

practices vary greatly across police departments, seemingly high rates of action may be 

misleading, as assessments of police department performance and also as assessments of the 

system performance, which was generally conceptualized as the strength of safety and 

.I. 

accountability nets for victims and offenders in the community. 

Taken at face value, however, these figures suggested that Helena had the most proactive 

police practices, at least for cases in which the offender remained on the scene - almost all 

reports involved specific offense charges, predominantly at the misdemeanor rather than 

violation level; an overwhelming percentage of on-scene suspects were arrested, and almost 90% 

of all arrests resulted in arraignment. By way of contrast, Morton seemed to produce a very low 

on-scene arrest rate, many reports with no charges indicated, and a significant percentage of 

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cases (23%) lost between the arrest or warrant stage and arraignment. Otherwise, Lakeport’s 

police appeared to be quite active, although not so much as Helena’s, followed by police in 

Stocktown and Carthage. 

These patterns of law enforcement activity are not very consistent with predictions made 

on the basis of the findings from the qualitative analyses of the five communities: and they 

probably tell us more about report-writing practices than anything else. The second set of 

-- outcome measures are population-adjusted estimates - the number of cases per 10,000 

population who are subjected to particular legal actions in domestic incidents each year. While 

these measures are imperfect - domestic violence, as well as citizen reporting of incidents, may 

occur at somewhat different rates in different communities - if one accepts the premise that such 

rates are roughly equal, and that police are alerted to roughly equal numbers of incidents, then 

these measures permit comparison of activity and response levels across communities. 

These population-adjusted figures offer a different view of these communities, albeit one 

that is not completely consistent with predictions based on community agents’ own descriptions 

of their levels of coordination and responsiveness. Table 4.13 summarizes the relative 

performance of the criminal justice system across seven general areas, contrasting predictions 

made on the basis of qualitative analysis (reported in more detail in Table 4.1) and findings from 

the quantitative analysis of case data. Many of these predictions turned out to be correct, and 

moreover, correct across a number of variables within each community. Based on its strong 

police department policies, supported by active participation and cooperation in prosecuting and 

adjudicating domestic incidents, Lakeport was expected to produce high levels of written reports, 

inclusion of evidentiary information in reports, offense identification, and arrests. Report-writing 

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was not as high as one might have expected, nor was offense identification in incident reports, 

although this might be attributable to a genuinely lower level of victim reporting in this more 

affluent community. However, officers generated a large number of reports that noted physical 

attacks and threats, important facts to record for prosecutors seeking to make cases without 

requiring victims to testify. 

Stocktown’s strong arrest policy, seemingly committed police leadership, and 

- collaborative relationship with the District Attorney, were predicted to result in moderately high 

levels of police activity, although a strong defense bar and due-process oriented bench were 

expected to lead police and prosecutors to be diligent, but somewhat selective, in seeking 

convictions. However, Stocktown’s levels of report-writing, evidence documentation, offense 

identification, and both on-scene arrest and off-scent warrant production were higher than those 

of the other communities. In contrast, Morton, which emerged from the qualitative analysis as an 

example of an established coordinated response community, produces high levels of written 

reports, and moderately high levels of evidence documentation, but a comparatively low level of 

offense identification. Offenses that are identified often result in arrest or warrants, however; 

like Stocktown, Morton’s police department appears to aggressively pursue off-scene offenders. 

The seeming disparity between offense identification and arrests may be an artifact of training 

and supervision: officers are instructed to pursue an arrest if they believe an offense has taken 

place, and may err on the conservative side in identifying charges. 

The importance of examining population-adjusted figures is most obvious in the data 

from Helena. The seemingly high arrest rate evaporates, and it becomes clear that it is an artifact 

of officers’ very low reporting-writing levels. Compared with the other communities, all police 

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actions occur at low levels in Helena, especially off-scene pursuits. It would appear that Helena 

police reserve report-writing for incidents that are relatively serious, that involve allegations of 

physical attack; when they identify offenses, they use misdemeanor or felony charges most often. 

This selectivity is consistent with findings from the qualitative analysis: police officials are 

indifferent to routine domestic violence incidents, believe that serious violence is rather rare and 

less serious cases do not merit police involvement, and therefore provide little leadership or 

- supervision to officers in the direction, of more aggressive enforcement. 

Finally Carthage’s police department was predicted to generate low levels of legal 

actions, in part because it was in the process of making a transition toward a more enforcementoriented set of policies and practices, and those efforts were not supported by local judges who 

played key roles on the domestic violence task force. Carthage emerged as a town in which 

police leadership were attempting what might be, for that community, rather radical changes in 

the way domestic violence was handled, and encountering resistance not only from within their 

ranks, but from key collaborators as well. However, Carthage police outperformed these rather 

low expectations. They produced moderate levels of written reports and documentation of 

SA 

offenses, as well as arrest rates. Interestingly, they continued to rely on summonses in both 

misdemeanor and violation level offenses for suspects who had fled the scene, believing (as did 

the local judges and some prosecutors) that warrants were not appropriate for these cases; 

however, they generated many summonses. 

Population-adjusted levels of arraignment, protection orders, guilty pleas, and sanctions 

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are greatly affected by levels of police action, of course.36 In Lakeport, the high levels of police 

action were followed by high levels of court reaction.. Predictions about system performance 

based on the responses and descriptions of local actors turned out to be fairly accurate: this small 

community evidences a comparatively consistent response to domestic violence. In Stocktown, 

despite task force members’ descriptions of a somewhat adversarial courthouse and a due process 

orientation from the bench, arraignment rates, orders of protections, and convictions were rather 

high - another example of a $sponsive criminal justice reaction. One might infer from this 

pattern that the judges’ high expectations for proof, coupled with the prosecutor’s interest in 

evidence-based prosecution, encouraged police to adopt high standards for report-writing and 

evidence documentation. Sustenance for these high expectations may have come partly in the 

form of the goodwill and cooperative relationships developed across criminal justice and victim 

services agencies in the community, and the widely shared belief that judges were not indifferent 

or hostile to victims, but rather, protective of defendants’ rights in stakes with potentially serious 

consequences. 

Morton’s somewhat mixed pattern of police actions is followed by high levels of court 

action, at least up to the point of conviction. Among these communities, Morton’s judges were 

the most integrally involved in progressive task force reforms. Although they usually remained 

on the periphery of most of the task force’s activities, they seemed to subscribe to the shared goal 

36 In some communities, some victims initiate complaints after the incident by coming to the 

police station or sometimes the courthouse to file charges. Because data collection for this 

project began with police files, it cannot be known how many such cases were victim-initiated. 

However, respondents in all communities indicated that they thought this was quite rare in 

domestic cases, although it was not uncommon for a victim to file charges shortly after an 

incident that had been reported to police (and these cases were included in these analyses). 

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of improving victim safety, and used their power to issue orders of protection fairly freely 

However, few offenders were sentenced to jail, although probation was used somewhat more 

frequently. It is important to note that Morton’s domestic violence program operated a batterers’ 

intervention program, which was reportedly frequently invoked by judges (although strenuously 

opposed by defense lawyers). Judges might have seen this program as a constructive alternative 

to more restrictive penalties. 

Helena‘s low level of police intervention translates into relatively low levels of court 

action, although the criminal court judge made frequent use of orders of protection, as he 

reported in interviews. However, the court’s practices were otherwise inconsistent with the 

orientations of the local task force and the views of the domestic violence program and District 

Attorney; and indeed, the judge was unaware of exactly what the task force did, or who 

participated on it. 

Finally, judges in Carthage, with more incidents to process than those in Helena, yielded 

very low levels of orders of protection, a comparatively high level of outright dismissals, and few 

jail sentences or probation sentences. These results were as expected: the judges were outspoken 

in their views that the criminal justice process was not an appropriate venue for most of what 

police labeled domestic violence, and countered attempts to criminalize such behavior through 

the courts. 

A final perspective on these findings is provided in Table 4.14, which charts the 

population-adjusted number of incidents subjected to cumulative legal actions, across 

communities. If the criminal justice process constitutes part of the fabric of a net of 

accountability, then this table suggests differences in the size as well as the density of that net. 

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Stocktown and Morton, followed by Lakeport, compile more records of incidents (and also 

document those incidents more thoroughly); Helena produces a very low official rate of domestic 

violence. Those first three communities also retain roughly equal proportions of cases through 

arrest or warrants, and arraignments. Of the three, Lakeport evidences the least attrition in the 

courts. Helena, as described earlier, starts low and ends lower. 

Some additional observations are in order. If we conceive of the criminal justice process 

as a net, then it is apparent that it operates as a more entangling and larger net in some 

communities than in others. At the report-writing phase, for example, Morton generates 250% of 

the reports written in Helena. At the other end (sentencing), four times as many defendants are 

sentenced in Lakeport as in Carthage or Helena. 

Obviously, the level of decisions made at one stage place ceilings on the level of 

subsequent decisions. Arrest levels vary less than do report-writing levels, although they do 

track together; the range of variation in arraignment levels is compressed by the range of 

variation in arrest levels. However, there are differences in the level of case retention between 

arrest and arraignment (as noted previously), that do not correspond neatly with the overall level 

-5 

of enforcement activity. For example, Stocktowin loses a significant proportion of cases, despite 

a policy that prioritizes warrants for domestic cases; Morton, a more bureaucratized and 

centralized criminal justice system, experiences a similar attrition rate. The same is true for 

Carthage, probably due to its use of summonses rather than warrants to bring in off-scene 

suspects. Lakeport loses few cases at this stage, and neither does Helena, although in other 

respects these communities appear to have very different orientations toward domestic violence. 

Perhaps the most important observation to be made from this presentation of these data is 

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the very low levels of convictions on any charge, despite variations in level of police and court 

activity. While the disparity across communities on this outcome is significant (twice as many 

convictions are made in Stocktown as in Helena), in all cases they represent small proportions of 

police reports. Measured as a proportion of arrest, they vary as well, between 44% and 60%; 

there appears to be no correspondence between the level of community commitment to 

coordinated strategies or consensus on mission, and conviction rate. It is interesting to note that 

the highest sentencing (jail or probation) levels were generated by the due-process oriented 

judges of Stocktown and the rehabilitation-oriented judges of Lakeport. 

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Chapter 5: Conclusions and Directions for Future Research 

The purpose of this project was to explore the dimensionality of community responses to 

domestic violence, with a particular focus on communities that had attempted to establish 

coordinated responses through a domestic violence task force that included victim advocacy 

groups and criminal justice agents. The impetus behind encouraging community coordination 

efforts is twofold: first, it recognizes the diversity of community histories, resources, and 

politics; and second, it acknowledges the inherent fragmentation of the criminal justice process, 

and the implications of that fragmentation for victims and communities in the area of domestic 

.- 

violence. The project is primarily descriptive and qualitative, not explanatory; primarily 

hypothesis-generating, not hypothesis-testing. 

This report provides portraits of five communities, which are probably typical in many 

respects of small cities, but atypical (at least among New York cities) insofar as all of them had 

task forces dedicated to domestic violence at the outset of the research, something that was true 

of only 25% of cities surveyed. It is important to note that the presence of such a task force was 

s=. 

a criterion for inclusion but beyond that, these communities were selected on the basis of the 

diversity they exhibit on a small set of dimensions that could be assessed at the beginning of the 

project: police practices at the report-writing and arrest stage; allocation of criminal justice 

resources (across agencies) to domestic violence matters (such as training, legal advocacy, 

information collection); strength and stability of the local domestic violence program; degree of 

formalization and comprehensiveness of interagency agreements; breadth of criminal justice 

participation in the task force; and the level of community outreach in which the task force 

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participated. Even more variability in these communities' responses to domestic violence was 

observed after the project was underway. 

Therefore, this project was not an examination of "model cities" or model programs, nor 

is it an explicit test of hypotheses about political, cultural, or economic conditions that promote 

better coordination, nor hypotheses about the effectiveness of particular programmatic or policy 

changes. It is not a rigorous quantitative analysis of competing policies or programs; it does not 

.- lend itself directly to conclusions about "what works" in community coordination strategies. Its 

contribution to our understanding of responses to domestic violence rests in its comparisons of 

I 

criminal justice performance in contributing to community safety and accountability nets under 

varying interorganizational arrangements, and in its highlighting of often-overlooked variables 

that may place significant roles in shaping local responses. This study was not intended to 

generate normative models (or ideals) that should be the bases for policy or program 

recommendations, although it does generate empirical models that help us understand why some 

coordination efforts are more successful than others in producing stronger and more 

comprehensive nets. 

~ 

The following sections briefly summarize the findings of the study, concluding with a 

discussion of the implications of these findings for future research and policy. 

Summary of Findings 

Defln ing community coordination 

"Coordinated community response'' has become a buzzword in criminal justice and 

advocacy circles, and authoritative funding and research agencies promote coordinated 

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community responses as a solution to the multifaceted problem of domestic violence. This 

perspective reflects recognition of the poor fit between traditional criminal justice paradigms 

(about both victims and offenders) and the complex issues raised in domestic violence cases. 

