Domestic Violence Towards Women

Awareness of violent crimes towards women: A local overview

By Katie Ware

Domestic violence offenses for Vancouver, Washington in 2007

Rape     Aggravated & simple assault           Robbery               Larceny                 Murder
12         1091                             7                           21                         1
Motor vehicle theft   Violation of protection Burglary Total offenses
            5                                       41                                 4                       1,182
I found that the statistics from the Victim Advocacy Program were the same as those of Washington’s annual crime report.

      I talked with all my family members, co-workers, and a couple of friends. I received similar responses from most all of them.   The spontaneous responses included things like, “oh, interesting”, “that’s nice,” “wow, that sounds like a pretty heavy topic”, and “I’d be interested in finding out about what you’re learning.”   When I think about it, I would have probably responded the same way they did. When I signed up for this course, I remember thinking, “this should be interesting.” It has been interesting so far.
      I did, however, have a few good conversations with a few people. My best friend shared her experiences with her verbally abusive husband. I also spoke with a co-worker who is in special education who shared some stories of some very dysfunctional families.
      My friend was married for 8 years. She married a “good” Christian man whom she looked up to. His family was not quite as stable as hers and he fell in love with her family. They eventually married but she found out early on that he wasn’t quite as perfect as she thought. He would upset her by some of the things he said, how he said them, or just nit picked at little things. There were instances where he would get really mad at something stupid she did or he would tease her.
      He lacks a lot of empathy and was not completely... [continues]

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