It’s hard to find exact statistics for domestic crime, since so many cases go unreported. Victims who fear for their lives, are battered into submission, or get duped into thinking “everyone fights,” fail to take steps to stop the cycle. The most recent estimates range from 960,000 incidents to three million physically abused individuals, of which 85% are female. According to a 1998 Commonwealth Fund survey, nearly one-third of females reported being physically or sexually assaulted by a husband or boyfriend in their lifetimes. In 2001, over half a million American women were victims of a non-fatal crime committed by an intimate partner.

Physical abuse is the most common definition of domestic violence crime. Behaviors range from hitting, grabbing and choking to throwing things or assaulting with a weapon. According to a Center for Disease Control study, individuals who were victims of intimate partner violence were three times more likely to get a sexually transmitted disease, more than twice as likely to smoke and binge drink and were more likely to have arthritis, high blood pressure and a disability later in life. It’s important to remember that even if the violence occurs in one’s own home, the police have the power and authority to protect you from an attack. Additionally, they will be able to find you a temporary place to stay if you need one.

Economic threats are a crime as well. To control someone, an abusive partner may withhold money, give a petty allowance and demand accountability, steal paychecks, or withhold basic necessities. Often, the attacker will prevent their spouses from working or choosing a career, will sabotage their job, causing them to miss work or to lose work because the assaulter continuously calls or shows up to cause a ruckus. This sort of behavior is symptomatic of underlying dysfunction that ties in with emotional, physical and sexual crime.

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, October 29th, 2008 at 6:46 am and is filed under Family. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.