Domestic Violence Focused Deterrence August 2014 Voiceover: Beat Intro 00:03 This is the Beat—a podcast series that keeps you in the know about the latest community policing topics facing our nation. Barry Bratburd 00:11 Hello and welcome. My name is Barry Bratburd, and on behalf of the COPS office, I would like to introduce Captain Timothy Ellenberger. Captain Ellenberger is in the major crime deterrent and prevention section at High Point Police Department in North Carolina. Today, Captain Ellenberger is here with us to discuss the High Point Offender-Focused Domestic Violence Initiative Strategy that targets the domestic violence offender to reduce repeat domestic violence incidents, reported assaults, injuries, and deaths. The COPS Office funded an evaluation of this strategy in 2012 through the community policing development micro grant solicitation. So, Captain Ellenberger, please tell us about the Offender-Focused Domestic Violence Initiative started in High Point and give us an idea of the strategy and the process. Captain Timothy Ellenberger 00:59 We’ve been using the focused deterrent model to combat a number of different problems. It first started back in the late-1990s with chronic violent offenders. When we started using that, we saw a noticeable decline in our violent crime rate. Then, around 2004, we used it to address drug markets in our community, and we saw another drastic decline in our violent crime rate. We targeted violent groups and gangs, and again we saw another one. What was always smacking us in the face, so to speak, was domestic violence. It was never really reduced indirectly by the other efforts we were having. So, in 2010, we answered over 5,000 domestic violence calls, which was kind of an average for the year. When you look at the time that we spend on that, that’s two officers going to each call for an average of about 26 minutes; it’s over 6,000 hours that our officers were spending on that. Most importantly was, between 2004 and 2008, a third of all of our homicides were domestic violence- related. So, we decided that if we’re going to really apply focused deterrence to address what our data tells us is our problem, we are going to have to deal with domestic violence. So my chief and my assistant chief contacted David Kennedy and brought out a paper he had presented years before that had the theory that the chronic domestic violence offender was dangerous not just in a domestic violence arena; he also got in bar fights and was exposed in other ways in the criminal justice system that allowed for more sanctions to be placed on him after he’s convicted. In other words, we suspected that our chronic domestic violence offender was also exposed in other ways that led us to be able to apply heavier sanctions on him other than just in the domestic violence arena. Bratburd 03:26 Great. Why is it so important to target these particular offenders? Ellenberger 03:32 Well, most of the traditional approaches to domestic violence have been victim-focused. In other words, there’s been a big emphasis on helping victims to avoid these patterns of intimacy with abusers and to remove themselves from the abusive settings. Ours is offender-focused. And we believe that service to the victim, the traditional approach, is important, but not enough attention has been paid to holding the offender accountable. This belief that domestic violence is qualitatively different than any other type of violence is really not supported by the analysis of our offenders’ criminal histories. So the chronic domestic violence offender tends to have an extensive criminal history, including both domestic and non-domestic violence. So in essence, we are dealing with the person that is causing the problem in addition to providing service for those victims too. Bratburd 04:36 What partners did you bring to the table, and why is collaboration so important for this strategy? Ellenberger 04:41 Domestic violence is not just a police department’s problem, and it’s not just a courthouse problem, and it’s not just any one person’s problem. It’s a community problem. We have family services up at Piedmont. They are our victims advocate. They provide the services for victims of domestic violence and in other areas too. We have the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, who are our research partners who did the initial research on our offenders that showed us that these offenders are violent in other areas also, not just in domestic violence. Then we have to have the state and federal prosecutors partnered with us because they are going to be prosecuting these cases. The probation officers too because they are the ones—because a lot of the times a misdemeanor or a domestic assault does not result in six months in jail. It results in six months of supervised probation. So they are the ones who provide the offenders. Then our High Point Community Against Violence deals with offender services. So after an offender is notified, they will work with the offenders to get them job training, or education, or assist with housing, whatever they may need to change their behavior. So if they say, “I wouldn’t do these things if I didn’t have this drinking