Victims' Voices

Abstract

The perspectives and experiences of victims have been underrepresented in the ongoing debate about mandatory arrest laws for domestic assault. This article presents findings relevant to this policy debate. The authors interviewed 25 victims whose assailants had been arrested under the provisions of the recently passed New York Family Protection and Domestic Violence Intervention Act. The authors' focus was on the respondents' experiences with the new law and specifically their perceptions of police demeanor toward them and their assailants. A majority of the participants reported multiple encounters with law enforcement prior to the arrest event. The authors identified four categories of police demeanor—minimizing the situation, disbelieving the victim, we don't care, and macho cop—that were crucial to victims' perceptions of how they were treated by officers. The importance of police demeanor in establishing the trust of victims is discussed and related to policy issues.