So sad.

Oh I forgot he was one of those good guys with a gun I don't have to worry about!

Doesn't do the victim any good now, but the fucker that did it is going away for a very long time.

And that is true even if the "victim" says she had no fear of the person having a gun when he went turkey hunting. Federal Court ruled that the Victim position that she had nothing to fear when the person who had a restraining order against him went Turkey Hunting did NOT even mitigate the Five Year mandatory sentence.

It is a TOUGH rule, and that includes ANY Firearms, even a firearm in a house the person who is subject to the restraining order but that is owned by another person in the house.

This is back in the late '50s. I will never forget hiding behind the couch while she screamed before the cops came (thank you, neighbors, for those calls!) as she was beaten. We had a lock on the bedroom door so my Dad couldn't beat his way into it, and he tried - Mom and my brother and I (and our dog) had no choice but to sleep together, till I was about 10. Not ideal, obviously, and once he got thrown out for good at that age he never paid a dime in child support. We went on to be poor, but dignified, and we never went hungry. And Mom worked hard as a laundress.

I didn't see or hear from him until I was 23. Phone call out of the blue, and bro and I went and saw him. Then I saw him one more time, on a slab on the morgue six months later as I had to ID him after getting a call from that morgue. That was it with my "Dad".

Mom lived to 85 in 2003, beloved by all. Don't ever underestimate domestic violence. It destroys lives (although I have hung in there - maybe). Never any excuse for it. Ever.

I had a slightly dysfunctional childhood myself, but not nearly as bad as what you had to put up with. I hope you and your bro are doing alright these days, though.

Most abusers knew its location, though, because in moments of weakness, the abused wife or girlfriend would tell him where it was so he could pick her up.

Holidays were always the most dangerous times. Seems like if a woman spent the holiday with him, she'd be back or dead by the end of that holiday.

The Police are only minutes away and if any males calls they refuse to tell them who is in the Shelter, including any of the workers. When I first started to work for Legal Aid (which is the group that handled GETTING such protection orders in Pennsylvania) I would call them and then tell the receptionists to have the client or the worker to call me. That lasted about six months, for I have a fairly unique voice, I have been asked if I am from England, Germany, Russia, and various other locations. I have to tell people, no I grew up locally, but since I had a hearing problems between the ages of two and five, my speech is like someone who never heard someone else speaks (i.e. like a deaf person). Since then, every time I call the Shelter, they let me talk right to the client over the phone. I should note, I am the only exception to the general rule, and just because by be just talking they know who I am. Other male Attorneys still have a rough time talking to clients who are living in the Help Center.

It looks more open then it is, It is on a slope between two streets, thus the fence goes around the rear and you can NOT see over the fence from OUTSIDE the shelter:

_1024

http://www.womenshelpcenter.org/

I have been working for Legal Aid in regards to Protection Orders for over 25 years, and I have NEVER been in the Shelter. They bring the clients to my office, or I see them at the Courthouse. There is no need for me to go into the shelter most of the time. With the computerization of such orders, except when they are in my office I have not have to call a client in at least five years. It does come up, custody cases and housing cases are the big issues, but most women only stay less then a month.

Phone calls. Couldn't verify who was staying there or anything. I always parked a block away.

YEAH!!!! SECOND AMENDMENT RIGHTS!!!!

Guns are such an easy way of dealing with problems. Anybody who uses a gun feels a sense of satisfaction and victory in accomplishing what they set out to do. I'm sure that this former husband had a big smile on his face when he was killing his estranged wife.

Now it's time for him to hire a lawyer to tie up the court system fighting this for the remainder of his life. Because after all, she's the one at fault here, certainly not him and his trusted gun.

But don't worry....this is just a completely isolated incident, and the vast majority of gun owners are responsible, law abiding folk, who merely are exercising their 2nd Amendment rights to protect themselves. And I'm sure that's comforting to the dead woman.

Will it ever end?

Domestic abusers are bullies and usually cowards, so the guns make them feel tough.

for developing a gun that only shoots when paired with the bracelet sold with it.
Those guns sound like a nightmare for domestic abuse victims to me.

Its no secret these abusive knuckle dragging beasts use the kids to get to the ex-wife.

Every time I hear of yet another case like this, I'm reminded of the words of a police officer in Ohio who was quoted in a newspaper article I read about twenty years ago. This was before the days when everything was on the internet, so I can't provide a link. But his words lodged in my mind, and I can quote him so closely that it's almost verbatim.

A grizzled veteran of twenty years of working on battered-women's cases, he declared, "I'm sick and tired of always hearing about how we need more funding to build battered women's shelters. We don't need any more battered women's shelters.

"What we need is shelters for batterers. We need to get those shelters built and staffed, and we need to get the batterers into the shelters.

"Those shelters", he went on, "are commonly known as jails."

Ever since I read those lines, I've wondered to myself: why in the world - why in the world - do we confine the victims of a violent crime, and let the perpetrators roam free?

Remember, in most abuse cases, the Defendant (the abuser) often says all he was doing was defending himself from what the Abused victim was doing. Thus you have no EVIDENCE beyond a reasonable doubt that any crime occurred. It is a simple she said, he said situation and since we are generally talking about co-owners or co-tenants of the home. To arrest one of them requires evidence beyond a reasonable doubt of some criminal act. 99% of the time you do not have that. You have evidence of hitting, but no evidence of any "Assault". In cases where the police do have such evidence they arrest the abuser.

