Domestic violence is a worldwide endemic and significant social and public health issue occurring everywhere in this world. History is consistently evolving to challenge the family law system and respond to current growing issues of domestic violence. However, why is it that victims who manage to escape domestic abuse, receive additional harm and betrayal (S.L.Brown, 2013)?
The concept of secondary victimisation is a term used to describe the feeling of betrayal by the victim from the responses they may receive. This concept is most commonly associated in cases of rape as a way to understand the victim’s experiences and the formal or informal support; some of which deemed harmful (Liang, 2016). However, this focus is centred around the negative experiences of women involved in domestic violence and their expectation to be believed, validated and protected, only to be granted with disempowerment, victim-blaming and a complete disappointment in the legal system (Laing, 2016).
This is mainly achieved through a popular question directed towards those involved in domestic violence:
“Why doesn’t she just leave?”
This attempt to rationalise and provide an answer to domestic violence quite often burdens the victim for the onus for action (Walker, 2015). Most victims understand the true meaning of these types of questions and the code they indicate. A code many people identify as ‘it’s her fault for staying’. It outlines the perception that women are choosing to willingly staying in an abusive, neurotic relationship and the reason why many domestic abuse relationships are not taken seriously by the Criminal Justice System.
Dunn (2012) suggests a society that values resistance and autonomy acknowledge females who refuse to leave domestic violence relationships as non legitimate victims. The tension surrounding the ‘representation of passivity and society’s belief in agency’ representing the tradition notions to describe an ‘ideal victim’ does not fit the category for those involved in abusive relationships (Dunn, 2012).
What individuals don’t understand is that the victim generally go through many stages of denial whereby they do not believe they are in an abusive relationship. Prior research demonstrates, many women take time to figure out the ‘controlling behaviour is not deemed passionate or loving but scary and abusive’, and when they do realise they are in this situation many are too scared to leave (Fraser, 2005). What people fail to acknowledge is more than 30% of women in Australia are murdered after separation. In many ways, women believe leaving is scarier than staying and do not believe they have the support to get away from their abusive partner. The belief their abusive partner will track them down and kill them is present in many who escape and based on statistics, this is a common occurrence in many abusive relationships (Klein, 2010). Stark (2007) interviewed many females who managed to escape a violent relationship but feel ‘more frightened than the days, weeks and months after they moved out’ (119). Other outcomes include long-term stalking, denial of financial resources and manipulation of the family court system to terrify the victim and their children (Laing, 2016). DeKeseredy, Dragiewics and Schwartz (2017) centre their research around the violence committed at the beginning, during, or after they leave by focusing on the notion of ‘if I can’t have you, no one can’. Their statistic display most of the violence and murders happen during those times.
Rivera, Sullivan and Zeoli (2012) approach the context of secondary victimisation with research surrounding the domestic survivor’s involvement in the legal system. Where the minority of women reported feeling ‘heard, respected, listened to, and safe’ (p.244) during court mediation. Whilst,
“63% reported they experienced secondary victimisation”
Khaw and Barma (2018) interviewed 24 mothers who outlined their experience of domestic violence emphasising the negative outcomes of the court by the continuation of harassment and violence even after escaping the situation. They define the court as minimising or ignoring the relevance of domestic abuse with regards to receiving custody or making parental decisions. Furthermore, research demonstrates the significantly lenient sentences compared to strangers or other assaulters (Hayes, 2015). In Australia, the most common sentence for a domestic abuser is a bond or fine and the most common violence-related charge is assault (Women’s Aid, 2013).
This is shared in Jane’s story by The Divorce Violence Resource Centre Victoria. Jane shares her story of being in an abusive relationship where her final decision and courage to leave her abusive partner was only faced with bitterness and disappointment in the legal system. After years of enduring physical and emotional abuse, the court sentenced him with a good behaviour bond and allowed allowing her abusive partner to see her children every second weekend.
