Lessons Learned the Domestic Violence Intervention Project - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

1 / 30
About This Presentation
Title:

Lessons Learned the Domestic Violence Intervention Project

Description:

... from finding alternative brief anger management or other inappropriate therapies ... Anger management: AM is usually a short-term skills-based intervention ... – PowerPoint PPT presentation

Number of Views:242
Avg rating:3.0/5.0
Slides: 31
Provided by: mhfs
Category:

less

Transcript and Presenter's Notes

Title: Lessons Learned the Domestic Violence Intervention Project


1
Lessons Learned - the Domestic Violence
Intervention Project
  • Chris Newman, DVIP

2
Why work with abusers?
  •  
  • punishment alone is not enough to deter
    perpetrators from re-offending
  • most domestic violence offences are not reported
  • psychological and emotional abuse are difficult
    to punish in law
  • many women stay with, return to or continue to
    have contact with violent and abusive partners
  • men who abuse are likely to go on to abuse other
    women, even if they serve a prison sentence for
    domestic violence
  • some men want to change
  • It involves men working to end violence against
    women

3
Life on three planets
Child protection (public law) Child as
victim mother seen as failing to protect - focus
on changing her Father often invisible
Domestic violence (civil and criminal
law) Focus on offence and offender and
changing him Woman as victim Child invisible
Child contact (private law) Mothers resistance
considered hostile Presumption of Contact
father as victim (?)
4
Implications for developing effective
interventions for perpetrators?
  • If the system matters as Gondolf tells us, then
    in each of these arenas a perpetrator programme
    will need to be tied into the system in a
    different way if it is to
  • Increase victims safety
  • help to hold abusers accountable
  • meet the needs of the other agencies which are
    working to ensure the victims safety. 

5
The Domestic Violence Intervention Project
Self-referred clients

Perpetrator services Assessment 32
session structured group programme
ongoing follow up group
Victim support services Individual work
Structured workshops Support
groups Safety planning
6
Advantages of an independent sector project
  •  
  • Independent of both courts and probation. So
    could argue for consequences for non-
    participation
  • Men come to the programme from a range of routes
    - reduces resentment and sense of persecution
    by the system
  •  
  • Not driven by institutional targets. For instance
    completion rates
  •  
  • Ability to hold to a position of principle,
    avoiding government or institutional pressures
  •  
  • Ability to campaign for safe practice in the work
  •  
  • Small size of organisation means can respond to
    change quickly
  •  
  • And offer services at low cost compared to larger
    organisations.
  •   

7
The Domestic Violence Intervention Project

London Probation Area
Self-referred
Perpetrator services Assessment 32
session structured group programme
ongoing follow up group
Victim support services Individual work
Structured workshops Support
groups Safety planning Programme for mothers in
care proceedings
8
Hester and Radford Domestic violence and child
contact Social Policy Research 100 June 1996
  • Many professionals in England interpreted the
    Children Act 1989 in a way which allowed contact
    with fathers to take precedence over child
    welfare.
  •  
  • Fathers commonly used contact with the children
    as a route to further abuse the mother. Domestic
    violence injunctions and policing practice in
    both countries gave women only limited protection
    from further abuse.
  •  

9
Hester and Radford study
  • Only 7 of the 53 mothers interviewed in England
    were able - eventually- to arrange contact which
    did not threaten their own safety and/or their
    children's well being.
  • Most mothers initially wanted children to
    see their fathers contact arrangements broke
    down because of violence.
  • No evidence to support claims made by many of the
    professionals interviewed that contact broke down
    because mothers were 'hostile' to the idea of
    contact  

10
Hester and Radford 1996
  • Hester and Radford concluded that contact should
    not be presumed to be in the best interests of
    the child if there has been domestic violence to
    the mother

11
Experts report and guidelines to the court - 2000
  • Domestic violence is a serious failure in
    parenting
  • In deciding the issue of contact the court is
    asked to consider
  • The history of domestic violence
  • The motivation for seeking contact
  • Victim empathy, attitude to past violence and
    capacity to change
  • The effects of the domestic violence on the
    resident parent and children

12
  • The risk to the children if contact is ordered
  • The wishes and feelings of the child
  • Whether to make treatment for the abuser a
    condition of future contact or seek advice in
    assessing the risk of harm to the child
  • Whether or not conditions or non-molestation
    orders should be made and whether contact should
    be supervised

13
The Safe Contact Protocol
  • Protocols between the SCP agencies - CAFCASS,
    Supervised Contact Centres, DVIP, the Mens
    Centre
  • Agree a format for specialist risk assessment
  • prevent applicants seeking endless alternative
    expert reports in order to get a more favourable
    response (while allowing for a second opinion)
  • prevent applicants from finding alternative brief
    anger management or other inappropriate therapies
    to address their abusive behaviour
  • or from finding a contact centre which will take
    the case even when a CAFCASS reporter has advised
    that contact is not safe.
  • Workers from the partnership agencies meet
    regularly to share training and discuss cases and
    protocols.