While increasingly coordination efforts have become more inclusive - reaching out to public 

health and education sectors, as well as to community organizations such as churches - the 

primary impetus for coordination efforts, as well as the most common activities associated with 

them, revolve around changing the criminal justice process to become more responsive to 

victims. Most often, these activities are initiated by multi-agency task forces, that typically 

- 

resulted from the work of domestic violence program advocates, engaging the participation of 

one or more criminal justice agencies. Inevitably, a very diverse array of interorganizational 

arrangements, agreements, and activities have come to be grouped under the category of 

"coordinated responses." 

This study identified two general meanings of the term "coordinated community 

response." The first meaning is the existence of an active interorganizational structure (that 

transcends criminal justice agencies, but must include some of them) aimed at collaboratively 

h I 

improving the local response to domestic violence. Coordination is a process, or project, with a 

general aim of changing or improving policy or practice; it is variable and multidimensional. The 

first sections of this report mapped some of the dimensions of coordination, through analysis of 

survey data from criminal justice agencies (police departments and prosecutors) and through 

qualitative study of five communities. 

The second meaning is a product: the existence of stronger and more comprehensive 

(rather than weaker and more unpredictable) nets of victim safety and accountability. The 

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-- 

strength of such nets depends on many factors other than criminal justice decisions: the 

availability and quality of victim services, the orientations of public agencies that are in contact 

with victims (such as child protective services), and community culture, in the form of informal 

social controls directed at offenders, as well as norms and expectations about the entitlement of 

victims to help. The second sections of this report assessed the strength of these nets, as 

measured (in a limited way, to be sure) by the character of criminal justice responses to domestic 

violence, based on descriptive quantitative analysis of case data. 

The dimensionality of criminal justice and community responses to domestic violence 

Surveys of law enforcement agencies and District Attorneys in New York reveal that 

there is considerable variation in the formal and informal practices used to respond to domestic 

violence incidents. While most police departments have adopted specific domestic violence 

policies or protocols, these policies vary in their definition of what "counts" as a domestic 

incident. Moreover, they vary in their follow-up (pursuit) practices for off-scene suspects; their 

post-arrest booking and detention practices; their investigation practices; and their interaction 

with (and referrals to) victim-oriented community agencies. Only one in four police departments 

reported participating in a local domestic violence task force. 

,i_ 

Interestingly, although it seems commonsensical to classify police departments in terms 

of how progressive they are in this area, there is no single dimension of policy or practice along 

which departments can be arrayed empirically. The dimensions on which practices vary are (1) 

connectedness with victim advocacy; (2) proactivity of policies regarding apprehension and 

detention of suspects at the time of incidents; (3) dedication of resources to specialized domestic 

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violence work; (4) degree of officer discretion afforded by arrest policy; and (5) task force 

participation. 

Prosecutors are less likely to have formal written policies about domestic violence than 

are police departments, but nonetheless can articulate their informal practices in these cases. 

Importantly, these practices vary a great deal, in terms of their responses to victims, responses to 

suspects, policies about proceeding without victim participation, dedication of resources to 

domestic violence matters, and utilization of information and case tracking; and only half of all 

prosecutors report participating in a task force. As was true with police policies, prosecutors’ 

-- 

policies do not comprise a single dimensions of proactivity. Instead, they vary across six 

dimensions: (1) policies aimed at enhancing short-term victim safety; (2) pretrial diversion and 

victimless prosecution; (3) dedication of resources to domestic violence cases; (4) commitment 

to seeking jail or probation sentences for offenders; (5) using and transmitting information from 

police and the courts; (6) victim advocacy. However, these analyses are based on a relatively 

small sample, and it is likely that the diversity of dimensions says more about the lack of 

intercorrelation among these practices than about the integrity of the dimensions themselves. 

2- 

These surveys, complemented by interviews in several sites with agents in criminal 

justice as well as advocacy organizations, provided the basis for a comprehensive catalog of the 

dimensions on which community responses might vary. These sets of variables can be loosely 

grouped as (1) criminal justice agencies’ policies and practices; (2) criminal justice system 

characteristics (expectations, activities, and discretionary decisions that are the product of more 

than one agency’s policies or behavior, such as the speed with which cases are resolved); (3) 

victim services’ agencies’ operations; (4) interagency relationships among victim advocates, 

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criminal justice agencies, and others in the community; and (5) the role of communities, as 

participants and audience, in coordinated response activities. 

The character of community responses in jive cities: results of qualitative research 

Five sites were selected for intensive observation and analysis, based on preliminary 

survey and interviewing work. Of the dimensions discussed above, there were six that are of 

I clear policy and research sigr&icance; and on which preliminary information was available to 

permit site selection: (1) police practices and policies; (2) dedication of criminal justice resources 

to domestic violence matters; (3) domestic violence program attributes; (4) formalization of 

interagency protocols; (5) inclusiveness of criminal justice participation in the local domestic 

violence task force; and (6) task force outreach to the community. Sites were selected from 

upstate New York communities; each site represented a distinctive combination of these 

characteristics. Judgements about the where a community "scored" on each dimensions were 

made on the basis of information about statewide baselines (when available), and comparatively 

within the sample otherwise. 

=* 

Moreover, sites varied in the number of these dimensions on which they "scored high": 

one site scored high on five out of six dimensions; one ranked high on three, moderate on three; 

one ranked high on one, moderate on three, and low on two; one ranked high on two, low on 

four, and one ranked high on only one, moderate on only one, and low on the other four. Implicit 

in this rough measurement strategy is an overall ranking of the level of coordination activity. 

Site selection was followed by interviewing and observation in each community, over a period of 

several months (during which time systematic case data collection was also underway). 

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Interviews were aimed at producing more finely textured portraits of community responses, 

across the dimensions already identified. They were also intended to uncover problems, 

obstacles, and specific experiences of criminal justice agents and advocates. 

In general, these interviews confirmed the preliminary assessments made at the site 

selection stage. However, they also produced a wealth of information that challenges (or at least, 

is inconsistent with) conventional wisdom about improving community responses. Following 

are a few examples: 

0 The level of commitment and energy invested in coordinated responses, as well as the 

quality of interorganizational relationships among advocacy and criminal justice 

agencies, is not easy to predict simply from the size, visibility, or resource level of 

domestic violence programs. 

0 More generally, the level of optimism expressed about coordination itself varied: in some 

communities, respondents were upbeat about future activities, in others they were more 

focused on what seemed to be failures of their efforts. 

"No drop" policies may be adopted by victim-oriented, progressive district attorneys, but 

may also be employed in a defensive, self-protective fashion, as a means of testing and 

ensuring victim cooperation in acquiring convictions. 

0 Formalization of protocols and interagency agreements is avoided by some criminal 

justice agents who seek to preserve flexibility in dealing with aggressive defense 

attorneys. 

0 Police officials' attitudes and orientations toward domestic violence appear to be related 

to department policies - this is no surprise. However, judges' attitudes and orientations 

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vary at least as much, and are likewise strongly reflected in their behavior on the bench, 

and their self-described use of discretion. Judicial behavior in domestic violence cases 

has very seldom been studied, and even less often has this behavior been attributed to the 

judges themselves. The judges interviewed for this study seemed to differ on two 

important dimensions: first, their views on the credibility of victims and the appropriate 

use of criminal sanctions for domestic violence; and second, their commitment to 

protecting defendants’ rights and due process considerations. 

0 Low-level, interstitial decisions (such as whether or not to fingerprint, whether to utilize 

summonses or warrants, whether or not to pursue suspects who fled the scene) are 

identified by local actors as critical to aggregate outcomes. Case processing varies 

tremendously across these areas of discretionary policy and practice. 

0 Finally, many criminal justice agents are inclined to define the range of domestic violence 

policy and practice within the scope of their own local experiences; they seldom talk 

about how these matters are handled elsewhere, and tend to take for granted the 

restrictions that are imposed by other agencies. However, their adaptations to these 

limitations are not uniform. For example, faced with active defense lawyers and 

disinterested judges, two police departments reacted quite differently; one attempted to 

facilitate evidence-based prosecution, improving reporting and information collection 

functions; another adopted an indifferent attitude toward domestic cases, seeing little 

point in investing in such efforts. 

i 

Measuring the criminal justice net of safety and accountability 

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The final phase of this research involved analysis of case data from each community, in 

order to assess general predictions about the performance of local criminal justice systems that 

varied in their coordination strategies. Data were collected from police department, 

prosecutorial, and court records. A uniform coding strategy was adopted in four of the five 

communities; the fifth required slight modifications inasmuch as the police department did not 

use the state's standardized domestic incident report. Data were coded on situational 

- characteristics, victim, offender, and relationships characteristics, allegations of criminal 

conduct, and police, prosecutor, and court decisions. Because data were codedfroni oficial 

records, they represent police interpretations of events. While for most research strategies, this 

would be a flaw or limitation, it is critical to the comparative strategy of this study, since one 

objective of this research was to observe and interpret differences in the "sweep" of criminal 

justice nets in communities that one could expect to have quite similar incidences of domestic 

violence incidents. 

Hence results are reported in two ways: first, in descriptive terms using as a baseline the .% 

number of reports written (during the data collection periods) by each police department; and 

second, in descriptive and comparative terms, adjusting figures to community population. Key 

variables include report-writing; documentation of evidence in written reports; statutory offense 

indication on police reports; police arrests (on-scene and off); arraignment; pretrial detention; 

issuance of orders of protection; court disposition; and sentencing (to jail or probation). The 

"performance" of local criminal justice systems looks somewhat different depending on which 

set of measures one is looking at. 

In the main, comparisons of "performance" across these key variables tends to confirm 

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most of the predictions generated by qualitative community studies. Helena was expected to 

evidence a passive or even negative response to domestic violence (based on police officials' 

negative attitudes toward victims, confrontational relationships among law enforcement and the 

well-established advocacy program, and the detachment of the local judge). True to prediction, 

Helena's criminal justice ''net'' is quite weak, compared with those of the other communities; few 

suspects are written up, apprehended, convicted, or sentenced; few victims receive criminal court 

.- orders of protection. At the other endzof the spectrum, Morton, with a well-established and 

inclusive coordination effort, produced high levels of most outcome measures, although lower 

levels of police charges and sanctions than one might have expected. In hindsight, one 

interpretation of this anomaly might be an emerging difference of opinion between police 

officials and advocates over the prioritization of cases: the former favored heavy investment of 

resources into known recidivists and high-risk cases, while the latter argued for a more consistent 

response to all victims and offenders. Lakeport, with a less established but more formalized, and 

equally inclusive, coordination effort, also produced high levels of most outcome measures. iStocktown and Carthage "outperformed" predictions based on qualitative research, in 

several ways. It was predicted that Stocktown would be constrained by a demanding bench and 

strained by a moderate domestic violence program that appeared to be working at or beyond 

capacity. However, that community produced higher levels of court outcomes than was 

expected, a fact that might be attributable to the highly cooperative relationships among police, 

prosecutors, and advocates, and the commitment to implementing evidence-based prosecution. 

Carthage was predicted to produce low levels of legal action of all sorts, based on the attitudes of 

local judges, problems of accessing important case information in the courthouse, and the use of 

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low-level legal actions for off-scene suspects, as well as the limited involvement of a small and 

relatively new advocacy program. However, police performance measures indicate higher levels 

of activity than predicted in this community, although, as expected, the criminal court added little 

to these legal interventions. 

These findings lead to a few summary observations about these communities, which may 

be generalizable to similar cities. First, police report-writing varies dramatically, more so than 

the other community-level measures of safety and accountability. However, given the relatively 

low levels of formal legal action (arrest) - ranging from 30% to 47% of written reports - there 

are many incidents that involve no formal response. However, the quality of reports varies as 

well; this is critically important, since (1) many offenders are not on the scene when police 

arrive, and therefore are not (sometimes cannot) be apprehended; and (2) victims may choose to 

pursue the charges one or more days after the incident, when a complete and detailed report gives 

them more credibility than a sketchy one. 

Second, police behavior has an inevitable limiting effect on the strength of the 

community net: criminal court judges cannot act on charges that are not brought to them. While 

in New York, some domestic violence cases are routed through Family Court, that was rare in the 

cities studied here. 

Third, there is considerable variability in the proportion of cases that fall through the 

cracks between law enforcement and arraignment. Some of this is probably attributable to 

variations in warrant and summons customs. 

Fourth, the probabilities of conviction (by guilty plea; there were no trials in these 

overwhelmingly misdemeanor-level cases) were higher in communities with lower levels of 

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arraignments. Perhaps those communities tacitly screen out many cases at early points in the 

process, leaving judges to face only the most determined victims or serious charges or damning 

evidence. 

