By: anonymous

anonymous — Wed, 22 May 2024 16:27:08 +0000

I agree with your concerns that nothing is fool-proof or abuser-proof in Intimate Partner Violence. Abusers today are very skilled at getting out of the criminal charges laid against them. In my own case, (I am eighty-six years old) when I called the police about my husband’s angry and threatening behaviour in August of 2021, the police took my statement down on a cell phone. Not by hand. I was then assigned a Crown Attorney in my district. I was under the misunderstanding that the Crown Attorney was there to represent me. I was assigned a counsellor from Victim Witness Assistance and I was not allowed access directly to the Crown Attorney. The young police officer involved (not a domestic abuse officer) then lost my audio statement, I was never told of its loss, nor was I asked to replace it. Thus, in April 2022, the Crown Attorney dismissed the charge of assault against my husband, who was 85 at the time. Her reasons for doing so: loss of police evidence, the abuser was 85 years old (disregarding the victim (me) at 84 who had been assaulted three times, the last leaving me with a permanent injury) and the COVID backlog in the courts. Case dismissed. The abuser claims he never assaulted me in all the years of our marriage (33). This is just one example of what can happen to a victim despite all the service agencies that are put into place to help support victims. What doesn’t happen is that the federal and provincial governments do not make an effort to support victims of abuse. They talk a good story, they put websites up listing the many agencies to contact if you’ve been abused. They don’t fund the courts with judges or staff, courts are darkened. Anyone who has experienced Intimate Partner Violence knows that abuse happens behind closed doors and abuse silences the victims. So how can any agency deal with those two realities of Intimate Partner Violence? It is still a “he said/she said” issue for judges in the courts if the charge gets that far. A victim truly has very little opportunity of defending herself, for she is most often not believed and the perpetrator gets to walk free.

Comments on: Survivor safety

By: anonymous