14
Risk assessment for the family courts
Perpetrator services
Supervised Contact
  • Assessment of
  • Risk
  • Victim vulnerability
  • Child/ren

Social Services or CAFCASS
Victim support services
Childrens services
15
Work with social services
  • Help shift the focus away from victims (usually
    mothers) to the actual source of risk the
    abuser.
  • Enable early intervention with perpetrators,
    rather than waiting until concerns about the
    child rose to the point that court action had to
    be taken to protect the children.
  • Act as expert witness in care proceedings
  • Provide interventions with mothers involved in
    care proceedings

16
The Domestic Violence Intervention Project
London Probation Area

Self-referred
Perpetrator services Assessment 32
session structured group programme
ongoing follow up group
Victim support services Individual work
Structured workshops Support
groups Safety planning
Childrens services Supervised
contact Assessment Therapeutic work
Social Services
CAFCASS
17
  • Start with, and stick to, the principle that
    victims safety is paramount
  • Recognise that you need to adapt to a range of
    different environments - community activism,
    criminal justice, family courts, child
    protection, lobbying and campaigning
  • Establish clear principles for best practice in
    the work, and then work out how these can be put
    into practice within the different environments
  • Offer yourself as a specialist resource to larger
    agencies - helping managers and individual
    practitioners respond more effectively to DV.
  • make links with all those involved in struggle to
    end domestic violence. This will mean trying to
    understand their ethos, training and working
    practices

18
  • chrisdnewman_at_btinternet.com

19
Objectives of the Violence Prevention Programme
To help him to end his violence and abuse by
  • widening the mans definition of what constitutes
    violent and abusive behaviour.
  • Helping him to recognise the mental emotional
    and physiological signs of the build up to
    violence
  • to critically examine the beliefs that have led
    him to believe that violence and abuse towards
    women is justified.
  • to increase his understanding of the intentional
    nature of the violence and abuse he has used.
  • To increase his understanding of the effects of
    abusive behaviour on his ex-partner and
    child(ren).
  • help him develop alternative non-abusive ways of
    behaving and relating.
  •  

20
General Risk Factors
21
General Risk Factors
22
Interventions with domestic violence
  • Anger management?
  • Anger management suggests that the client has
    difficulty controlling anger.
  • But in DV
  • Selectivity of victim
  • Selective level of severity
  • Instrumental, controlling nature of DV
  • Also implicit blame of victim I just lose it
    when she winds me up, she pushes my buttons.

23
  • Anger management
  • AM is usually a short-term skills-based
    intervention
  • But - need to address deep seated belief systems
    and/or emotional developmental legacies.
  • Therefore focus on the underlying emotion and
    cognitions at the time of an assault rather than
    solely focusing on control of the mislabelled
    anger.
  • Outcome studies suggest that violence/ abuse
    elimination occurs from reconstructing clients
    entrenched belief systems and assumptions about
    masculinity and its perceived entitlements, and
    enhancing victim empathy and co-operative
    decision-making rather than from the management
    or control of anger. (Healey et al 1998)

24
Couples work, mediation?
  • The victim is unlikely to feel free to speak
    freely
  • And if she does feel free, may be punished later
    with physical violence or other abuse for
    speaking out of turn

25
Elements of domestic violence perpetrator
programmes
  • Increase awareness of physiological, mental and
    emotional signs of build up to violence.
  • Develop critical awareness of attitudes and
    beliefs that support use of violence.
  • Demystify use of violence I just lost it vs
    intentional/functional behaviour
  • Increase empathy for victims
  • Increase awareness of effects of domestic
    violence upon children
  • Widen definition of abuse, set it in context of
    power and control
  • Teach and practice alternative behaviour.

26
Safety implications of perpetrator programmes for
(ex)partners or referring agencies
  • They may lie about attendance and suspension
  • may use the programme material to criticise his
    partners behaviour
  • may lie about what happens in the group
  • may use attendance as a bargaining tool
  • attendance influences the decision- making
    behaviour of others.
  •  
  •  

27
Safety implications of perpetrator programmes for
(ex)partners or referring agencies
  • and most importantly
  • May create unrealistic expectations that the
    perpetrator will change.
  • Therefore referring agencies need detailed
    feedback on change in risk
  •  
  •  

28
Partner support services
  • Give accurate information about the Violence
    Prevention Programme and assist victims in having
    realistic expectations
  •   
  • Safety planning with victims and children who are
    in dangerous situations
  •   
  • Support them in identifying resources they could
    use to protect self and children
  •   
  • Offer emotional support and groupwork to
    facilitate personal and social understanding of
    the abuse

29
Assessing programme quality
  • See Guidelines from Respect ( The National
    Association for Domestic Violence Perpetrator
    Programmes and Associated Support Services)
  • www.respect.uk.net

30
The Primary or Predominant Aggressor?(or
primary perpetrator)
  • The person who
  • Uses the higher level of violence,
  • Has an established history of violence in the
    relationship,
  • Who represents the more serious ongoing threat of
    violence.
  • Look at
  • the level of injury
  • the history of violence
  • Which party represents an ongoing threat (who is
    afraid of who)
  • (Guidance on investigating domestic violence
    produced for Association of Chief Police Officers
    in 2004)
Write a Comment
User Comments (0)
About PowerShow.com