DOI: 10.3886/icpsr30741.v1
title: Victim Participation in Intimate Partner Violence Prosecution - Implications for Safety: Kalamazoo County, Michigan, 1999-2002
title: Version 1

description: This longitudinal mixed-methods study examined to what extent female intimate partner violence (IPV) victim participation in prosecution was associated with their future safety. The study followed a cohort of female IPV victims with cases the police presented to the prosecutor, in the year 2000, in a single Midwestern United States county (Kalamazoo County, Michigan) for a four-year period (1999-2002) across multiple systems (police, prosecutor, criminal court, civil court, hospital Emergency Departments) to assess the victim's experience with participation in IPV prosecution and her associated future help seeking, health and safety. Since this study utilized retrospective administrative data, subsequent IPV was defined as a future documented IPV-related police incident or an Emergency Department visit for IPV or injury. The data abstraction and analysis of the administrative data was informed by focus groups with survivors, advocates, and medical and criminal justice service providers, along with in-depth qualitative analysis of a stratified random sample of individual IPV cases. The final analytic dataset created by the research team integrated two types of data: (1) in-depth data about the index assault case and characteristics of the couple involved, and (2) longitudinal data about prior and subsequent IPV events spanning multiple systems: police, prosecutor, emergency department, and family court protection orders.
description: The purpose of this study was to examine victims' health and safety following entrance into the criminal justice system as measured by help seeking patterns across several systems; police, courts and Emergency Departments. The study's main question was whether a victim's participation in prosecution increases her safety, defined as a decrease in subsequent documented IPV events. Using administrative data, the study examined the complex relationship between victim participation in the prosecution process for an index event and future help seeking documented through IPV-related police incidents and future emergency department visits for IPV or injury.
description: This mixed-method longitudinal study followed a cohort of female IPV victims (N=993) with cases adjudicated in criminal court in the year 2000 in a single Midwestern United States county (Kalamazoo County, Michigan) for a four-year period (1999-2002) across multiple systems (police, prosecutor, criminal court, civil court, hospital emergency department). The research team conducted in-depth qualitative analysis of a stratified random sample of index cases to inform the creation of data abstraction forms. Specifically, the data abstraction forms developed and utilized by the research team include a Criminal Court Records Abstraction Form, Police/Prosecutor Long Notes Abstraction Form, and Emergency Department Abstraction Form. These forms were then piloted and iteratively revised and administrative records were reviewed at the offices of the prosecutor, 12 police departments, 2 criminal courts, 1 civil court, and 8 Emergency Departments. Once the data abstraction forms were finalized, the Project Director conducted trainings with the research staff for the first 150 record reviews until 100 percent inter-coder reliability was achieved. Other data sources utilized by the research team include police incident data, protection order data, prosecuting attorney data, the United States Census 2000, and death certificate data.
description: The study contains 717 variables including demographic information, case factors, victim characteristics, defendant characteristics, couple characteristics, event characteristics, incident characteristics, adjudication characteristics, and victim participation. Demographic questions include age, race/ethnicity, children, and employment. Case factors information include relationship of victim to defendant, who called police, arrest outcome, and case outcome. Victim characteristics include whether victim was pregnant at time of incident, victim use of alcohol and drugs at time of incident. Defendant characteristics include block socioeconomic status, defendant use of alcohol and drugs at time of incident, and prior domestic violence conviction. Couple characteristics include marital status at time of incident, cohabitation at time of incident, whether couple had children together, and prior intimate partner violence between couple. Event characteristics include charge class (misdemeanor or felony), and violence severity. Incident characteristics include type of violence by either victim or defendant, injuries by either victim or defendant, weapons used by either victim or defendant, and whether others were present during time of incident. Adjudication characteristics include whether prosecutor authorized charges, classification of charges (misdemeanor or felony), date of final disposition, criminal sanctions, and jail time. Victim participation variables include whether victim called police, communication with prosecutor, type of contact, and whether victim expressed prosecution wishes.
description: none
description: ICPSR data undergo a confidentiality review and are altered when necessary to limit the risk of disclosure. ICPSR also routinely creates ready-to-go data files along with setups in the major statistical software formats as well as standard codebooks to accompany the data. In addition to these procedures, ICPSR performed the following processing steps for this data collection: Standardized missing values.; Checked for undocumented or out-of-range codes..
description: Presence of Common Scales: None
description: Response Rates: Not applicable
description: Datasets: 
 
 DS1: Dataset
description: record abstracts, mixed mode 
The study employed three distinct phases: (1) qualitative data collection, (2) abstraction, merging and analysis of administrative records, and (3) respondent verification meetings. Only administrative records data from phase 2 are available as part of this data collection.
description: Female intimate partner violence (IPV) victims with cases for which the police presented the case to the prosecutor in the year 2000 in Kalamazoo County, Michigan followed through the administrative records they generated in criminal justice agencies, emergency departments, and court systems.
description: The study sample consists of 993 female victims of male-perpetrated IPV as identified through police charging requests to the prosecutor's office in the year 2000 in the study site. Inclusion criteria were: female victim; male defendant; intimate partner relationship (defined as current or former spouse, current or former dating partner, or having a child in common) between victim and defendant; and charging request for assault (including simple assault, aggravated assault, felonious assault, assault with intent to commit murder, homicide, sexual assault, kidnapping, stalking or aggravated stalking). Access to, and permission to use, the prosecutor administrative records were granted by the local Prosecuting Attorney's office and facilitated by the Michigan Department of Community Health. The sample cohort was identified through two methods: (1) delivered as an intact dataset, and (2) manual search and abstraction from prosecutor administrative records. The intact dataset containing 964 of the final 993 sample had been compiled previously as part of a larger CDC-funded study, MEDCIIN (Michigan Department of Community Health, 2003, 2000), and contained charging requests that had charge codes tagging them as domestic assault. This database was further supplemented by 29 higher order cases that had not been previously identified but met this study's criteria. These cases included the following charges: homicide, criminal sexual conduct, kidnapping, assault with intent to do great bodily harm, and assault with intent to commit murder. Because these higher-order cases were not flagged as IPV-related, the supplemented cases were identified through a manual search of the administrative records system of the Prosecuting Attorney's office. All cases for each of the higher order charge codes were reviewed and those that met study criteria were added to the study sample.