Fifth, very few offenders face supervision or incarceration following a domestic violence 

incident. Future analyses of these data will permit some tentative inferences about the frequency 

with which fines, counseling, community service, and other sentencing alternatives were 

adopted, and the frequency qith which these conditions were attached to adjournments in 

contemplation of dismissal. However, it is important to note that judges varied widely in their 

views about the most commonly mentioned alternative, counseling: for some, it meant batterers’ 

intervention programming, while for others it meant marriage counseling. 

Conclusions and Implications for Future Research 

Finally, this study sheds some light on the role of courts, domestic violence advocacy .I, 

programs, community task forces, victims, and offenders. 

The roZe ofthe courts: Much research and policy discussion has revolved around police 

practices; but while they are undoubtedly important for the construction of community safety 

nets, it appears that the behavior of the courts is very important as well. This study uncovered 

two communities whose overall responses to domestic violence were seemingly shaped by the 

bench: in one case, by a rights-oriented judge who held police and prosecutors to high 

evidentiary standards (which they often met); and in another case, by judges who strongly 

believed that most domestic violence cases did not even belong in court, which stifled and 

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discouraged the police department members of the local task force. 

The role of advocacy programs: While domestic violence advocacy programs are 

important parties to any coordinated response effort, the attributes that are often noted or 

emphasized (or that are likely to attract attention) are not necessarily the attributes that contribute 

to strong community responses. Large, well-established and well-funded programs may not be 

able to change the entrenched behavior of skeptical or hostile criminal justice agents; smaller 

agencies may succeed in establishing cooperative relationships with local police and prosecutors. 

By virtue of their status as non-profits, often staffed by volunteers, successful advocacy 

programs may be those that learn to "do more with less." The ability to cultivate long-term 

relationships with criminal justice agencies may be more important (for the purposes of 

improving criminal justice responses) than are resources. (Of course, a strong community 

response also would require adequate resources for victims, beyond the criminal justice system, 

which more established programs might be able to provide.) 

- 

The role oftask forces: The findings of this study suggest that inclusive and broad-based 

participation in a task force dedicated to domestic violence may be a very limited indicator of the 

activities of that task force. The communities with the weakest nets represented the ends of this 

continuum: one had a task force with full participation from all sectors of the community, 

including all criminal justice agencies at the city and county level, and was led by a local judge; 

the other had a task force that was eschewed by local police, and unrecognized by the local 

judge. The communities with the strongest nets varied as well: one had a longstanding, 

inclusive, and active task force; the other had a task force that seemed to include the active 

membership of police leaders, the deputy district attorney, and the advocacy program. The 

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existence of a coordinating group may be a necessary condition for coordinating activities, but it 

is not a sufficient one. 

The role of victims: At the time these data were collected, victims were seen as essential 

to prosecution in some communities. Expectations about victim involvement are difficult to 

change, although one community demonstrated fairly successful efforts to adopt evidence-based 

prosecution. One of the frequently-heard justifications for this is the simple fact that almost all 

domestic incidents result in violation-.or misdemeanor-level charges (if they result in charges at 

all). However, many interview respondents expressed attitudes toward victims that were openly 

__ 

skeptical, critical, or demeaning, and it is difficult to avoid concluding that these attitudes affect 

the way discretionary decisions are made. Where claims of victimization are delegitimized by 

criminal justice officials, there is little reason to expect those officials to overcome obstacles to 

coordinating in the direction of greater accountability and victim safety. 

The role of offenders: Domestic violence offenders seem resistant to change; many of 

them recidivate frequently; they are seldom subjected to significant or purposive interventions 

that are truly designed to affect their behavior. Perhaps for these reasons, more attention is paid 

to victims’ behavior (such as reporting), to victim safety, and to victim satisfaction with various 

responses from community agencies. However, at the local level, policy makers and researchers 

must remember that some criminal justice officials are attentive to the rights and claims of 

suspects and offenders as well; they sometimes claim that they are reluctant to take action in a 

case that involves a partner if they would not make the same discretionary decision in a case that 

involved acquaintances or strangers. While these claims may be exaggerated, in some cases, or 

unjustified, it remains the case that these concerns must be recognized and incorporated into 

136 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
coordination strategies, which typically focus on increasing the probability of an offender 

becoming and remaining entangled with the law. These concerns, when legitimate, are not 

insurmountable. 

This project contributes to future research agendas in three general ways. First, these 

findings demonstrate a research strategy that may be fruitful for developing more refined 

understandings of the ways community responses vary, and the implications for important 

outcomes: by comparing communities, important factors may become more apparent, factors that 

might elude detection in single-site studies, even longitudinal ones. This study provides only a 

-- 

rough cut at comparative analysis, but it illustrates the possibilities of such a strategy. The 

proliferation of federally- and state-sponsored programs aimed at specific objectives could 

provide a remarkable laboratory for understanding community change if evaluations of such 

programs could be coordinated to examine common independent and dependent variables. 

Second, this project focused on an outcome measure - the performance of the criminal 

justice system in creating a safety and accountability net - as a first step toward adoption of truly 

community-level variables. Many studies of domestic violence interventions focus on individual 

offenders, in particular on recidivism in populations of offenders who have been subject to a 

particular intervention (such as arrest, or a BIP). This is an important strategy for learning about 

the effectiveness of specific interventions. However, given that the crime of partner violence is 

common, often unreported, and historically subject to very limited criminal justice reactions, it is 

equally important to understand how strong the legal nets are. A community that succeeds in 

effectively treating a select subset of offenders cannot claim to have a community-based 

response. Future research that combines other agencies’ contributions to such nets with the work 

137 

h T 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
of criminal justice agencies would be particularly valuable. As research on community 

partnerships and coordination extends beyond advocacy programs and criminal justice agencies, 

into the fields of public health, family courts, and other social services, practitioners and 

researchers must clarify their expectations and predictions about the changes they hope to 

achieve. 

Third, this project sheds some light on some important independent variables, which, 

-- while difficult to measure, may be determinative in the success or failure of community 

coordination efforts. In particular, judges emerged from this project as highly variable elements 

in local task forces, and their orientations toward domestic violence were well-known and 

understood by others in the Community. As powerful decision makers in misdemeanor courts, 

judges may be limiting or libirsting factors in attempts to improve community responses. 

In addition. low-visibility, interstitial decisions by criminal justice agencies emerged as 

potentially significant obstacles or facilitators for change. While traditionally the focus of 

domestic violence research among criminal justice scholars has been on arrest (usually on-scene 

arrest), and to a lesser extent, protection orders and sentencing, this study suggests that the 

quality of report-writing, the accessibility of case information to various actors, the prioritization 

of domestic violence warrants, and other routine practices may play a more significant role in 

aggregate outcomes than researchers might suspect. 

j_ 

Finally, the dynamics within task forces, and not just their presence or composition, is 

worth closer inspection. Greater inclusiveness sounds more desirable, but future researchers 

might wish to explore the possibility that certain key elements are critical for establishment of 

good working relationships and change opportunities, while the active participation of other 

138 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
actors may be less critical. 

139 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
-- 

Tables 

p 

140 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Table 2.1 Scope of Police Departments’ Arrest Policies (n=207) 

Family offense relationship^^^ 

Family offense relationships and cohabiting 

couples 

Family offense relationships, cohabiting couples 

and same-sex couples 

same-sex couples, and dating couples 

Family offense relationships, cohabiting couples, 

n (Total) 

13 20 9 42 

(3 1 %) (48%) (2 1 Yo) ( 1 OOYO) 

(20%) (45%) (35%) ( 100%) 

(53%) (29%) (1 8%) (1 00%) 

(29%) (26%) (44%) (1 00%) 

(32%) (35%) (33%) (1 00%) 

8 18 14 40 

20 I1 7 38 

25 23 39 87 

66 72 69 207 

1 Relationship by marriage, divorce, children-in-common, or other blood relationships, as 

defined by New York State. 

141 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Table 2.2 Police Department Policy: Arrest and Follow-up in Misdemeanor Incidents (n=207) 

Require written reports for all domestic cases 

Require supervisor review for domestic incident reports 

90% 

88% 

Pres ribe pursuit of suspects who have fled scene in domestic I inclients 78% 

I 20% 

File warrants without victim complainthignature when suspect has I fled scene I 

1 64% 1 I Rortine overnight detention of misdemeanor suspects in domestic 

vi0 ence cases 

I Refer domestic violence cases to detective for follow-up I 25% I 

I42 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Table 2.3 Police Departments' Responses to Victims (n=207) 

Information given regarding filing for \barrants 

Referral to social services 

78O 0 

90' n 

Transport to safe location 

Follo~ -up contact M Ith domestic violence unit 

Victim adcocate assigned 

Liaison M ith domestic violence service proc ider 

Participation on local task force 

1-13 

mo 0 

76O 0 

I 70~ 

1 IO0 

2600 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Table 2.4 Factor Analysis of Police Departments’ Policies and Practices (n=207) 

144 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Table 2.5 Prosecutors' Routine Policies and Practices in Domestic Cases (n=45) 

IHa\.e \,ictim ad\ ocate available 

:lpprize victim of suspect's release 

Track cases for specialized prosecution 

Track data to inform charging for recidivists 

Tra,ck data to inform sentence recommendations for 

Iiiforiiiuriiit7 ~nuiiuperni.nt 

recidivists 

14 6 0 30 

4s 29 6' 50 

29 h 11 64 

36 -_ '7 -- 57 

31 -_ 43 

1? 

-- 

3-1 1: 

Routinelv receive police reports on domestic 

i 11 c i den t S 

Routinel\, receive police reports on arrests In 

domestic cases I 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Table 2.6 Prosecutors’ Task Force Participation and Domestic Violence Office Policies (n=45) 

146 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Table 2.7 Factor Analysis of Prosecutors’ Policies and Practices (n=45) 

eciaIized victim advocate available 

147 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Table 2.8: Dimensions of Coordination 

E. Criminal justice agencies' policies and practices 

1. Police practices 

a. 

b. Report writing 

C. Arrest policies 

Scope of "domestic violence" defined by departmental policy 

A. 

B. 

C. 

'A. Pursuit policy 

B. 

Prosecutor practices: Intake and charging 

a. 

b. Pre-trial detention and release 

C. Issuing orders of protection 

d. 

e. Sentencing: treatment, supervision, accountability 

Discretionary, presumptive, mandatory arrest policies 

Response to cross-complaints, "dual arrest" policies 

Arrest, ticketing, booking, post-arrest detention practices 

d. Response to absent offenders 

Warrants, summonses, and citizen complaints 

2. 

3. Court decisions 

Scope and definitibn of "domestic violence" adopted by court 

Dispositions: dismissal, deferred dismissal, conviction 

F. Criminal justice system characteristics: fragmentation and coordination within the system 

1. 

2. 

Expectations about victims' roles and responsibilities 

Allocation of resources to domestic violence cases 

a. 

b. 

C. Training (intra- and inter-agency) 

Adversarial vs consensual legal proceedings 

Timeliness: points of delay in processing complaints 

Consistency of and access to case information/records across agencies 

Allocation of resources, orientation toward victim assistance and advocacy 

3. 

4. 

G. Victim services agencies' operations and mission 

1. 

2. 

3. 

4. 

Interagency relationships: distance and coordination across criminal justice and service agencies 

1. 

Mission and scope: focus on domestic violence, women, all victims 

Reliance on volunteers vs. paid staff 

Tenure of leadership, stability of organization 

Semites available for victims and for offenders 

H. 

Mechanisms of coordination and collaboration: task forces, councils, partnerships 

a. Longevity of initiative 

b. Participation patterns 

C. Leadership 

d. 

Adversarial, cooperative, and indifferent relationships among agencies 

Degree of formality in shared protocols and policies 

Agreement on priority problems and strategies 

Referrals to victim and offender services organizations from the criminal justice system 

Scope of activities, programs, initiatives 

2. 

3. 

4. 

5. 

I. The role of community in community coordination 

1. 

2. 

3. 

