NCJ Number
190990
Date Published
2001
Length
90 pages
Annotation
This is a process evaluation of a program responding to intimate partner violence.
Abstract
The Domestic Abuse Reduction Team (DART) was formed in an effort by the probation officer, the district attorney's office, and local advocates for battered women in rural Clinton County, NY, to coordinate prosecution of offenders and to effectively supervise them under probation. Data for the study came from interviews with victims, courtroom visits, district attorney files, probation department files, domestic incident reports, and interviews with service providers. The study presents limited quantitative analyses, a very preliminary analysis of recidivism, and analysis of the promise and limits of probation as an alternative to incarceration, which it describes as the most innovative portion of the DART program. It also examines victim empowerment in Clinton County. The study considers that the most noteworthy result of the process evaluation is analysis of the importance, and the difficulty, of institutionalizing the reforms of DART. The study concludes that intensive probation supervision holds some promise in terms of eventually removing violent offenders to jail, and in giving victims time to redirect their lives if they so wish. However, DART encountered difficulties regarding the empowerment of women, at times at odds with vigorous prosecution and supervision. And the program has been unable to institutionalize the changes made in processing intimate partner violence crimes. Tables, references, appendixes