Oklahoma Domestic Violence Intervention Tool To Be Implemented by Police Statewide
OKLAHOMA CITY – Domestic violence is a major problem in Oklahoma.
This state ranks third in the nation for deaths attributed to domestic violence, and eleventh in the nation in the number of women killed by men. One-fourth of all women in Oklahoma will be a domestic violence victim in their lifetime.
Just in Oklahoma City, police officers were dispatched in 2012 on more than 36,000 domestic violence calls. That was an average of nearly 100 each day, or one every 15 minutes. Fully one of every six of those calls – 6,000 of them – was deemed violent enough that detectives were assigned to investigate further.
Typically in this state it’s a man who murders his wife or girlfriend, and literally thousands of children are killed or injured in household quarrels. About two-thirds of the children in homes where domestic violence occurs are physically abused.
During an interim legislative study conducted last year by state Rep. Kay Floyd, the Oklahoma Department of Human Services reported that an estimated 30 percent to 50 percent of families who received Temporary Assistance to Needy Families in 2012 experienced domestic violence. Additionally, more than 18,300 cases of domestic violence were reported among Oklahoma families that received assistance through the DHS Child Support Services Division in 2012.
Floyd, D-Oklahoma City, and Sen. David Holt, R-Bethany, authored a measure this year designed to address domestic violence.
During the preliminary investigation of a suspected incident of domestic violence, law enforcement officers are directed by House Bill 2526 to ask the victim a series of questions designed to help determine “the potential for danger…”
The “lethality assessment” form is a critical element in reducing and preventing domestic violence. “It lets us know what the red flags are,” said Dr. Janet Wilson of the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center.
The “lethality assessment protocol” was analyzed during a three-year study conducted in Oklahoma and financed with a grant of more than $500,000 from the National Institute of Justice, Floyd related. Data from the study is still being collated and analyzed, Wilson said.
The study was a collaborative effort involving Johns Hopkins University, Arizona State University, the University of Oklahoma, Oklahoma’s State Health Department, seven police departments (including Oklahoma City and Tulsa), plus researchers and police advocates.
During the three-year period “we tested whether the lethality assessment protocol worked better than what we do now,” Wilson said. Currently a police officer hands a domestic violence victim a safety card, she said, “which is very good but just not enough.”
The lethality assessment protocol requires an officer to ask the victim a series of 11 questions, the answers of which are noted on a form, and the officer then contacts an appropriate victim advocacy organization. “Based upon the results of the lethality assessment, referrals to shelters, domestic violence intervention programs and other social services shall be provided to the victim,” HB 2526 decrees.
“Intervention is immediate,” Floyd said. “This legislation directly addresses our domestic violence crisis by giving law enforcement the tools to help victims receive the appropriate security or services they need.”
This type of analysis is already employed by the Oklahoma City and Tulsa police departments, “because it is a useful tool in evaluating the level of danger in a domestic relationship,” Floyd told her House colleagues. HB 2526 requires all state law enforcement agencies to utilize the form after the new law goes into effect Nov. 1.
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