NCJ Number
163056
Date Published
1996
Length
0 pages
Annotation
A physician describes a partnership between the police and health care providers in Memphis, Tenn. to provide outreach services and conduct research on domestic violence, victim and offender attitudes, and the relationship between drug abuse and domestic assault.
Abstract
The project's medical staff made home calls with the police to scenes of domestic violence, to talk with both victims and assailants. Three-fourths of the victims were females, 90 percent had previously been assaulted, and one-third of the repeat victims were being assaulted daily. Only 13 percent had gone to a medical facility, and 4 percent had tried to contact a shelter for battered women. The staff concluded that passive interventions are ineffective and that responses need to be linked with the police and 911 systems. The police used an inexpensive 5-minute screening test to assess drug use at the scene. Findings revealed that a high proportion of perpetrators abused alcohol, other drugs, or both; that cocaine use was linked with more severe violence; and that two-thirds of the assailants used both alcohol and cocaine. Findings also revealed that large numbers of children had witnessed domestic violence and that this is major risk factor for later domestic violence. Staff now do immediate counseling with the family. In addition, 30 percent of the victims matched the symptoms of the Stockholm syndrome. Most assailants were arrested and were out of jail within 8 hours; they generally were not referred for drug treatment. Thus, the project has gone beyond a survey to victim care through an outreach crisis center approach. This approach could be used in every community. Tables, videotapes of interviews with perpetrators and victims, questions from audience, answers from the speaker, and introduction by National Institute of Justice Director Jeremy Travis