problem,” then we can work with them to get them help for that drinking problem. On the other side, if they don’t take advantage of these services and they re-offend after notification, then that same group, High Point Community Against Violence, will show up in court and say we did this with this offender or he didn’t take our offer of assistance for this offender, and that’s the community speaking to the judge. Bratburd 06:39 Right. Ellenberger 06:41 And since we’ve started this, we’ve added pieces where we found gaps. For instance, we now have in our workgroup that meets bi-weekly, we have a Department of Social Services representative who. Often times these offenders have child support or family problems that Social Services are involved in. We’ve added a representative from our emergency room who is seeing these cases as they come in. The most dangerous cases or worst assaults, they are seeing those in the emergency room. We’ve added a magistrate judge, which is our first level of judge in North Carolina. Every time someone is arrested, they go before a magistrate to determine the conditions of their release. Where we have seen gaps in what we’re trying to do, we’ve added members of the community to join us and try to fill those gaps. What we realized before we started this was that these offenders were not really resisting our best efforts. We could do better. We could prepare better cases from the police department. The prosecutors could work a little harder on getting these prosecutions. The victim’s services angle could do a little bit better in assisting in this whole domestic violence problem. So when we realized that the chronic domestic violence offender was not resisting our best efforts, then we tried to look at what would our best effort looks like, and let’s try to do that. Bratburd 08:20 Great. Now can you share with us some preliminary statistics and data on the effectiveness on the program? Ellenberger 08:26 Sure. To date, we have notified over 1,000 offenders. That’s two years of full implementation on April 1, 2014, marks the two-year date of full implementation. We’ve notified over 1,000 offenders. When you look at that number, that’s a significant number for our prosecutor to have to deal with—1,050 offenders over a two-year period. That’s kind of overwhelming. But when you look at only 100 of them have re-offended, it’s a little less than 10 percent. Those are the cases where we really want the prosecutor to pay special attention to, and that’s more manageable, that 102 cases over a two-year period is much more manageable. That’s our chronic offender, the person that will not listen to our message of deterrence and will not chance his behavior. Those are the ones that we zero in on and apply sanctions to. During the same time period, we have reduced our number of calls for service and the number of assaults on our victims of domestic violence, and we’ve made less arrests. While those numbers are not drastic, they are improvements. For instance, we’re answering about a call to a call and a half less per day than we were prior to implementation. We are investigating about five less assaults per month, which over time, at the end of the year, that’s 60 less assault victims that we have. And we’re making about three or four less arrests per month. While those numbers don’t seem like drastic improvements, I think they are a step in the right direction. It also, I think, lends a little bit of legitimacy. I would be suspicious of what was going on if we were investigating about a third of the numbers of calls or if we had reduced the reported assaults by 50 percent. Those numbers would have made me a little suspicious because I just don’t think you can turn it all around that quickly. Bratburd 10:51 Right. Yes, I think you’re right on point there. Is there anything else you’d like to add? Ellenberger 10:57 Yes. I think that we’re making less arrests over time. Initially, we made more arrests because we were paying closer attention to the problem. We’ve got less reported victims, and we’re answering less calls. So everything is pointing into the right direction. We’re constantly refining and filling in gaps and trying to make it even better. Bratburd 11:26 Well, it sounds like you are absolutely moving in the right direction. Well, thank you very much for your time today, Captain Ellenberger. We really appreciate you spending some time talking about your program and sharing your expertise. Ellenberger 11:37 Thank you, sir. Voiceover: Beat Exit 11:38 The Beat was brought to you by the United States Department of Justice, COPS Office. The COPS Office helps to keep our nation’s communities safe by giving grants to law enforcement agencies, developing community policing publications, developing partnerships, and solving problems. Voiceover: Disclaimer 11:55 The opinions contained herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official position or polices of the U.S. Department of Justice. References to specific agencies, companies, products, or services should not be considered an endorsement by the authors or the U.S. Department of Justice. Rather, the references are illustrations to supplement discussion of the issues.