Based on in-depth reviews of 84 domestic violence homicide and murder-suicide cases, the DVFR identified 11 key goals to improve the response to domestic violence in Washington State. Among these key goals: Offer comprehensive, survivor-centered advocacy at every point at which victims seek help.
The following is a summary of recommendations for domestic violence advocates and community-based advocacy programs in the six DVFR reports issued 2000-2010. Page numbers (in parentheses) indicate where each recommendation can be found in the full report, along with victim stories and relevant findings from review teams.
Full reports are available here.
2010: Up to Us
Domestic violence advocates: Offer safety planning strategies to all victims and their friends and families who contact your agency. (22)
Domestic violence programs and funders: Increase efforts to co-locate community-based domestic violence advocates in a range of community settings, for example in health clinics, DSHS Community Services Offices, and Protection Order offices. (22)
Domestic violence programs: Articulate a clear message about what your program does that can be easily understood by anyone in the community. Use that message in community education, outreach, fundraising, social media, and with the news media. (22)
All professionals: Help victims identify multiple options and strategies for safety. Refer every domestic violence victim to a trained domestic violence advocate for ongoing safety planning. (22)
Domestic violence programs and culturally specific community organizations: Build relationships with one another. Offer cross-training, share community engagement strategies, and collaborate to co-advocate for victims of domestic violence in marginalized communities. (25)
Domestic violence programs: Prioritize recruiting and hiring advocates, managers, directors, and board members from diverse cultural backgrounds who are grassroots leaders, organizers, and advocates in their own communities. (25)
Immigrant community organizations, immigration attorneys, and domestic violence programs: Provide information to community members about immigrants’ legal rights, how to access legal assistance, and legal options available to immigrant domestic violence victims. (25)
Funders: Support domestic violence advocacy programs by and for Native communities, communities of color, immigrant communities, and lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender communities. (25)
All programs offering domestic violence services: Establish protocols for assessing who is a survivor of domestic violence and who is an abuser in a same-sex relationship and for determining whether someone seeking services is eligible. (25)
Domestic violence advocates: Build the capacity of parents and adults who work with youth— for example, teachers, after-school care providers, camp counselors, youth group leaders, coaches, and teen parenting program staff—to provide information and support around healthy relationships and abuse. (30)
Domestic violence advocates and adults who work with youth: Use WSCADV’s interactive education tool In Their Shoes: Teens and Dating Violence to help parents and adults who work with youth learn about teen dating violence. (30)
Domestic violence programs: Include messages in public education, outreach campaigns, and media that are directed at friends and family members (for example, how to support a victim or where to call for help making a plan to support a friend). (32)
Domestic violence advocates: Routinely help victims rebuild their connections with family and friends and safety plan with their support networks. (32)
Domestic violence advocates: Routinely ask victims about abusers’ access to firearms and help victims explore options for removal of firearms in the civil and criminal legal systems. (44)
Funders and domestic violence programs: Increase emphasis on services and strategies that support long-term economic stability and well-being beyond temporary, emergency needs. (46)
Funders: Support and replicate innovative local programs that involve domestic violence advocates, landlords, and housing authorities collaborating to create permanent affordable housing specifically for domestic violence victims. (46)
Domestic violence programs: Offer training about domestic violence and relevant state laws protecting domestic violence victims’ housing rights to local landlords, property managers, and housing authorities. (46)
Domestic violence advocates: Learn about and advocate for victims to obtain the full range of services and exemptions for domestic violence victims in economic assistance programs. (46)
Funders and domestic violence programs: Increase attention and commitment to abuse prevention, support for healthy relationships, and early intervention with victims of domestic violence. (47)
Funders and domestic violence programs: Fund and coordinate efforts statewide to develop and evaluate strategies to prevent domestic violence. (47)
2008: Now That We Know
All professionals working with domestic violence victims should be aware of the prevalence of economic abuse and how it might limit a victim’s options. (48)
All professionals working with domestic violence victims should provide victims with referrals to domestic violence programs and information about the range of services these programs offer. (51)
Mainstream domestic violence programs at the state and local levels should support the work of domestic violence programs and other organizations addressing violence against American Indian and Alaska Native women, women of color, and immigrant and refugee women through learning about the specific and complex barriers to safety and self-determination facing victims of domestic violence in these communities and adapting services to better meet their needs. (39)