Protection Orders are liked by Police for the burden of proof to get one is just preponderance of evidence, i.e. it is more likely then not that the abuser hit or otherwise abused the victim. Once the Protection Order is in place, all the police have to show beyond a reasonable doubt, is the following:

1. The Abuser KNEW of the Order
2. The Abuser was NEAR the victim.

Notice, if a Protection Order is in place, the Police do NOT have to have evidence of any actual abuse. All the Police has to show, beyond a reasonable doubt, is that the Protection Order has been issued, served on the abuser, and the abuser is near the victim in violation of that order. At that point the Local District Attorney takes over the case and sends the abuser to jail.

Remember we are dealing with people who have had a long term relationship, and often children together. Who owns what is often in dispute, as while as who gets the children. Worse, often the victim is financially dependent on the abuser. How do you make sure the Victim can PAY for her housing? For the housing of the Victim's children? And lets do not forget Food and Schooling,

In the worse cases, you often have a woman who does not drive and is thus dependent on her husband to take her everywhere. In many ways these real bad cases, you have BOTH parties using taking their "Sex Roles" to their illogical conclusion, i.e. he demands total control over her, she is under his total control (and in many ways, that is a way for HER to control HIM, i.e. her dependence on him, forces him to take her where she wants to go). These cases are rare, but I get one every couple of years (most such cases are NEVER filed, she lives with abuse). I would go into the Psychological basis for this, but I am trying to keep this paper short.

In the more typical case, abuse DECREASES as the victim become more and more submissive to the abuser, but increases whenever the victim starts to interact with other people (like normal people do). Victims have a tendency NOT to know how to drive a car, rarely attend church or other public activities and rarely interacts with her own siblings (and an increase in any one of these things tends to bring on the abuse).

I bring this up, for how do you protect someone, who refuses to be protected? i.e. the Victim wants the police gone and leave the abuser in the home. Unless the abuser does something in the presence of the Officers, there is nothing they can do. In the above two situation that is NO uncommon. The Abuser is beating up the victim, often the Victim (or a neighbor) calls the Police, the Police show up and the Victim says it was all a mistake. How do you prove beyond a reasonable doubt that a crime took place, when the Victim is denying that a crime took place?

We can try to help such victims as much as we can, but they tend to be isolated for it is control over the victim the abuser wants, not abuse per se. In cases where you have a victim with friends, or even people who do something with the victim, the victim are more likely to seek help. Thus in many ways the first step in NOT to arrest the abuser, but to socialize the victim. In the days of old, this was the job of the Church. Today they is no single organization that most people belong to. This was the strength of Churches in the days of old, but something that is missing today in most families. In many places Public Schools have filled this void, but if you have a family that is just meeting its legal obligations it is a bad fit (and this was a problem with the Churches in the days of old).

In many ways Protection Orders are a patch on a bad system. We need greater community attendance to such cases, and I do not mean police. Getting people to work together as a community is the first step, for once a group of people think of themselves as one, then they will address issues of abuse, rather then rely on the Courts and the Police to handle the problem. These women need support from their community more then anything else, but support that is often lacking in today's society.

I'm afraid my own post amounted to a frustrated yowl, more than anything else.

Ohio. 'nough said.

How many women have been killed who had an order of protection in their purses or homes? You want protection? Get a gun and learn how to use it. I'm not fan of guns, but if I really thought that some sick SOB had it in for me, I would buy one. If I'm going to die, I'm going to make sure that I take the bastard with me.

Are abused women supposed to walk around with a loaded gun in their hands at all times? Including putting daughter on a bus? How do you know this would have saved her anyway? he may have shot her before she even saw him! take away guns from anyone even suspected of physical abuse.

We are not talking ideals here. In an ideal world he wouldn't have had a gun, but he did. Therefore, she was just a sitting duck.

That means that putting his hands on a gun would subject him to an automatic 5 years in prison. If he's commited himself to murder, the law isn't going to mean jack to him. Confiscate his guns? He'll get more, even if it means breaking the law. And even without a gun, he can overpower her.

Yeah, like a piece of paper was going to keep some psycho away from his target. When will we actually start protecting the victims?

Restraining orders aren't worth the paper they're printed on.

The problem is how do you prove BEYOND A REASONABLE DOUBT that abuse occurred? In many cases the Police are called, and BOTH parties says nothing happened. In other cases, both parties blame the other. Who is telling the truth? And, given the test for ARREST AND CONVICTION is proof beyond a REASONABLE DOUBT how do you have that when you only have two witnesses and both are blaming the other?

Thus the Protection Order was born. It solved the above problem. First, once such an Order is issued, all the Police have to prove beyond a reasonable doubt is that the Defendant knew of the Order AND that he or she was NEAR the victim. Nothing else needs to be proved, thus makes it a simple and quick arrest (the Abuser can NOT even claim the Victim asked the Abuser to see the Victim, for the Protection order is clear the abuser MUST stay away from the Victim).

Police LOVE protection orders, for once one is entered (And today that means it is on their computer in the patrol car) the Police do NOT have to see the abuser assault the victim, all the officer has to see is that the abuser is near the victim.

On the other hand, if the accusation is false (such false reports DO OCCUR) the alleged abuser just have to stay away from the alleged Victim and no criminal actions will be brought against the alleged abuser.

In cases were the issue is questionable, the Protection Orders makes it easier for Law Enforcement to protect Victims, even when they do not want protection. Thus the protection order does its job quite well.

Remember, the Protection Order is an attempt to get around the burden of proof the Police AND the victim have when it comes to any actual criminal assault. The protection order does so by shifting the burden from the victim to the abuser. Once the burden of proof has shifted, it makes the job of law enforcement easier and therefore quicker.

On the other hand, do you really want such shift of burden of proof on EVERYONE (i.e. Police can arrests anyone with no burden of proof)? Thus the two step procedure, the first step is a court ruling, based on some evidence that a victim was abused. Once that is done, any further contact is all that is needed for an arrest.