Definition of community as a resource: inclusion of groups with community constituencies (eg, 

clergy); inclusion of "the opposition" (eg, defense bar) 

Definition of community as a target audience: educational efforts 

Definition of community: outreach to potential and unidentified victims and offenders 

148 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
~ ____ ~~ ~~ ~ 

Progressive police practices in 

arrest, report-writing, booking 

Task force/coalition outreach to 

community 

moderate 

moderate 

Inclusive c.j. participation in task 

force or coalition 

D.V. program resources, staffing, 

stability in community 

moderate high high 

moderate high low 

~~ ~ ~____ 

C.J. resources allocated to d.v. 

cases: victim advocates, training, 

information collection 

Formalized interagency protocols 

and agreements 

Tabie 3.1 

Site Selection Criteria 

Eker>ofi-l Stocktown I Morton I Helena 

.~ high high high 

rn oderate high high 

high 1 moderate I high 1 low 

high 1 low I moderate ~~ 1 low 

Carthage 

moderate 

low 

high 

low 

low 

low 

149 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Table 3.2 Demographic and Crime Characteristics of Study Cities 

White: 88% 

Black: 9% 

Other: 3% .- 

White: 75% White: 88% 

Black:20% Black: 8% 

Other: 5% Other: 4% 

Population 

Median household 

income 

Median family 

income 

Unemployment 

(Males over 16) 

Public assistance 

20,000- 

25,000 

$32,000 

$38,000 

6 Yo 

9 yo 

% Population 

change 

Black: 5% 

Racial diversity Other: 1% 

$24,000 

$30,000 

6 Yo 

$21,000 $23,000 

$28,000 $31,000 

6 Yo 6% 

50,000- 

75,000 

12% 

>150,000 

15% 10% 

50,000- 

75,000 

High school 

graduate or less 

Index crime rate 

per 1,000 (1996) 'IIndex violent crime 

rate per 1,000 

(rape, robbery, 

aggravated 

assault) (1996) 

Total police 

personnel (1996) 

Sworn police 

personnel (1996) 

61 Yo 60 % 56% 59% 63% 

56 58 

2.3 7.3 

55 241 632 161 166 

52 142 474 114 159 

(I 996) 2.2 1 2.3 3.0 2.2 2.6 

50,000- 

75,000 

-1 1 

White: 87% 

Black: 10% 

Other: 3% 

$20,000 

$27,000 

8 Yo 

17% 

Sworn officers per 

I,OOO population 

150 

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of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Table 3.3 Dimensions of Coordination: Lakeport 

Criminal justice agencies’ policies and practices 

A. Problem definition: Broad definition, including all family and partner relationships, wide array of offenses; 

“injury beyond bruising” is standard for misdemeanor charge; mandatory report-writing; multiple levels of 

review (including chief) 

B. Arrest policies: Mandatory arrest policy predating legal reforms; dual arrest provisions; overnight detention 

C. Response to absent offenders: Pursuit; arrest for misdemeanor and advise victim to file for warrant if violation 

D. Case files: Booking includes photo and fingerprinting for misdemeanors, not violations 

E. Pre-trial detention and ROR: District attorney won’t recommend ROR; judge routinely RORs, especially if 

defendant agrees to counseling 

F. Victims’ roles and responsibilities: District attorney has no drop policy and works with police department to 

improve evidence; victim not expected to actively participate, but charges reduced to violation if she does not 

G. Allocation of resources to case development: Police department, district attorney, and criminal courts have 

easy access to information; computers in all sectors permit ready retrieval 

H. Allocation of resources to victim assistance: District attorney and domestic violence program train police 

department; no in-house victim advocate 

I. Issuance of orders of protection: Orders of protection routinely issued in almost all cases 

J. Type of proceedings: Somewhat adversarial; public defender seeks jury trials, sees district attorney and courts 

as inflexible and punitive, judge generally supports prosecutor’s claims 

K. Points of delay in processing: Long delays between filing for and issuance of warrant; delays in over enrolled 

counseling program 

L. Conviction standards and dispositions: District attorney policy, plea agreements come with requirement for 

counseling; charge reduction only for first offenders 

M. Sentencing options: Frequent use of counseling, including BIP, monitored by program staff with feedback to 

court, and district attorney; probation used as well 

~ ~~~~ 

Social services agencies’ policies and practices 

A. Scope of responsibility: Primary focus is domestic violence victims 

B. Volunteers vs. paid staff: Mix of experienced staff, some volunteers 

C. Stability of organization: Small but stable operations 

D. Services available: Multiple services for victims; BIP available 

151 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
-- 

Relationships between criminal justice and victim services agencies 

A. Structure and inclusiveness of coordination: Task force, initiated by district attorney; includes most key 

criminal justice actors and domestic violence programs 

B. Locus of initiatives: District attorney provides leadership 

C. Relationship across agencies: Cooperative, trusting 

D. Type of relationships: Somewhat asymmetrical; dominated by district attorney, domestic violence program 

plays a supporting role 

E. Information sharing channels: Open exchange of information 

F. Formality in shared protocols and policies: New policies are quickly formalized into an integrated and 

widely disseminated protocol manual 

G. Task orientation: Informatid sharing; grantwriting; policy formulation 

H. Agreement on priority problems: Moderate agreement; domestic violence programs would prefer prioritizing 

victim, task force policies tend to emphasize offender accountability 

I. Stability and continuity of key participants: Task force is new, still settling 

J. Referrals to victim and offender services organizations: Routine referrals from police department to victim 

programs; heavy use of batterers’ programs 

The role of community in community coordination 

A. Definition of community as a resource: Limited to criminal justice and domestic violence programs 

B. Definition of community as a target audience: Not yet 

C. Outreach to potential victims and offenders: Not yet 

D. Priority of domestic violence as an issue: Strong consensus that domestic violence should be a criminal 

justice priority, optimism that intervention will make a difference 

152 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Table 3.4 Dimensions of Coordination: Stocktown 

. . . . . . . . . . . . . 

Criminal justice agencies’ policies and practices 

A. Problem definition: Broad definition of domestic relationships; mandatory police report-writing for all 

incidents; high court standards for probable cause (e.g., misdemeanor assault only if medical help was needed) 

B. Arrest policies: Mandatory arrest policy; presumptive arrest policy in place for 10 years; primary aggressor 

policy; overnight detention 

C. Response to absent offenders: Pursue if arrest intended; officer applies for warrant if suspect not found 

D. Case files: Booking, but no fingerprinting, of most misdemeanors; prosecutors support officer’s charges 

E. Pre-trial detention and ROR: District attorney does not recommend ROR; judges routinely set $500.00 bail 

F. Victims’ roles and responsibilities: Police officers sign complaints if witness; no-drop policy; but court 

requires victim appearance/testimony if defense moves to dismiss 

G. Allocation of resources to case development: Open exchange of information among police, district attorney, 

courts 

H. Allocation of resources to victim assistance: Victim notification of release; victim advocates notified by 

police of incidents; training of police by district attorney, advocates; special ADA for domestic violence 

I. Issuance of orders of protection: Orders routinely issued if case involves injury or repeat offender 

J. Type of proceedings: Proceedings somewhat adversarial; most defendants have counsel, often seek dismissal 

from court 

K. Points of delay in processing: Domestic violence warrants are top priority, routinely executed; district attorney 

moves cases quickly 

L. Conviction standards and dispositions: High and unpredictable standards for conviction; judge requires 

“serious injury” for misdemeanor conviction 

-. 

M. Sentencing options: District attorney recommends jail or probation; judge prefers time served and counseling; 

probation department active in supervising post-conviction 

Social services agencies’ policies and practices 

A. Scope of responsibility: Primarily domestic violence victims 

B. Volunteers vs. paid staff: Both; adequately staffed at present 

E. Stability of organization: Program has stable core of long-term staff, but is growing quickly 

D. Services available: Full range of services for victims; BIP available 

153 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Relationships between criminal justice and victim services agencies 

A. Structure and inclusiveness of coordination: Coalition, active participation from domestic violence program, 

police department, district attorney, probation, family court 

B. Locus of initiatives: Domestic violence program and district attorney lead most initiatives 

C. Relationship across agencies: High level of coordination and cooperation after history of hostility, distrust 

D. Type of relationships: Symmetrical relationships 

E. Information sharing channels: Informal information exchange and recommendations; pragmatic 

communication style 

F. Formality in shared protocols and policies: Informal, often unwritten agree,ments about incremental policy 

changes 

G. Task orientation: Policy development; resource aggregation for new programs (e.g., training, more advocates) 

H. Agreement on priority problems: Shared high priority on victim safety, offender accountability 

1. Stability and continuity of key participants: Stable participants, although coalition survived three police 

chiefs in four years 

J. Referrals to victim and offender services organizations: Defense referral network, although judges are 

reluctant to refer to BIP 

The role of community in community coordination 

A. Definition of community as a resource: Inclusive, open 

B. Definition of community as a target audience: Emergent 

C. Outreach to potential victims and offenders: Emergent efforts 

D. Priority of domestic violence as an issue: High priority for all participants, including judge 

.-_ 

154 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Table 3.5 Dimensions of Coordination: Morton 

.- 

Criminal justice agencies’ policies and practices 

A. Problem definition: Broad, inclusive definition, in terms of relationships and behaviors; required incident 

reports and review 

B. Arrest policies: Mandatory arrest policy predates legislative reform; primary aggressor provision; overnight 

detention 

C. Response to absent offenders: Off-scene pursuit policy; depositions taken at scene for use in filing for warrant 

D. Case files: Standard booking; intake ADA processes prior to arraignment 

E. Pre-trial detention and ROR: District attorney does not usually recommend ROR, judges often set bail 

F. Victims’ roles and responsibilities: No-drop policy; police instructed to maximize evidence collection at 

scene; follow-up investigators contact victim 

G. Allocation of resources to case development: Uniform case-numbering system permits case-tracking across 

agencies; system to be integrated into domestic violence program computer 

H. Allocation of resources to victim assistance: Victims notified of release, victim advocate stationed in police 

departmentkourthouse; specialized unit and training in both police department and district attorney’s office. 

1. Issuance of orders of protection: Order of protections routine 

J. Type of proceedings: Quasi-adversarial; most defendants represented by counsel 

K. Points of delay in processing: No-shows require bench warrants, which can be slow to result in apprehension 

L. Conviction standards and dispositions: District attorney attempts to get convictions for misdemeanors even in 

absence of visibkinjuries 

M. Sentencing options: Sentences include BIPs, other offender treatments, probation 

Social services agencies’ policies and practices 

A. Scope of responsibility: Domestic violence program focuses primarily on domestic violence victims 

6. Volunteers vs. paid staff: Core paid staff full-time and part-time, use of university inters and volunteers 

C. Stability of organization: Very stable leadership (15-20 years), gradual growth of organization and expansion 

of programs and services 

D. Services available: Extensive services and referral network for victims, offenders, and families 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
-- 

Relationships between criminal justice and victim services agencies 

A. Structure and inclusiveness of coordination: Coalition, including all key criminal justice agencies and 

advocates 

B. Locus of initiatives: Initiative for coalition is domestic violence program 

C. Relationship across agencies: Mutually supportive, open relationship 

D. Type of relationships: Symmetrical; strong emphasis on candor and compromise 

E. Information sharing channels: Regular and informal information sharing via extensive.network, sustained by 

domestic violence program staff 

F. Formality in shared protocols and policies: Informal; tend to refrain from formalizing policies except for 

purposes related to training 

G. Task orientation: Long-term planning; negotiated policy and practice reforms in all criminal justice domains; 

coordination in resource acquisition; self-study and outside evaluation 

H. Agreement on priority problems: Open discussion about competing objectives of meeting victim needs and 

targeting high rate recidivists (police department priority) 

I. Stability and continuity of key participants: High level of stability, surviving personnel change 

J. Referrals to victim and offender services organizations: Extensive referrals and casework, consultation 

across criminal justice and domestic violence program staff 

The role of community in community coordination 

A. Definition of community as a resource: Very inclusive, open 

B. Definition of community as a target audience: Extensive, via media, newsletter, school intervention 

C. Outreach to potential victims and offenders: Proactive, through education and information sessions for 

clergy, educators;-employers 

D. Priority of domestic violence as an issue: Consensus on high priority of domestic violence 

156 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Table 3.6 Dimensions of Coordination: Helena 

.- 

Criminal justice agencies’ policies and practices 

A. Problem definition: Inclusive definition of domestic relationships; visible injury standard for probable cause; 

report writing discretionary; cursory review of all domestic violence reports 

B. Arrest policies: Presumptive arrest; dual arrest is appropriate; state’s mandatory arrest law is seen as very 

problematic; most released with desk bail after booking 

C. Response to absent offenders: Pursuit likely only if outstanding warrant on another charge 

D. Case files: Prosecutors charge what police report recommends, judge arraigns 

E. Pre-trial detention and ROR: Judge prefers to set high bail, but often RORs a few days later 

F. Victims’ roles and responsibilities: Prosecutor attempts to apply a no-drop policy, but judge reluctant to 

convict without complaining witness 

G. Allocation of resources to case development: Obstacles to information exchange among police, district 

attorney, court 

H. Allocation of resources to victim assistance: Limited victim notification: victim advocates stationed 

prosecutor’s office; no specialized units; no specialized training 

I. Issuance of orders of protection: Orders routinely issued in misdemeanor assault, even over victim objections 

J. Type of proceedings: Most defendants have counsel who advise against quick guilty pleas; adversarial 

K. Points of delay in processing: Bench warrants for no-shows take weeks to execute 

L. Conviction standards and dispositions: Standards for conviction tacitly require victim cooperation; judge 

prefers to incarcerate on other (concurring) charges, e.g., drug possession 

M. Sentencing options: Counseling often recommended, but not specific to domestic violence; BIP deemed too 

expensive for defendants ($20.00) 

