8/14/2019 Domestic Violence Part 1: Attitudes and Assaults

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8/14/2019 Domestic Violence Part 1: Attitudes and Assaults

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A series of articles have been written to speci cally discuss issues relating tothe investigation of the everyday domestic violence incident, which policeattend frequently. Issues which may present the biggest hurdles forinvestigators are explored including: personal attitudes, prejudice and bias,understanding assaults properly, collection of evidence and an apparent lackof commitment or assistance by the victim.

This article is the rst in the series and is divided into two parts:

A comprehensive understanding of these two factors will assist police in theexecution of their duties. Firstly, by dissipating some of the attitudes thatmay impinge upon conducting a detailed investigation, and secondly, bybeing con dent in the understanding of the o ff ence of common assault.

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In a perfect world, police would investigate each and every incident of crimebrought to their attention in the same unbiased logical manner. We do not,however, live in a perfect world so we have to contend with our own biasesand other pressures such as fatigue and emotion.

If we can acknowledge the existence of our personal prejudices and bemindful of them when attending to our portion of the 140 000 plus domesticincidents that we will be tasked to investigate next year, we should have abetter chance of ensuring they do not inhibit our pursuit of discovering thetruth and taking appropriate action.

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As human beings, we all have our own values, beliefs andattitudes that we have developed throughout the course of ourlives. Our family, friends, community and the experiences wehave had all contribute to our sense of who we are and how weview the world. (NSW Dept of Education and Training 2009Personal values, belief and attitudes accessed online 1/8/13)

It would follow that attitudes of many police towards conducting a thoroughinvestigation of a domestic violence incident would be a ff ected in some way

by our previous experience of similar investigations, and also by ourcommunity, (i.e. colleagues).

Let us take the example of a domestic incident occurring at a location towhich police have been called three times in as many months, where thevictim discloses to police that her husband verbally abused her and pushedher into a wall. How many police attend this incident with the view ofconducting a proactive and thorough investigation? How many police arein uenced by their perceptions such as: police have attended this location ona number of occasions, the incident is relatively minor, the time and e ff ortpolice would need to exert in order to have a chance of conviction at court issubstantial and there is a real possibility that the victim will becomeuncooperative between now and any potential court date. Our ownexperiences of failed prosecutions and perceived time wasted byuncooperative victims, and similar experiences related to us by ourcolleagues all a ff ect our attitudes, and decisions, particularly our decision toonce again invest considerable e ff ort into a cause that in the past appearedfruitless.

As members of an organisation that identi es domestic violence as:

an abhorrent crime that damages our community at all levels and

is related to approximately 40% of all homicides. (NSWPF Domesticand Family Violence Policy 2012)

when investigating any matter, but particularly domestic violence o ff ences,we should as best as possible remove all adverse attitudes and adopt theproactive approach as outlined by the NSWPF Domestic and Family ViolencePolicy 2012.

The NSW Police Force will use a proactive approach in dealingwith o ff enders. This approach requires police not only to respondto incidents of domestic and family violence, conduct thoroughinvestigations and give strongest consideration to arrest, but to

reduce recidivism. In adopting a thorough proactiveinvestigation police will interview witnesses, take statements,record injuries and property damage using digital and videocameras to gather evidence, and prepare detail briefs for theprosecution [emphasis added]

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What is now referred to as a common assault historically contained two

At law the distinction between the two off

ences still survives and a personcan be found guilty of an assault or guilty of a battery, although in general

8/14/2019 Domestic Violence Part 1: Attitudes and Assaults

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