VAWnet News Blog

Suzanne Cole started her early summer day behind a stack of purple folders, in a small Anchorage office surrounded by shelves of folders. To get to the office, she had to walk through a room with more shelves filled with thousands and thousands of purple folders — most representing an Alaskan’s accusation of domestic violence against another, and the rest for stalking.

Rosie Batty, whose son Luke was murdered by his own father at cricket practice, has partnered with make up brand Lancôme for a new campaign. The 2015 Australian of the Year is the face of the Love Your Age campaign and is the first Australian to front a commercial for the brand. The campaign will help raise awareness of domestic violence – a cause that Ms Batty has championed since her son was killed in 2014.

Domestic violence is more than just an issue people hear about,  it’s something many Americans have to deal with every day. The National Coalition Against Domestic Violence(NCADV) has made a concerted effort in focusing on preventing abuse keeping people aware of the issue.

This annual VPC report is being released in advance of Domestic Violence Awareness Month in October. The study uses 2014 data, the most recent year for which information is available. The study also ranks the states on the rate of women murdered by men. In 2014, Alaska had the highest rate, followed by Louisiana, Nevada, Oklahoma, and South Carolina.

The Martinsburg Police Department recently created a program designed to identify and better serve victims of domestic violence while reducing the time that patrol officers spend responding to repeat calls.

Denver7 spent months requesting and analyzing records from more than a dozen law enforcement agencies — large and small — across Colorado, seeking to calculate arrest rates on calls of domestic violence and domestic unrest. The state’s domestic violence law mandates an arrest when probable cause demonstrates a crime has been committed. The key phrase, “probable cause,” gives officers discretion to walk away from a domestic call without arresting anyone if there is no physical evidence or eyewitness statements to corroborate allegations of abuse.