~~ 

Social services agencies’ policies and practices 

A. Scope of responsibility: District attorney advocacy program serves all victims, but local domestic violence 

program provides specialized advocate 

B. Volunteers vs. paid staff: Local domestic violence program well-staffed, benefits from interns from local 

colleges 

C. Stability of organization: Domestic violence program well-established, diversified, highly visible in 

community 

D. Services available: Extensive victim services; BIP available 

157 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Relationships between criminal justice and victim services agencies 

A. Structure and inclusiveness of coordination: Two domestic violence task forces, one led by domestic 

violence program, other run by mayor; police department and judges only familiar with latter 

B. Locus of initiatives: Domestic violence program and district attorney share leadership; no input from police 

department, crimina1 court 

C. Relationship across agencies: Indifferent, sometimes hostile 

D. Type of relationships: Adversarial 

E. Information sharing channels: Little information shared; police see district attorney and domestic violence 

program as hostile “watchdogs” 

F. Formality in shared protocols and policies: Little shared policy development 

G. Task orientation: Mayor’s task force is largely symbolic; domestic violence task force undertakes policy 2 

development, resource aggregation, case-level problem-solving 

H. Agreement on priority problems: Task force members agree on prioritizing victim safety, but this view is not 

shared by police/courts 

I. Stability and continuity of key participants: Participation stable, but limited 

J. Referrals to victim and offender services organizations: Very limited knowledge about services/BIP, 

few referrals 

The role of community in community coordination 

A. Definition of community as a resource: Task force participation by diverse groups 

B. Definition of community as a target audience: Active outreach efforts to community through media, 

educational institutions 

C. Outreach to potential victims and offenders: Some efforts at secondary prevention 

a 

D. Priority of domestic violence as an issue: Domestic violence seen as high priority by task force members, 

but as over-politicized and hyped by police 

158 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Table 3.7 Dimensions of Coordination: Carthage 

Criminal justice agencies’ policies and practices 

A. Problem definition: Restrictive definition, “family offense”; probable cause requires visible injury 

B. Arrest policies: Discretionary outside statutory mandate; use of appearance tickets; little use of post-arrest 

detention 

C. Response to absent offenders: No pursuit, routine reliance on summonses 

D. Case files: High incidence of violation-level charges, incomplete booking and printing practices 

E. Pre-trial detention and ROR: High incidence of ROR 

F. Victims’ roles and responsibilities: Reliance on victim appearances at all stages, especially to support warrant 

if offender is no-show 

G. Allocation of resources to case development: Case records, including police reports, seldom accessible to 

practitioners 

H. Allocation of resources to victim assistance: No protocol for notification; planning to have lay advocates in 

court to provide legal advice; no training or specialized unit 

I. Issuance of orders of protection: Few orders issued 

J. Type of proceedings: Consensual proceedings 

K. Points of delay in-processing: Cases often ‘continued‘ when defendant fails to respond to one or more 

summonses 

L. Conviction standards and dispositions: Expectation that ACD is most suitable disposition 

M. Sentencing options: Most sanctions seen as inappropriate; counseling, especially conjoint counseling, favore 

Social services agencies’ policies and practices 

A. Scope of responsibility: Victim services 

B. Volunteers vs. paid staff: Limited paid staff, most located in county seat 

C. Stability of organization: Organization attempting to expand and create new programs, expand resource base 

D. Services available: Limited services for offenders and victims 

159 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
-- 

Relationships between criminal justice and victim services agencies 

A. Structure and inclusiveness of coordination: Task force, with broad inclusive membership from criminal 

justice; well-attended monthly meetings 

B. Locus of initiatives: District attorney’s office, primarily a new DA, police captain 

C. Relationship across agencies: Approximately three years at time of study 

D. Type of relationships: Asymmetrical, dominated by criminal justice concerns; victim services plays secondary 

role I 

E. Information sharing channels: Limited.informa1 communication outside meetings 

F. Formality in shared protocols and policies: Informal and very limited 

G. Task orientation: Assessment; information sharing 

H. Agreement on priority problems: Dissensus within and among participants over nature of problem, role of 

criminal justice in responding 

I. Stability and continuity of key participants: Relatively stable participation and leadership 

J. Referrals to victim and offender services organizations: Few referrals to offender servicedvictim services 

The role of community in community coordination 

A. Definition of community as a resource: Little outreach beyond criminal justice, victim services 

B. Definition of community as a target audience: Minimal 

C. Outreach to potential victims and offenders: Minimal 

D. Priority of domestic violence as an issue: Domestic violence perceived as a priority political and social, 

but not a criminal justice issue 

160 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Table 3.8: Summary of Key Findings of Community Responses 

-- 

Darker cell colors represent policy, practice, or characteristic consistent with higher predicted 

levels of offender accountability and/or victim safety 

~~ 

Police dept 

practices and 

policies 

Prosecution and 

court policies and 

practices 

Characteristics of 

coordinated 

response efforts 

Strength of dc )mest 

Nature a 

Pretrial detentionirelease 

orientations and 

161 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
I 

Report-writing: written 

reports of incidents 

?uality of reportwiting: recording of 

:vidence, injuries, 

hreats, weapons 

?olice offense 

dentification: reports 

ndicating violation, 

nisdemeanor, felony 

Table 4.1: Outcome Variables: Predictions of Community-Level Measures of Accountability and Safety 

Lakeport 

High 

Police dept policy, 

chief reviews 

reports 

High 

police dept policy, 

collaboration with 

DA evidencebased prosecution 

High 

Judge supports 

charges 

Stocktown 

High 

Police dept policy 

b 

High 

Police dept policy, 

evidence-based 

prosecution, high judicial 

standards 

Moderate 

Police anticipate high 

standards for supporting 

serious charges 

Moderate 

Police dept policy 

promotes arrest and use of 

warrants, but court has 

high standards for 

probable cause 

Moderate 

Judges reluctant to 

"punish" before conviction 

3 

Moderate 

Judge and defense bar, vs. 

evidence-based DA 

Moderate 

Judge emphasizes 

yonnal legal action: 

4rrest and off-scene 

egal action (warrants 

ind summonses); 

irraignments 

Morton Helena 

High Low 

Police dept policy No PD policy, little 

supervisory review 

of reports 

High Low 

Police dept policy, 

special unit reviews 

reports, PD focus on 

convicting recidivists 

No police policy 

High Low 

Higher charges Police dept engages 

supported by detailed in victim-blaming, 

incident reports dv is low priority 

High Low 

Police dept policy Police dept does not 

promotes arrest; DA encourage officers 

supports arrests, judges to arrest or pursue 

willing to convict warrants 

High High 

Consensus in CJ that 

Ops protect victims 

Judge believes Ops 

cause more good 

than harm 

High Low 

Consensus on Little evidence, 

criminalization of dv aggressive defense 

bar 

High Moderate 

Consensus on Judge concerned 

~ 

High 

Police dept policy 

promotes arrest 

and use of 

warrants 

acc&ntadility I criminalization of dv 

Orders of protection 

issued by criminal court 

I about victim safety 

High 

Community 

policy; judge 

believes in Ops 

Case dispositions: guilty 

pleas, ACDs vs. 

dismissals 

Moderate 

Judge gives break 

to "first offenders" 

Sanctions: supervision 

in the form of jail, 

probation sentences 

High 

Community policy, 

accountabilitv 

Carthage 

Medium 

Restrictive PD definition 

of "domestic violence" 

Low 

Reports seldom reviewed, 

not easily accessed by 

prosecutor, low 

expectations for conviction 

Low 

Police, prosecutor need 

victim to sustain serious 

charges in court 

Low 

Restricted PD definition of 

"domestic violence"; 

judges discourage legal 

action in dv cases 

Low 

Judges believe Ops cause 

more harm than good 

Low 

Judges don't see dv as 

criminal behavior 

Low 

Judges don't see dv as 

punishable behavior 

I62 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
N (incidents involving adult partners) 

Time span 

YO Domestic violence reports 

offenders 

involving partners and male 

227 1062 328 323 813 

8 mo. 9 mo. 3 mo. 8 mo. 12 mo. 

80% 81% 57% 80% 79% 

% Legally defined as family offenses 36% 3 8% 43% 40% 3 8% I I 

60% I 34% I 43% 

YO Married partners 

YO Cohabiting 

YO On-going relationship 

% Occurred in victim's home 

Age of offender: 

18-25 

26-35 

Over 35 

31% 25% 25% 29% 27% 

3 8% 45% 51% 42% 53% 

62% 75% 72% 79% 68% 

69% 78% 87% 69% 78% 

28% 31?'0 34% 34% 31% 

44% 49% 35% 44% 44% 

28% 21% 3 0% 22% 25% 

YO Offenders African-American 

% Victims African-American 

Age of victim: .% 

18-25 

26-35 

Over 35 

% Offenders reported using alcohol, 

drugs 

17% 3 6% 

11% 22% 

39% 41% 

3 1% 39% 

28% 18% 

9% 8% 

46% 

42% 

35% 

23% 

163 

25% 3 1% 

45% 40% 

3 5% 40% 

19% 20% 

24% 4% 7% 

% Offenders reported possessing or 

using weapon 

% Children reported on scene 

% Victim reports physical attack 

5% 7% 7% 16% 1 0% 

15% 17% 24% 10% 14% 

77% 59% 43% 93% 67% 

%Victim reports property damage or 

taking 

YO Victim reports verbal threats 

28% 32% 19% 28% 30% 

65% 57% 23% 44% 54% 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
YO Officer indicates active order of 

Victim injuries: 

protection 

None reported 

Minor visible 

Pain, not visible 

Major visible 

% Offenders on-scene when police 

present [ 

164 

22% 20% 11% 21% 12% 

75% 72% 84% 65% 67% 

20% 23% 10% 2 9% 26% 

3 yo . 2% 3 ?'o 2% 2 Yo 

2% 2% 4% 4% 5 yo 

' 41% 3 8% 5 6% 3 7% 48% 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Table 4.3 Police and Criminal Court Responses: Statistics from Official Data 38 

Estimated domestic violence partner 

reports written per month 

Offenses recorded on police report: 

Felony 

Misdemeanor 

Violation 

None reported 

On-scene arrest rate (arrestsiwritten 

reports) 

Off-scene arrest, warrant, summons rate 

Total police arrest, off-scene warrant, 

summons rate 

-- 

28 1 I8 306 40 

4% 5% 6% 6% 

42% 39% 13% 53% 

48% 51% 18% 40% 

7% 4% 63% 2% 

58% 50% 22% 81% 

39% 29% 40% 7% 

47% 3 6% 30% 3 4% 

Arraignment rate 39 

Pretrial detention: 40 

Detained at arraignment 

Bailed 

ROWDisposed same day 

.-^ 

Court order of protection issuance rate 

Court disposition: 

Dropped or dismissed 

Court's guilty verdict rate 

ACD 

Don't knowmot recorded in file 

Sentencing: 

Probation ('YO of arraigned) 

Incarceration, not including time 

served (% of arraigned) 

96% 78% 77% 

5% 22% N/A 

42% 53% NIA 

53% 25% NIA 

77% 53% 67% 

15% 4 yo 15% 

50% 59% 49% 

26% 30% 35% 

9% 7% 0% 

9% 1 Yo 7% 

21% 2 1 Yo 7 yo 

87% 

18% 

49% 

33% 

76% 

13% 

69% 

11% 

3% 

9% 

12% 

68 

1 ?A0 

39% 

5 1 Yo 

10% ~ 

40% 

37% 

3 8% 

20% 

60% 

3 0% 

10% 

2 Yo 

8 Yo 

Frequencies based on incidents involving partner relationships, with a male suspect and or aggressor and 38 

female 

victim. 

Arraignment rate based on all incidents resulting in arrest, warrant, or summons. 

Percents based on all cases arraigned. 

39 

40 

165 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Table 4.4 Annual Incidence of Police Reporting, Arrest Practices, and Court Outcomes Standardized 

per 10,000 Population 

4.2 

18.0 

11.7 

23.3 

2.3 0.8 

.. ... 

