Eve S. Buzawa

Understanding the Context of Dual Arrest With Directions for Future Research

Arrest rates for intimate partner violence have increased dramatically since the implementation of preferred and mandatory arrest policies. Of concern has been the increase in the percentage of cases in which both parties in an incident have been arrested. This article examines the current research on dual arrests and the deficiencies of that research, argues that dual arrest should not be examined in a vacuum but should be placed in a broader context taking into account both the full range of police options and comparisons of police action in intimate partner violence cases to the responses to other domestic and nondomestic incidents, and outlines an agenda for future research.

A Comparison of the Police Response to Heterosexual Versus Same-Sex Intimate Partner Violence

It has been argued that the police do not respond to domestic calls involving same-sex couples in the same manner as they respond to calls involving heterosexual couples. A major problem facing researchers examining the police response to cases involving same-sex couples has been the lack of adequately sized samples. In this article, the authors utilize the 2000 National Incident Based Reporting System database, which contains 176,488 intimate partner assaults and intimidation incidents reported to 2,819 police departments in 19 states. The key issue examined is whether similar cases involving same-sex and heterosexual couples result in the same police response.

Responding to Crimes of Violence Against Women: Gender Differences Versus Organizational Imperatives

Whether the police response to domestic assault differs from how they handle incidents involving strangers continues to be a topic of debate and research. Based on a 1-year sample of cases from a midwestern city, the hypothesis that an inverse relationship characterized the association between level of intimacy and arrest was tested. Notwithstanding relevant elements of probable cause such as the presence of weapons, witnesses, injury, and the offender, the results confirmed the hypothesis.

The Impact of Relationship Status, Gender, and Minor Status in the Police Response to Domestic Assaults

Abstract Data from police records on 320 domestic violence calls for assistance collected during a four-month period from five jurisdictions operating under a pro-arrest statute in a Northeastern state were examined to determine the distribution of incidents by victim-suspect household relationship. It was hypothesized that, despite the lack of any statutory distinction, police compliance with the requirements of a pro-arrest statute—and mandatory arrest policies—would be higher in incidents involving a parent complainant than in incidents between other household members. Logistic and ordinary least-squares regression indicated that the odds of arrest for cases of child to parent and sibling assault were significantly higher than for other kinds of relationships, especially adult partner cases. Analyses also revealed that police compliance with victim assistance actions was significantly less likely for victims of parent to child and sibling violence relative to other victim-suspect relationships. The police were also more legalistic in the application of the statute to both female victims and female suspects. The implications of the increased role of extra-legal variables in the arrest decision (i.e. age, gender and relationship status) and the police support of parental authority are examined.

Policy, Place, and Perpetrators: Using NIBRS to Explain Arrest Practices in Intimate Partner Violence:

This study presents the results of a multilevel analysis of arrest outcomes in intimate partner incidents reported to the police. Using NIBRS data for 2000 in combination with data from other sources, we investigate how arrest policies, levels of urbanization, incident circumstances and offender characteristics influence arrest outcomes in domestic violence incidents. Our results indicate that arrest outcomes for intimate partner violence are influenced not only by mandatory arrest legislation, but also by level of urbanization and incident circumstances. The findings demonstrate the need for continued research that considers agency-level as well as offender- and incident-level characteristics in accounting for arrest outcomes.

What happens when a reform works? The need to study unanticipated consequences of mandatory processing of domestic violence

One of the primary facets of the sociology of law is concerned with the relationships between formal rules and regulations having the force of governmental social control and the values, norms and practices of those who enforce them (or not). This “law in action” perspective enables research to test out the differential impact on legal decisions of both formal and informal aspects of social control (Hawkins, 1992). One of the limitations of recent work on domestic violence is that it focuses too narrowly on one or two negative sanctions, e.g., arrest or restraining orders, to the exclusion of the other options and the mix of formal and informal decisions in the criminal justice system as a whole (Reiss, 1974). This research attempts through a close analysis of the workings of the Quincy, Massachusetts criminal justice system in response to domestic violence, to identify the consequences, unanticipated and anticipated, of decisions made in several domains (public, police, prosecutors, and courts) of the criminal justice system. This study uses in-depth interviews with batterers, victims and criminal justice agency and related personnel as well as agency policies, training materials and records to examine possible unintended consequences of aggressive intervention in cases of domestic violence. This study will explore the impact of the Quincy Domestic Violence Program, considered to be a national model, on the lives of victims and offenders who are treated by the court. We have selected the District Court at Quincy, Massachusetts as our research site. It has a well deserved national reputation treating abusers systematically from the initial intake by arresting officers through close supervision in probation.

Global Responses to Domestic Violence

Chapter 1 Introduction -- Chapter 2 Reprint from Feminist Criminology -- Chaper 3. Canada -- Chapter 4. United States -- Chapter 5. Germany -- Chapter 6. The United Kingdom -- Chapter 7. Central Europe -- Chapter 8. South Africa -- Chapter 9. Australia -- Chapter 10. People’s Republic of China -- Chapter 11. Japan -- Chapter 12. Korea -- Chapter 13. India -- Chapter 14. Brazil -- Chapter 15. Domestic Violence in the Arab World. .

Severity of injury and the decision to arrest in cases of intimate partner violence

From a victims physical health perspective, at the centre of any case of intimate partner violence (IPV) is the degree of trauma imparted on that victim by the offender. Yet, the implementations of state-level ‘Mandatory Arrest’ and ‘Preferred Arrest’ laws encourage arrests decisions in cases of IPV typically without regard to the level of trauma severity found in each case. And, despite these well-meaning implementations and the gravity of their consequences, the importance of evaluating trauma severity in victims of IPV remains largely overlooked. The goal of this study was to correlate police arrest decisions in cases of IPV to a trauma severity score generated from established clinical protocols in the treatment of trauma. A Trauma Severity Quantification Table (TSQT) was created in order to quantify the major factors of an incident of IPV: anatomical location of attack, method of attack, facilitating weapon/object and resulting trauma. A total of 256 cases of IPV reported to six police departments in Idaho, a state with a discretionary arrest law in domestic violence cases, in the calendar year 2000 were processed using the TSQT. A statistically significant difference was found between arrests (mean 17.96, standard deviation [SD] 5.90) versus no arrest (mean 16.13, SD 5.67) outcomes (P = 0.03). It is suggested that trauma severity is a factor in police arrest decisions in a discretionary state sample, but that more attention needs to be brought to this method of analysis and its implications for future arrest decisions.

Domestic Violence: The Beginning, Continuation, or Final Act in a Criminal Career?

Abstract This paper uses a life-course perspective to examine the extent to which domestic violence is part of a criminal career. Offenders who commit domestic violence as their first criminal act are compared to offenders for whom domestic violence is merely a continuation of a criminal career and for whom the domestic violence relationship provides an opportunity for the commission of still another type of offense. In addition, there is an examination of patterns in offending and reoffending for males and females.

The Impact of Offenders Leaving the Scene on the Police Decision to Arrest in Cases of Intimate Partner Violence

In this article, the authors examine an issue that has not been studied in depth by prior research: the impact that fleeing the scene has on the likelihood of arrest in intimate partner violence cases. Using police data obtained from 25 police departments in four states, and controlling for a variety of incident, offender, victim, and jurisdictional characteristics, the authors find that an offender who flees the scene of the incident is more than 5 times less likely to be arrested than one who remains at the scene. The policy implications of the findings are discussed.