Principle 7 of the DOJ Guidance on Identifying and Preventing Gender Bias in Law Enforcement Response to Sexual Assault and Domestic Violence highlights the importance of holding officers who commit sexual assault or domestic violence accountable. As stated in the DOJ Guidance, “Law enforcement agencies strive to be seen by their communities as credible and legitimate authorities in enforcing the law and protecting public safety. If a law enforcement agency does not fully investigate reports of sexual assault, sexual misconduct and domestic violence perpetrated by its own officers or fails to appropriately discipline officers when those allegations are substantiated, the legitimacy of that law enforcement agency may be called into question.” Additionally, seeking access to safety and protection is significantly more challenging for victims when the perpetrator is a law enforcement officer. This section provides resources for law enforcement agencies and victims’ advocates to improve prevention, investigation, and accountability in such cases.
Public Trust: Confronting Law Enforcement Sexual Misconduct in the #MeToo Era Webinar, End Violence Against Women International, August 2018.
This webinar addresses law enforcement sexual misconduct and explains how to bring police departments into the current #MeToo era so agencies can work to prevent and improve the response to officer-involved sexual harassment, sexual assault, and sexual misconduct. The webinar includes a review of data and case studies, and identifies promising practices for prevention, supervision, and accountability.
Officer-Involved Domestic Violence, National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, December 2018.
This webinar addresses the impact of Officer-Involved Domestic Violence (OIDV) and the unique challenges encountered by victims of batterers who are police officers. It explores this issue from a variety of perspectives, including survivors of officer-involved domestic violence, and from the prosecutorial and law enforcement lenses.
Invisible No More: Police Violence Against Black Women and Women of Color, August 1, 2017
This book is an examination of how Black women, Indigenous women, and women of color experience racial profiling, police brutality, and immigration enforcement. Placing stories of individual women in the broader context of the twin epidemics of police violence and mass incarceration, it documents the evolution of movements centering women’s experiences of policing and demands a radical rethinking of society’s visions of safety—and the means devoted to achieving it.