Claudine Dombrowski: January 2014

Author Note: When I began researching this topic, it was to be a broad and national review paper. However, to show the different views of what researchers thought were important in the successes of this program, I came across my own state's Batterer Intervention Program (BIP). The more I learned, the angrier I became. Although the state of Kansas really sticks out in this particular profit over protection, BIP -- the nation it's self uses funding for all sorts of so called BS.

The bottom line is simple. What all the organizations, all the same ole same, all the (fill in the blank) are doing, and the new - take their place fatherhood initiatives, and their by-organizations, are doing, is NOT working. It is time to stop profiting and start protecting. Until that time, if ever it comes, domestic violence will never end. As you can tell, it is only getting worst. No longer are their just "punches" and "slaps". We simply have "dead' and more dead. Women and her children, being murdered daily.

When will we finally say, "enough is enough?" Until that time, like that program below, profit over protection is all that victims can expect.

(hat tip to joel - for the term "Profit Over Protection")

-Claudine

Are Batterer Intervention Programs Reducing Domestic Violence?

Courts often mandate that ‘convicted’ abusive partners attend “batterer intervention programs” in addition to serving a probation term. Throughout the past twenty years, alternatives to battering programs and batter intervention programs receive funding through local, state and federal agencies. The very name of these programs implies that they reduce domestic violence.

It is the consensus across the board with experts and scholars in the field of Intimate Partner Violence, that these programs, by varying names, since their inception more than twenty years ago, are not treatment modalities, they do not cure, and that battering is not a mental illness. However, due to the lack of prosecutions and the lack of consequences to the batterer or perpetrator, the increase in the use of ‘batterer intervention programs” have been implemented by almost every State in an attempt to further follow up with the perpetrator as part of his probation requirements in a domestic violence conviction.

However, the National consensus and final conclusions, from the large body of objective data, research and studies, as per the National Institute of Justice, The Department of Justice, The Office of Crime Victims and other Leading organizations is that; “Batterer Intervention Programs Do Not Change Offender Behavior.” The recent National Institute of Justice report isa compilation of data and research over the past decade and as a result, the report spurred a joint committee sponsored by National Institute of Justice (NIJ) and the Family Violence Prevention Fund (FVPF) to have an “Expert’s Round Table” meeting in December 2009. The resulting meeting published in 2010 “Doing the Work and Measuring the Progress: Batterer Intervention Meeting Report,” in which includes, executive order and further recommendations.

One of the major recurring themes in the research is that there exists a gap between “what researchers emphasize when they evaluate batterer intervention programs” and “what practitioners consider reflective of their program goals and accomplishments.”

For example:

Oddly, or not, during this research paper, there currently does not exist an audit report in the State of Kansas on the Batterer Intervention Programs. In fact my research shows that the Kansas States “Batterer Intervention Program” – adopted by the Kansas Attorney General’s Office, as the ‘model’ for Domestic Violence and Batterer Intervention (KS Attorney General, Victims’ Rights)’ is one in the same as the “Kansas Family Peace Initiatives” (FPI) founded entirely by one person with his private business attached to it. The FPI claims an astonishing “81% success rate” in their Batterer Intervention Program and they simply state: “our success rate has been verified by private sources retained by FPI.”

Therefore, we are to take the ‘word’ of the Family Peace Initiative’s own agenda, and platform. An individual, not a group, but a business, in that “they” claim is so successful, although no objective data or empirical research can be found to verify this, even though it would be the only Batterer Intervention Program in the Nation, to claim an “81 percent success rate,” when the rest of the Nation shows none. This gives rise to a whole other set of ethical issues and questions. In that, from the Family Peace Initiative website, (www.FamilyPeaceInitiative.com) “they” now offer --“paid for” expert testimony, “paid for“ expert training, to which the “husband and wife” team are currently booking ‘training's’ throughout Kansas and Texas at $300.00 per person with a thirty person cap per class. This, is in addition to the money earned not only from Federal and State grants, funding for the program its self,but also from the public and the clients/perpetrators who are court ordered to attend.

However, since the Judiciary and Criminal Justice system have failed and continues to fail victims of domestic violence, the Batterers Intervention Program is all that ‘victims’ receive in the way of any type of validation and nothing remotely close to justice. It is also another way to keep ‘eyes on’ the batterer, in alleged protections of the victim, for those very failures. Imagine what should be a prosecution and incarceration of a severe person crime, that now has moved to “treating the batterers” and not the victim.

In conclusion, with the overwhelming research readily available nationally, it is more than clear that Batterer Intervention Programs have had ‘minimal at best’ to ‘absolutely no effect’ at all, on reducing violence against women. It is clear from reviewing other perpetrator/victim crimes that prosecution alone is the single strongest deterrent in reducing violence against women. So this begs the question, “Why are we funding yet another wasted program where we “think” we should “treat” a perpetrator versus “prosecute”? And, further harms incurred by sending out a false sense of security from the Judges, to the public, and the victims - by what is essentially, further silencing victims of domestic violence by “treating” the criminal as if it were a disease.

Batter Intervention Programs do not decrease domestic violence. Yet there continues to be an increase in the use of ‘batterer intervention programs”. I believe this program needs to be tabled and other sources sought out and implemented to decrease domestic violence.

Claudine Dombrowski

Pages

Tuesday, January 14, 2014

Power and Control: Domestic Violence in America in Documentary (+playlist)

Profit Over Protection - The Industry Of Abuse. Spotlight "Kansas Batterer Intervention Program"

Are Batterer Intervention Programs Reducing Domestic Violence?