Officers must be assured that they are not alone, that other members of the community share responsibility and can bring specialized skills to bear on the problem. The training program must integrate all agencies in the community. The aim is to inculcate trust and cooperation among the community, social service agencies, and the criminal justice system. Involving other agencies is especially important to assure officers that their efforts are not futile. If an officer spends many hours interviewing adult and child witnesses, collecting evidence, filing incident reports, and making arrests, only to find that the investigation is the end of the process, her enthusiasm is inevitably blunted.
Arrest is only an important first step.
Neither law enforcement nor the courts can effect solutions for long-term change. In order to create a seamless system for dealing with domestic violence in the community, other players have to appreciate the formidable problems police officers face. The job of a police officer is hard to describe, even harder to comprehend, and there is nothing more unrealistic than television and movie versions of a police officer's job. The social worker who rides with an officer in the police cruiser, works alongside the officer in the police station, travels with the officer to the home of a victim gets firsthand knowledge that can't be learned from books or films. Officers in turn must know how their job dovetails with the duties of other professionals in the community.