Reports written (excluding 

‘unfounded’) 145.9 225.1 237.9 + 132.5 

Report indicates: 

Weapons 

Victim injuries 

Property damagekheft 

Verbal threats 

Physical attack 

7.3 

36.5 

46.9 

94.8 

112.3 

15.8 

63.0 

72.0 

128.0 

132.8 

16.7 

38.1 

45.2 

54.7 

102.3 

14.1 13.3 

30.9 43.7 

24.7 39.8 

38.9 ‘71.6 

82.1 88.8 

-- 

I 

Offense indicated on police 

report: 

11.3 

87.8 

114.8 

9.0 

14.3 

30.9 

42.8 

149.9 

Felony 

Misdemeanor 

Violation 

No offense noted 

Police response: 

5.8 

61.3 

70.0 

10.2 

34.7 

33.6 

68.3 

5.3 I .3 

Arrests (on-scene) 

Off-scene arrest, warrant, 

or summons 

Total legal cases initiated 

bv Dolice resmnse 

42.7 

40.5 

83.2 

63.2 

29.3 

41.9 

71.2 

55.0 

26.5 25.4 

3.9 25.5 

Arraigned 65.8 

Detained metria1 3.3 13.9 N/A 

Order of protection 50.7 33.5 36.9 

Court disposition: 

Dismissed by judge 

Guilty verdict 

ACD 

Sentencing: 

15.8 

32.9 

17.1 

5.9 

13.8 

7.0 

37.3 

19.0 

0.6 

13.3 

8.3 

27.0 

19.3 

3.9 

3.9 

2.9 I 11.7 

Sent to probation 

Sent to jail 3.1 I 3.1 

166 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
id 

167 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Table 4.5: Police Reports Written, Annual Incidence per 10,000 population 

Table 4.5 Police Reports Written 

250 ~ 

200 - 

150 - 

100 - 

50 - 

0- 

,//’ 

, 

I I I I 

Lakeport Stocktown Morton Helena Carthage 

168 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Table 4.6:Characteristics of Incidents Recorded by Police, Annual Incidence per 10,000 population 

Table 4.6: Characteristics of Incidents Recorded by Police 

1 

‘I 

140 

120 

100 

80 

60 

40 

20 

h 

, 

1 1 I U’ ~ I 

Lakeport Stocktown MoGon Helena Carthage 

Physical attack Verbal threats 

d Property damageltheft Victim injuries 

Weapons 

169 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Table 4.7: Offenses Indicated on Police Report per 10,000 population 

250 

200 

150 

100 

50 

1’ 1, I I‘ 

I ” 1 _” 

!’ I’ 

Table 4.7: Offenses on Police Reports 

I 

Lakeport Stocktown Morton Helena Carthage 

Felonies 

Violations 

Misdemeanors 

170 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Table 4.8: Legal Actions - Arrests, Warrants and Summonses per 10,000 population 

Table 4.8: Legal Actions, Arrests and Warrants 

I 

100 

80 

60 

40 

20 

A 

1 

I ”’ i 

u ” I I 1 I I 

Lockport Stocktown Morton Helena Carthage 

.. Warrant ‘or summons 

Arrests on-scene 

171 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Table 4.9 Legal Action Initiated by Police and Courts, per 10,000 population 

I00 - 

80 - 

60 - 

40 - 

20 - 

0- 

Table 4.9: Legal Action and Arraignments 

1 I 

i 

I 

Lakeport Stocktown Morton Helena Carthage 

Police legal action 

Arraignments 

172 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Table 4.10: Orders of Protection Issued, Annual Incidence per 10,000 population 

/ 

/,' ,, 

60 

50 

40 

30 

20 

10 

P r" 

/ 

0 I 

Lakeport Stocktown Morton Helena Carthage 

7j ,,' 

Protection orders 

173 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
-- 

Table 4.1 1: Criminal Court Dispositions in Domestic Violence Cases per 10,000 population 

Table 4.1 1 : Court Dispositions 

I 

70 

60 

50 

40 

30 

20 

IO 

A 

U' 

Lakeport Stocktown Morton Helena Carthage 

E Guilty verdict ACOD Dismissals 

174 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Table 4.12: Sanctions in Domestic Violence Cases per 10,000 population 

I 

Table 4.12: Sentencing 

1 

20 

15 

IO 

5 

175 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Table 4.13 

Community outcome 

variable 

Results of comparative population-based analyses of criminal justice responses: 

Comparison of predicted patterns (Table 4.1) with findings 

Lakeport Stocktown Morton Helena Carthage 

'ententes I Results 1 high I moderate 

I Results 1 moderate 1 high I high I low I moderate 11 

low low low 

threats, weapons I Results " I high I high I moderate 1 low I moderate 11 

misdemeanor, felony I Results I moderate 1 high I low 1 low 1 moderate 11 

I Results I high I high I high I moderate I low II 

I Results I high I high I moderate 11 

176 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Table 4.14: Case Attrition in Five Communities 

./- -- . . 

250 

200 

150 

100 

50 

0 

Re 

Stocktown 

Lakeport 

17 Morton 

Carthage 

Helena 

177 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Appendix A: 

Survey instruments 

178 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Survey of Law Enforcement Policies and Practices for Domestic Incidents 

Agency: ID: 

Jurisdiction served: (please list all areas served by your department or agency) 

Cities and villages: 

Townships: 

Counties: 

7% survey requests information on your agency's policies and practices in responding to domestic incidents, which includes all 

disturbances, disputes, violence, and reports of offenses between individuals in domestic relationships. This survey is being 

distributed to all law enforcement agencies in the state of New York. Yourparticipation is vital in providing baseline information 

about current practices in the handling of domestic incidents. Individual agency responses will be kept confidential by research 

project staff, and will not be published or disseminated. Please complete the survey and return it in the postage-paid envelope 

by June 1. Ifyou have questions about the survey, contact Dr. Aha Worden, School of Criminal Justice, University at Albany, 

at (518) 442-5213. Thank you. 

I d 

POLICIES FOR DOMESTIC INCIDENTS 

1. Does your department or agency have a written policy governing the handling of domestic incidents? (ifso, please anuch 

a copy, ifavailable) yes no 

. 

If your agency has such a policy: 

a. When was this policy initiated? I (month/year) 

b. According to your policy, what on-scene response is required in misdemeanor incidents in which 

probable cause exists for arrest? (please check all that apply) 

- 

- 

- 

mandatory arrest of suspect regardless of victim preference 

arrest unless victim requests otherwise 

mandatory arrest with exceptions: list exceptions 

- presumptive or preferred arrest 

- x arrest if victim requests arrest 

- arrest if victim signs complaint 

- arrest at officer's discretion 

- other: please describe 

C. According to your policy, what response is recommended when probable cause exists and the offender 

has left the scene by the time officers arrive? (please check all that apply) 

- active pursuit of suspect 

- 

- 

- 

- other: please describe 

refer case to detective division 

advise victim to seek arrest warrant 

request warrant without victim complaint 

d. What types of victim/suspect relationships are covered by this policy? 

@lease check all that apply) 

- married couples - divorced and separated couples 

- dating, ex-dating couples - live-in couples 

- couples with children in common - same-sex couples 

- non-partner family relationships - other 

179 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
e. Under what circumstances are officers required to file written reports in domestic incidents? 

- 

- 

- 

all domestic incidents regardless of whether offense alleged or observed 

domestic incidents in which any crime is alleged or observed 

domestic incidents involving specified family offenses (please idenrify offenses) 

- disorderly conduct - reckless endangerment 

- harassment - attempted assault 

- menacing - assault 

- other 

f. Does your policy include provisions for dual arrests cross-complaints? - yes __ no 

2. Regardless of whether your agency has a written policy regarding domestic incidents, do supervisors in your agency 

routinely review reports of domestic incidents? __ yes no 

3. Regardless of whether your agency has a written policy regarding arrest in domestic incidents, what, if any, of the 

following sorts of services and information are routinely provided to victims in domestic incidents? @lease check all that 

- apply) 

- 

- 

- 

- 

- 

- 

- 

- other: please describe 

assignment of case to domestic violence unit or designated officer for follow-up 

assignment of case to victim advocate 

information about Family Court options 

information about seeking arrest warrants (for cases in which suspects are not on the scene) 

referrals to social service agencies 

transport to safe locations (shelters, others' homes) 

information about orders of protection 

4. Regardless of whether your agency has a written policy regarding arrest, what is your agency's policy or practice 

regarding detention of suspects in domestic incidents following arrest? 

- 

- 

- 

- other 

suspects are typically detained until initial court appearance (within 24 hours) 

suspects are typically issued appearance tickets 

suspects are typically given desk bail 

5. Has your agency changed its policy on domestic incidents since January 1992? __ yes __ no 

a. 

b. 

If yes, when did that change occur? 

Please describe the nature of the change 

6. Does your jurisdiction have a domestic violence coordinating council or task force? -..-Yes - no 

Zfyes, is your agency represented on that council or task force? yes __ no 

TRAINING FOR INTERVENTION IN DOMESTIC INCIDENTS 

1. To whom of the following does your department provide training in responding to domestic incidents? 

- new recruits - patrol staff 

- first line supervisors - executive staff 

2. Who provides this training? 

- department personnel 

- 

- other: please describe 

local domestic violence service providers 

180 

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has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
DOMESTIC INCIDENT DATA COLLECTION 

.- 

1. What records does your agency use to identify domestic incidents for the purpose of UCR reporting? 

- 

- 

- other: please describe 

review of incident and crime reports 

dispatcher records (including CAD systems) 

2. Aside from, or in addition to, UCR reporting, does your agency attempt to keep track of domestic incidents for any other 

purposes? __ yes __ no 

Zf your agency keeps records on domestic incidents, 

a. 

b. 

When was your record-keeping system for domestic violence incidents initiated? 

Check the types of information that are maintained in these records: 

calls for service - incident reports 

crime reports .I arrest reports 

orders for protection - other 

Are these records maintained on a computer? - yes 

If computerized, for how long are these records retained? 

C. 

a. - no 

POLICY EFFECTIVENESS AND IMPACT 

The Family Protection and Domestic Violence Intervention Act of 1994 significantly structures the ways local criminal justice 

systems are expected to respond'to domestic incidents. In what ways do you anticipate that this legislation will affect your 

agency's ability to effectively and efficiently intervene in domestic incidents? 

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION.. . . . 

Thank you very much for participating in this survey. A summary of responses will be compiled for dissemination to interested 

participants, and will include descriptions of the ranges of responses on the above items (but individual agency responses). 

If you would like a copy of the summary results of this survey, please complete the following information: 

@lease print your name or the name of the 

appropriate contact person in your agency) 

(title) @hone number) 

Copy of agency's domestic incident policy attached? yes - no 

rev6 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Appendix B: 

Case Data Collection Instruments 

182 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Coding instructions 

sPROJID 7-digit: Coder ID and consecutive number 

DRNUM Format 96-xxxxx. from Box 2 

Code rhe following rarrubles as recorded in rhe "Victim" box, for 

the first victim cfnarrative rndicates o person making 

complainrs or allegoiions who is opa'y IO rhe case, adopr ihar 

person as VI Do nor use as VI complornanis who ore neighbors 

calling infom neu door (such people are wimesses). cfthere 

are mirltiple vicrrrns. adoptprrmary rorger ofoflender UT VI. and 

code additional information ot end of form for VicrimZ. 

VlTYPE 

VILNAME 

VIFNAME 

VlMINl 

VlADDl 

VI ADD2 

VIADD3 

VI ADD4 

VIDOB 

VIAGE 

VISEX 

VI RACE 

VlNORhtAL 

VI DRUGS 

VIALCOH 

VIMARKS 

VllLL 

VIUNDET 

V 1 HAND 

V 1 MENTAL 

VIEMF'LOY 

Victim1 identified (Box 3. maybe Box 45)s 

I=victim (Vi) 

2=complainant (CO) 

3=person reporting (PR) 

4=other (OT) 

Victiml last name; String 

Victiml first name; String 

Victiml middle Initial; String 

Victiml address street number 

Victim I address street; String 

Victiml address city, String 

Victim I address state; String 

Victiml date ofbirth; Format MODAYNR 

Victiml age 

Victim I sex: O=female 

I=male 

Victiml race: I=white 

2=black 

3=lndian (nat Amer) 

4=Asian 

)=other 

Box 21: normal checked 

Box 21: drugs checked, or narrative 

Box 21: alcohol checked, or narrative 

Box21: marks checked 

Box21: illness checked 

Box 21: undetermined checked 

Box 2 1: handicapped checked 

Box 21: mental disorder checked 

Box 23: employer indicated (or school) 

Code Victim1 injury voriablesfrom Box 22 and/or narrafirc: 

VIMJURY 

VlBRUlSE 

VI CUTS 

VILACER 

VI BITE 

VlPAlN 

V I UNCON 

VI BROKEN 

V 1 INTERN 

VlHOMlC 

VIOTHINJ 

VIMED 

VIREFMED 

VI any injury indicated O/I 

swelling, bruises. bump on headheckbody 

scratches. minor cuts 

severe lacerations 

bite marks 

pain 

unconscious. incapacitated 

possible broken bones 

possible internal injuries 

dead 

other injuries not covered above 

received medical treatment 

refused medical treatment 

Code rhc followingfrom rhe Incident Box 

INCADDI box 27. incident street number 1XTCnnnl I..." ?7 ;"?;A=", ""-- 

C'rxlr offtnsrs mdicurrzl box 36 unrl or narrurrre cudr ~IS Prnu 

code secrton. eg .?id io. nor r.rrhoil> Ijprml code numhrr noi 

td'd her wonk ued srrrh is ksuuli .?', look up rk numhrr 

OFFENSE1 

OFFENSE? 