These negative outcomes for domestic violence survivors leaves them feeling disempowered and discourages future legal recourse. Not only that but the typical stereotype of domestic violence victims are self-destructive women, damaged goods or women who deserve it for staying in that type of relationship. In the UK, Women’s Aid (2013) reported the dismissive response from the criminal justice system left them wishing they had never reported to begin with and felt more like a criminal than victim. They found it difficult to be heard and many women reported feeling blamed, disbelieved and/or dismissed.h
Characteristics of the Female Victim in Domestic Violence
An issue commonly raised among the cases of domestic violence is based around the police’s response. In 2016, the Victorian Royal Commission into Family Violence noted a common frequency of the misidentification of women as the primary aggressor of the relationship where the use of self-defence, substance abuse and/or mental illness strongly influences the decisions of the police (Reeves, 2017).
The Royal Commission (2016) found victims are routinely mistaken for primary aggressors even though the Code of Practice (2017) state the police are ‘not to make assumptions when assessing evidence and determining who the likely primary aggressor is’ (p.14). In 2015, Women’s Health West received 57 referrals from police that identified the women as the perpetrator and further assessment found 51 out of the 57 women were actually the victims. Larsen & Guggisber (2009) confirm through their research women are often feared of their own arrest if they are to report to the police and one of the reasons that deter women from reporting.
This is shown in research stating: In Australia,
“1 in 8 female victims are deemed primary aggressors”
This outlines the shortcomings in the legal system and the negative experiences faced by many victims that deters many females from escaping an abusive relationship and wishing they did not report in the first place, whilst also preventing the perpetrator from being liable for their actions. Therefore, although the concept of secondary victimisation generally surrounds victims of sexual assault, the complexity of domestic violence and the experiences of the female victims involved in violent relationships show they too encounter victim-blaming and an in-depth sense of betrayal and disempowerment in the legal system.
References:
DeKeseredy, WS, Dragiewicz, M & Schwartz, MD 2017, Abusive Endings: Separation and Divorce Violence Against Women, University of California, California
Deveau, L & Hirschel, D 2016, ‘The impact of primary aggressor laws on single versus dual arrest in incidents of intimate partner violence’, Violence Against Women, vol. 23, no. 10, pp. 1155-1176
Dunn, J 2012, Judging victims: Why we stigmatize survivors, and how they reclaim respect, Bourlder Colorado, Colarado
Hayes, S 2015, The Big Question: Why Women Stay in Abusive Relationships, Queensland University of Technology, Queensland
Jane, “Jane’s Story”, Domestic Violence Resource Centre Victoria, viewed 5 April 2019, https://www.dvrcv.org.au/stories/janes-story
Kent, A 2018, ‘Power and agency: Characterisations of the female victim of family violence’, Australian & New Zealand Journal of Criminology, vol. 0, no. 0, pp. 1-20
Khaw, L, Bermea, AM, Hardesty, JL, Saunders, D & Whittaker, AM 2018, ‘“The System had choked me too”: Abused mothers’ perceptions of the custody determination process that resulted in negative custody outcomes’, Journal of Interpersonal Violence, pp. 1-25
Laing, L 2016, ‘Secondary victimization: Domestic violence survivors navigating the family law system’, Violence Against Women, vol. 23, no. 11, pp. 1314-1335
Larsen, A & Guggisberg, M 2009, ‘Police officers, women and intimate partner violence: Giving primacy to social context’, Australian Journal of Gender and Law, vol. 1, pp. 1–18.
Louis, SM & Johnson, EJ 2017, ‘How mother perceive their own domestic violence victimization and how it impacts their children’, Journal of Child Custody, vol. 14, no. 1, pp. 34-48
McCulloch, J, Fitz-Gibbon, K & Walklate S 2017, ‘Is more law the answer? Seeking justice for victims of intimate partner through the reform of legal categories’, Criminology & Criminal Justice, vol. 18, no. 1, pp. 115-131
Our Watch 2018, Facts and Figures, viewed 5 April 2019, https://www.ourwatch.org.au/understanding-violence/facts-and-figures
Reeves, E 2017, ‘How Victoria’s family violence system fails some victims- by assuming they’re perpetrators’, The Conversation, viewed 5 April 2019, https://theconversation.com/how-victorias-family-violence-system-fails-some-victims-by-assuming-theyre-perpetrators-87184
Roberts, DC 2018, Child Contact, Domestic Violence, and Family Law in Australia, School of Psychology University of Adelaide, Adelaide
Walker, L 2015, ‘Looking back and looking forward: Psychological and legal interventions for domestic violence’, Ethics, Medicine and Public Health, vol. 1, pp. 19–32.
The Issues of Domestic Violence 