OFFENSE3 

OFFENSE4 

PREMISE Box 37: type of premise: 

I =residence checked 

Z-public setting (street. public bldg) 

3=other residential (hotel, apt. 0th res) 

BOX4 I Box 41: Controlled substance checked Oil 

Code rhe following 6 variobles ofBox 42; don't use marrotwe 10 

$11 this in fit is lefr blank 

KIDXPAR child by parent checked 

CLWIFXHG 

WIFEXHU wife by husband checked 

PARXKID parent by child checked 

HUSBXWIF husband by wife checked 

OTHERXO other relationship checked 

OITYPE 

com law wife by husband checked 

Code primary party complained against by the 

person id'd as Victiml, as described by police 

I= "suspect" in Suspect Box 

2= "other" in Involved Persons Box 

3= "spouse" in Involved Persons Box 

4=othenvise classified 

Code thefollowing as applied ra porty identijied in 01 TYPE 

code as much as possiblefrom Suspect Box, Involved Person Bar 

frhor is used by police, ondfrom arrest reports fanoched. 

0 I LNAME 

OIFNAME 

OlMMI 

OIADDI 

OlADD2 

OlADD3 

OlADW 

OIDOB 

OIAGE 

0 I SEX 

OlRACE 

OIETHNIC 

OISSN 

Offenderl last name; Suing 

Offenderl first name; String 

Offenderl middle initial; Suing 

Offenderl address street number 

Offenderl address street; String 

Offenderl address city, Sning 

Offenderl address slate; String 

Offenderl date ofbirth; Format MOIDAYNR 

Offenderl age 

Offenderl sex: O=female 

i-male 

Offenderl race: I=white 

2=black 

3=lndian (nat Amer) 

4=Asian 

J=other 

Offender ethnicity. O-non-Hispanic 

Offender social securily number (Box 68 or 

arrest report), 9 consecutive digits 

I=Hispanic 

Code from Box 103 andfor narrative. 

CASEOPEN Box 103: open checked 

UNFOUND Box 10;. unfounded checked 

WARRANT 

ARREST 

NnPRnq Rov io: mrl mrrahc cleared nn nrmecution 

Box IO3 & narrative warranr/summons 

Box 103 and narrative: arrested (all arrests) 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
-- 

011 

-alive 10 

it by the 

y police: 

YPt. 

mon Box 

bed: 

h 

DAYNR 

r) 

spanic 

ic 

x 68 or 

loris 

arrests) 

V IORELAT Relation of offender to wctim (code from Box 

J2 and or nmalive: Offender=vicrim's 7) 

1 =spouse ?=corn law spousc;=parent 

J=sibltnp j=child 6=grandparent 

'i=grandchild S=in-Iaw P=stepparent 

IO=stepchild I I=stepsibling I?=other family 

2O=acquaintance 2 I=babysinee ?I=boyfriend/gf 

Z=bf/gf child 27=homosexual 29=ex-spouse 

30=o/wise know 40=unknown 4?=par. vics child 

J+exbfigf JJ=ex-gay JS=gf'bf of parent 

Code rhefollowrng,+om narrarwe R other dociimenrs where 

available. Note rhrse are not murually erclusrve variables. All 

are O/I ' $form indicores siruarion occurred code I. orhenvue 

code 0. 

OISCENE 

OISOUGHT 

OIFOUND 

0 I RESIST 

OIALDRUG 

V INOPROS 

V INOCOOP 

VINOFOFW 

VlSlGNS 

ACTORDER 

VIOORDER 

ODEPOS 

VDEPOS 

WDEPOS 

ARREPORT 

KIDS 

FAMILY 

Primary offender on-scene while police present 

Primary offender off-scene and other locations 

checked 

Primary offender off-scene when police arrive, 

found after search 

Primary offender resists arrest, refuses to 

cooperate 

Primary offender reponed to have been using 

alcohol or drugs 

Victim requests no prosecution or no arrest 

Vicfim referred to as "uncooperative" 

Victim refuses Family Offense form 

Victim signs Family Offense form 

Active order of protection referenced 

Order of protection violated 

Deposition attached offender statement 

Deposition attached victim statement 

Deposition attached wimes statement 

Arrest report attached 

Children present under 18 (Oil) 

Other adult family members present (Oh) 

Code rhe nerf 3 variables numerrcally, do nor include victims as 

witnesses, and do nor include cross-complaining parties mice. 

NUMWIT 

NLJMOFF Number of offenders 

NUMVIC Num_br of victims 

Circumstances ofcase fcodefrom Box 69 and narrative, actiom 

roken byprimafy offender as reported by police. alleged by 

complainam or witnesses. include actions taken against Victim1 

and Vicrim2, frelevanr) 

Number of known wimesses (total, adults) 

VERBARGU 

OIPUNCH 

OlKlCK 

OISLAP 

OlBlTE 

OICHOKE 

OISLAM 

01 FORCE 

0 I RESTRN 

0 I PHONE 

OISEXAB 

0 I PRODAM 

01 PROTAK 

OIPUSH 

01 BEAT 

OICUT 

OlHAlR 

0 1 THREAT 

OIVERBAL 

OISTALK 

01 WONTGO 

verbal arguing (verbally abusive not indicated) 

punching 

kicking 

slapping 

biting 

choking 

slamming into surfacelrvall/stain/floor 

forcedhninvited entry. anempt 

forcible restraint 

pulling phone from wall 

sexual abuse 

property damage 

property faking 

pushing, grabbing 

beating (repeated hits) 

cuning 

hair pulling 

threatened to hurt, kill VI or others 

verbally abusive 

followed. stalked, phone calls 

refused to leave (before oolice arrived) 

OIHWAP 01 had weapon 

01 HKSIFE 

01 HBLUNT 

OIHGCN 01 had firearm 

OlHCAR 

OIUWEAP Olused weapon 

OlUKNlFE Olused knife. cuning instrument 

OIUBLVNT 01 used blunt weapon 

OIUGUN 01 used firearm 

01 WAR 01 used car 35 weapon 

Code 1hefollowing as Primnv Vicrtm ncitons us reporred m 

narrarrve ' 

VIHWEAP VI had weapon 

VIUWEAP VI used weapon 

VlVlOL VI acted violently 

VITHREAT VI threatened someone 

VIVERBAL VI was verbally abusive 

VISTALK 

Code thefoilow,ngjrom narratn'e, elswhere in reporr. I fam 

evidence statemem is true, 0 orhenvise. 

OIWANTED 01 had outstanding warrant 

CLOTHRUN 

OILEFT 

Codefor second vrcrim rjrecond victim identified. 

V2AGE VictimZ's age 

VZSEX Victim2 sex: O=female 

Olhad knife. cuning mstrurntn! 

01 had blunt weapon 

OI had car. potential SI weapon 

VI followed. stalked, called someone 

Report wrinen for "clothes run" 

01 left premises on advice of police 

I-male 

VZRACE VictimZB race: I-white 

2=black 

3=lndian (nat Amer) 

4=Asian 

S=other 

VZORELAT VictimZ's relationship with offender 

I-spouse 2=com law spouse3=parent 

4=sibling S=child 6=,gandparent 

7=grandchild 8=in-law 9=stepparent 

IO=stepchild I I=stepsibling 12=ather family 

20=acquaintance 21 =babysittee 22=boyfriendlgf 

23=bfigf child 27=homosexual 29=ex-spouse 

30=o/wise know 40=unknown 

43=exbf/gf 44-ex-gay 45=gfhf of parcnt 

VictimZ's relationship with Victim I 

(Victim I =VictimZ's ?): 

I =spouse 2=com law spouse;=parent 

4=sibling S=child 6=grandparent 

7=grandchild 8=in-law 9=stepparmt 

IO=stepchild I I=stepsibling Il=other family 

20=acquaintance Z I=babysinee 22=boyfriendlgf 

23=bf/gf child 27=homosexual Z9=cx-spousc 

30=o/wise know 40=unknown 42=par. vtcs child 

43=exbf/gf 44-ex-gay 4S=gfhfof parent 

(OffenderVictimTs ?): 

42=par of vics child 

VZVRELAT 

V2lNJURY Victim2 injured 

VZMED Victim2 received medical treatment 

VZHWEAP V2 had weapon 

VZUWEAP VZ used weapon 

VZVIOL VZ acted violently 

VZTHREAT V2 threatened someone 

VZVERBAL V2 was verbally abusive 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
e?-- 

rmme to 

w. I man box 

kd 

DAYNR 1 

SpanlC 

ic 

x 68 or 

ons 

arrests) . , 

PROIID 

NUM 

VITYPE 

VI LNAME 

VI FNAME 

VI MINI 

VlADDl 

VI ADD2 

VIADD3 

VlADM 

VlDOB 

VlAGE 

VlSEX 

VIRACE 

VIEMPLOY 

OITYPE 

OILNAME 

OIFNAME 

OlMINl 

OlADDl 

OlADD2 

OIADD3 

OIADW 

OlDOB 

OIAGE 

OlSEX 

OIRACE 

OIETHNIC 

0 I SSN 

INCADDl 

MCADD2 

OCCDATE 

OCCTIME 

DISPDATE 

PD Codesheet (rev 117 97) 

VINORMAL- 9RREST 

96- VI DRUGS- UOPROS 

V l ALCOH- VI ORELATVI MARKS- OISCENE 

VllLL OISOUGHT- 

- V I UNDET- OIFOUNDVI HAND OlRESlSTVIMENTAL- OIALDRUGVIMJURY- V INOPROSV IBRUlSE__ VINOCOOP- 

__ 

--- /I V 1 CUTS V lNOFORMmonth day year 

VlSlGNS 

ACTORDERVIOORDERODEPOS 

VDEPOS 

WDEPOS 

VI LACERVlBlTE 

VIPAM 

VI UNCON- 

- V 1 BROKEN- 

__ VI INTERNVlHOMlCVIOTHR'II- ARREPORTVIMED KIDS 

V IREFMED- FAMILY 

OFFENSE1 NUMWIT 

NUMOFF OFFENSE2 

-- NUMVIC 

OFFENSE3 VERBARGUOIPUNCH- 

_____ 

--- 

month 

/ 

Day 

/ 

Year -- 

OFFENSE4 

-- OIKICK 

PREMISE OISLAP 

BOX41 OlBlTE 

KIDXPAR- OICHOKECL WIFXHU- 0 I SLAM 

WIFEXHUPARXKID- 

__-___ ~- 

OIFORCEOIRESTRNmonth Day Year CLHUXWIF- 01 PHONE- 

___I__ HUSBXWIF- OISEXAB___ 

-__- /I 

// OTHFRXO n!oDnnn\" 

OICL'T 

OlHAlR 

OITHREAT01 VERBAL0 I STALK01 WONTGO01 HWEAPOIHKNIFE__ 

OIHBLUNTOIHGUN ' 

OIHCAR 

OIUWEAP0 I UKNlFEOIUEILUNT0 I UGUN 

OIUCAR 

V 1 HWEAPVI UWEAPVIVIOL 

VI THREATVIVERBALVI STALK-- 

01 WANTEDCLOTHRUNOILEFT 

VZAGE ___ 

VZSEX 

VZRACE 

VZORELATVZVRELATVZINJURYV2MED 

VZHWEAPVZUWEAP- 

,,-8,,1n, 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
,,-, - - ,. . . ,revised 7/28:98 >l . .. I. , ,- . .' '- . 

-_ 

it 

llve IO 

I 

I t by the 

police: , 

3AYNR 

ipanic 

x 68 or 

IC 

(I) Coder ID 

(2) Jurisdicrion 

I=Schdy 5=S,acuse 

2-Utica 6- 

3= 7= 

4= 8=Lockpon 

(3) DVIR# (police dept) 

(4) Court Docket # 

(5) Date arraigned 

(6) Arraignment judge (initials) 

(7) Sealed case (O=no, I=yes) 

(8) Arrested on Warrant (0-0, I-yes) 

(9) Date of arrest on warrant 

(IO) Bail status 

I =ROR 

2=Released on bail (psted) 

3=lncarcerated (no bail set) 

4=Other 

(I I) Date of bail or ROR release 

(12) Bail amount (dolah) 

(13) Type of attorney 

l~rivate 

2=publicly paid 

3-0 counsel, self-rep 

Lockpon only: use initials 

(14) Arraignment charge I 

(J5) Arraignment charge 2 

(16) Arraignment charge 3 

(17) Arraignment charge 4 

(18) Conviction charge I 

(19) Conviction charge 2 

(20) Conviction charge 3 

(21)Convic:tion charpe 4 

122) Dale of Disposition Sentencing 

(23) Disposition Ty 

I=pled guilt) 

2=dismissed 

i=ACOD 

+conditional discharge 

j=convictcd at trial 

6=acquined at trial 

7=transfer 10 superior Coun 

8=orher 

(24) SentencdConditions type #I 

1 =incarceration 

2=time sewed 

3=probation 

4=fine 

S=restitution 

6=counseling 

7=slay away order 

O=communiiy service 

9=other 

(25) Sentence #I Amount (please 

calculate DOLLARS for fmes. restitution, 

DAYS for incarceration. TS, probation; 

HOURS for community service 

(26) Sentence/conditions type #Z 

(27) Sentence #2 Amount 

(28) Sentmwdconditions type #3 

(29) Sentence #3 Amount 

(30) Sentencelconditions type #4 

(3 I) Sentence #4 Amount 

(32) Order of protection issued (O/l) 

(33) Victim requests withdrawal (011) 

(34) Cross complaint tiled 

(35) Cross complaint docket # 

(36) Number of failures to appear 

after arrest 

(37) Number of bench warrants issued 

(38) Bail revoked after FTA or other 

violation? 

(j9) Date bail revoked 

ons 

uresis) 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Interview issues: 

All c.j. officials: 

.- 

Begin w/basic assumption that we’re mostly interested in misdemeanor cases, because the overwhelming 

majority of incidentskharges are at that and the violation level. The tendency on the part of c.j. types to 

talk about spectacular felonies is very strong, but that really isn’t what our study is about .... 

Be alert for attitudes, generalizations that reveal preconceptions about the “causes” of family violence, 

statements that reveal attitudes about other c.j. agents (if things aren’t being done to someone’s satisfaction, 

who do they blame?) 

Police: 

How has the 1994 legislation, esp. the mandatory arrest provision, affected the way domestic violence cases are 

handled by the police, prosecutors, courts? 

Have the effect been fundamentally good or bad? 

Has it prompted agencies to change policies, training, practices? If so, how? 

The law says that police shall arrest in misdemeanor cases (unless the victim affirmatively requests otherwise). 

Are officers encountering many situations in which victims oppose arrest? What do they do in those cases? 

Are officers encountering many situations in which both parties allege misdemeanor acts? How do they 

handle such situations? 

The arrest law technically covers only Family Offenses, which is limited to married, divorced, kids in 

common. Does this distinction (between those family members, and boyfriend/girlfriends) make a 

difference in the way police respond? 

Has the dept had the resources or opportunity to establish any special dv unit or response team? 

Walk through the process: Let’s assume that polite respond to 91 1, find female victim w/visible injuries 

(black eye), alleges boyfriend hit her: what happens next? 

Arrest? 

Taken downtown? Booked? Fingerprinted? 

Under what conditions would he be detained in jail? Is desk bail used? Under what conditions? 

How much $$? 

What happens to people arrested on Friday or Saturday night: weekend arraignments? 

As far as you know, are victims expected to show up for arraignment? 

As far as you know, does anyone (advocate, d.v. worker) contact dv victims in the first 24 hours 

after arrest? 

In most towns, in about 50% of all dv cases, irrespective of injuries or other factors, the alleged offender 

has left the scene by the time police arrive. 

What is departmental policy for handling those situations? 

As a practical matter, what do police usually do if there’s cause to believe a misdemeanor 

occurred? 

If warrants are issued, how are they followed up? Est. YO that result in arrest? About 

how long does it take? 

What, if anything, must the victim do in order to pursue legal action? 

Is there anything that state policymakers might or should do to help law enforcement respond to 

these off-scene offenders? 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Efficacy of police intervention: 

In terms of crime prevention and control -what do you think the police canhhould do that helps 

controvreduce domestic violence? Beyond what police can do, what else is necessary? 

PThis document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Prosecutors: 

How has the 1994 legislation affected the law police, your office, and the courts handle misdemeanor 

domestic violence cases? 

In your jurisdiction: have you experienced a visible increase in dv cases since mandatory arrest has been 

implemented? If so, how have you coped with it? 

What are your criteria for charging assault in domestic violence cases? -background: in many counties 

we've observed that harassment is the charge used for cases involving some types of injuries. What are the 

standards for distinguishing between, say, assault and harassment (the distinction between a misdemeanor 

and a violation?) 

(Be sensitive here to distinctions that have to do with evidence - visible injuries, testifying 

witness, for example - and those that have to do with offender status - first-offender, employed 

offender, seemingly remorseful offender, for example - and those that may have to do with 

anticipations of judge behavior or reactions.) 

How important is it to have victim "cooperation" or participation in the prosecution process? 

At what, if any, points is participation necessary for prosecution to move forward? 

How do you handle a victim who does not want to be involved? 

Is there a meaningful distinction (in terms of carrying the case forward) between having a victim 

who prefers not to play an active role, and one who plainly states that she wants the offender 

released or that she wants to withdraw or drop charges? 

How do you respond to a victim who requests that charges (say, of assault) be withdrawn? 

Sometimes people seem to think of prosecutors as the legal advocates or reps of victims, but of 

course that is neither accurate, nor fair to Das' responsibilities. Do victims you encounter seem to 

have access to, and awareness of, information about their legal rights, options, etc - esp. when 

civil/Family Ct issues like custody, child support are involved, too? 

Orders of protection: 

How frequently are they issued? Under what conditions? 

What are the criteria? 

Do'you think they're efficacious? Whylivhy not? 

What generally happens to someone who violates an OP? 

Walk through a case: offender arrested on-scene, police indicated assault, relatively minor but visible 

injuries (black eye, bruises): ask what happens next, follow up on "if' statements 

Bailipre-trial release: under what conditions is ROR granted? Bail set? Are there conditions under 

which your office would recommend ROR? Recommend against bailhelease, or high bail? 

Does suspect usually haveiobtain counsel? 

Are there pre-trial diversions/ alternatives? - what are they? When are they considered 

appropriate to use? 

When would you drop charges, or decide not to go forward? 

Under what conditions do judges dismiss charges? 

When are ACDs used? (Types of cases? Types of offenders?) Are conditions typically attached? 

Does anyone monitor those conditions? 

How do judges sentence in d.v. cases when defis. plead guilty? 

In your experienceiobservation, what, if anything, works? And why? 

(Effectiveness in terms of victim safety? Effectiveness in terms of offender desistance? What is 

the underlying theory of why d.v. occurs, and what is the underlying philosophy, if any, of the 

utility of criminal justice intervention?) 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
How much do youlthe courts rely on other agencies in the community to facilitate prosecutionidisposition 

of these cases? 

About Family Court: 

The law allows for concurrent jurisdiction of Family Offenses in criminal & Family Court. Any 

idea how many cases are being heard concurrently? How many go solely to Family Court? 

About defense lawyers: 

Have the responses or strategies of defense lawyers and/or public defenders in family violence 

cases changed as a result of changes in the law or changes in prosecutorial or court practices? 

What judges handle criminal cases in Schenectady? 

-- 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Judges: 

- -- 

What if any changes have you observed in your community's responseslhandling of domestic violence cases since 

the passage of the 1994 legislation, and its amendments? 

In your jurisdiction: have you experienced a visible increase in dv cases since mandatory arrest has been 

implemented? If so, how have the courts coped with it? 

What are your criteria for sustaining charges of assault in domestic violence cases? -background: in many 

counties we've observed that harassment is the charge used for cases involving some types of injuries. 

What are the standards for distinguishing between, say, assault and harassment (the distinction between a 

misdemeanor and a violation?) Are you and the prosecutors on the same wavelength on this? 

(Be sensitive here to distinctions that have to do with evidence - visible injuries, testifying 

witness, for example - and those that have to do with offender status - first-offender, employed 

offender, seemingly remorseful offender, for example - and those that may have to do with 

anticipations of jhdge behavior or reactions.) 

How important is it to have victim "cooperation" or participation in the prosecution process? 

At what, if any, points is participation necessary for a case to move forward? 

How do you respond to a victim who requests that charges (say, of assault) be withdrawn? 

If she's not present, what problems does that present? 

(Do you rely on the prosecutors, andor defense lawyers, for information about her 

preferences when she is not present?) 

Do victims you encounter seem to have access to, and awareness of, information about their legal 

rights, options, etc - esp. when civil/Family Ct issues like custody, child support are 

involved, too? If not, is there a place or person you can send them to for help? 

Orders of protection: 

How frequently are they issued? Under what conditions? 

What are the criteria? 

Do you think they're efficacious? Why/why not? 

What generally happens to someone who violates an OP? 

Walk through a case: offender arrested on-scene, police indicated assault, relatively minor but visible 

injuries (black eye, bruises): ask what happens next? 

What would the prosecutor likely charge? 

BaiVpre-trial release: under what conditions is ROR granted? Bail set? 

Does suspect usually haveiobtain counsel? 

Are there pre-disposition diversions/ alternatives? - what are they? When are they considered 

appropriate to use? 

When would you drop charges, or decide not to go forward? 

Under what conditions do judges dismiss charges? 

When are ACDs used? (Types of cases? Types of offenders?) Are conditions typically attached? 

How does the court sentence in d.v. cases when defis. plead guilty? 

Does anyone monitor those conditions? 

In your experience/observation, what, if anything, works? And why? 

(Effectiveness in terms of victim safety? Effectiveness in terms of offender desistance? What is 

the underlying theory of why d.v. occurs, and what is the underlying philosophy, if any, of the 

utility of criminal justice intervention?) 

How much do the courts rely on other agencies in the community to facilitate prosecution/disposition of 

these cases? 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
About Family Court: 

The law allows for concurrent jurisdiction of Family Offenses in criminal & Family Court. Any 

idea how many cases are being heard concurrently? How many go solely to Family Court? 

About defense lawyers: 

Have the responses or strategies of defense lawyers and/or public defenders in family violence 

cases changed as a result of changes in the law or changes in prosecutorial or court practices? 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
Appendix C: 

Case Data Collection Notes 

As part of the ongoing evaluation ofthe state’s mandatory arrest legislation, which called for evaluating 

the impact on recidivism of the legislative change, domestic incident reports were collected by the state’s 

Division of Criminal Justice Services, for coding of key variables. It soon became clear that for the purposes 

of both that project and this research, keypunching of check-off boxes would not yield sufficient information, 

and therefore a coding scheme was developed that permitted research staff on both projects to code critical 

information from the hand-written narratives. Extensive coding, recoding, and analyses suggested that this 

process extracted the maximum amount of information p~ssible.~’ 

An immediate concern in this effort was that police would not reliably use the new domestic incident 

reports (which were supposed to be sent to the central state agency each month), and that many domestic 

incidents would remain undiscovered by researchers, even if officers wrote reports on them. This concern was 

well-founded in some places: the most populous jurisdiction in this study simply refused to adopt the new 

form, which led to it being dropped from the mandatory arrest evaluation. However, because that community 

was theoretically interesting and important for this project’s purpose, and had a well-established system for 

identifying 91 1 calls as domestics and reviewing and reclassifying dispatches for permanent categorization, 

it was retained for this study, but all police reports had to be coded on-site. Another community adopted the 

practice of completing both the old form, and the DIR; a review of police files indicated that this was, 

surprisingly, a consistent if labor-intensive practice, and so data were coded from both sources. In all sites, 

information on cases resulting in arrest were comparatively easy to code. More challenging was the task of 

figuring out which non-arrest cases resulted in warrants or summonses, since that was seldom recorded in 

police reports; therefore, all non-arrest cases were therefore checked in warrant logs and docket books. 

Court data were coded on-site, in city courthouses. Almost all incidents resulting in apprehension were 

charged at the misdemeanor or violation level, and were therefore arraigned, settled, and sentenced in city 

courts, not county (felony) court. In several communities city court is routinely referred to as “police court” 

and indeed, in all five cities studied here the police department and court shared a building. Data were coded 

from docket books, summons and warrant files, order of protection registries, and case files. It is important 

to note that while there was considerable variation in the sophistication and completeness of records across 

these courts, only one of the courts was sufficiently computerized to permit researchers to simply code all 

important variables off a computer screen.42 Another site’s court records were so incomplete that the only way 

to reliably collect all needed information was to painstakingly read the judges’ handwritten notes on the inside 

of each case file, which were stored in cardboard boxes in an empty room in the police station. 

41 As an example, the DIR provided officers with check-off boxes for “actions” which 

included a variety of aggressive behaviors. However, many officers did not use the boxes, or 

checked some of them but then added more extensive information in the narratives. It seems 

reasonable to suppose that other criminal justice professionals would, in making subsesquent 

case decisions (eg, whether to issue an order of protection, whether to ROR) rely upon the entire 

report, not merely the easily coded parts. 

42Moreover, even in this site, the information could not be simply downloaded, although the 

clerk tried to do so for the project; her failure was attributed to security protocols in the software. 

However, another site (not included in this project), which coded much the same information 

with the same software, did not encounter this problem. 

183 

This document is a research report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice. This report

has not been published by the Department. Opinions or points of view expressed are those

of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S.

Department of Justice.
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