Mainstream domestic violence programs at the state and local levels should support the work of American Indian and Alaska Native domestic violence programs that seek to develop a process (such as a fatality review) that would examine community and system responses to domestic violence against Native victims, identify shortfalls, and organize to address the problems identified. (39)
Domestic violence advocates should consider attending appointments with domestic violence victims accessing housing, health care, public benefits, and other services. Advocates can support victims by advocating for language interpretation, fair and unbiased treatment by other service providers, and culturally appropriate services. (40)
Domestic violence programs and ethnic community organizations should collaborate to cross- train staff and volunteers, share outreach strategies, and provide co-advocacy for domestic violence victims. Collaborations between domestic violence programs and ethnic community organizations should include ongoing dialogue, capacity building, cross-training, program development, community partnerships, and co-advocacy. (41)
Ethnic community organizations and domestic violence programs should work together to share information and develop strategies for how community members can stay safe while supporting domestic violence victims. Ethnic community organizations should also create opportunities to engage their communities in dialogue about violence against women. (42)
Domestic violence programs should carefully examine their policies and practices to ensure that they support victims in remaining connected to their communities while planning for safety. Domestic violence advocates should routinely help victims plan for how they can safely stay involved with their religious and cultural communities. (42)
Domestic violence programs should consider innovative strategies to mitigate language and cultural barriers, such as training bilingual community volunteers as domestic violence advocates. (43)
Domestic violence programs should partner with interpreter agencies to cross-train both domestic violence advocates and interpreters on language usage and vocabulary limitations, including dialect differences and translation of legal terminology. (43)
Ethnic community organizations and domestic violence programs should provide domestic violence literature and resource information in public spaces throughout ethnic communities (e.g., in places of worship, ethnic restaurants, beauty salons, and small businesses) so that immigrant victims can learn about their rights. (45)
Immigrant and refugee social service organizations and domestic violence programs should collaborate to provide trainings to immigrant and refugee women on their rights in an abusive situation, how to obtain legal help, and how to plan for their safety. (45)
Domestic violence advocates should learn about potential immigration consequences for various offenses in order to help immigrant victims with safety planning. (45)
Domestic violence programs should routinely address economic abuse and exploitation as a part of safety planning with all victims. (48)
Domestic violence programs should designate at least one advocate to receive specialized training on financial education and incorporate financial education into their core services. (48)
Domestic violence programs should ensure that every caller knows about the range of services they offer and that similar services are available statewide. (51)
Advocates should talk with victims about what other services might be helpful to them. Advocates should offer to co-advocate for victims with other service providers and be clear that this can be done while still maintaining the confidentiality of information the victim discloses to the advocate. (51)
Domestic violence programs should develop communications strategies, including engaging with the media, to provide information to the general public about domestic violence and where neighbors, family, and friends of victims can turn for assistance. (51)
Domestic violence advocates should become familiar with Child Protective Services (CPS) practices and engage with local CPS staff in order to effectively advocate for domestic violence victims involved with CPS. (58)
Domestic violence programs should develop policies to address how they will work with victims who are using alcohol or other drugs and clearly communicate these policies to victims seeking services. These policies should emphasize a commitment to serve victims dealing with both domestic violence and substance abuse. (60)
Domestic violence programs should develop protocols for routinely asking victims respectful and non-judgmental questions about their substance use, with the goal of identifying safety planning needs and practical strategies for safety and sobriety. Safety plans should not depend on the victim’s ability to stay clean and sober. (61)
Domestic violence programs and chemical dependency treatment providers should train staff to recognize how abusers may use alcohol or other drugs to further their control over victims and routinely address this issue in victims’ safety plans, as well as in victims’ and abusers’ relapse prevention plans. (61)
Domestic violence programs and chemical dependency treatment providers should collaborate to provide cross-training, share outreach materials, and refer clients in order to provide more effective services to victims of domestic violence who are abusing substances. (61)
Domestic violence programs and local religious leaders should collaborate to build their capacity to improve religious responses to domestic violence and coordinated support for victims. (70)
Domestic violence advocates working with Protection Order petitioners should provide all victims with information about what to expect from the legal process, how to present their case effectively to the court, and their right to appeal or re-file if a Protection Order petition is denied. (74)
Domestic violence advocates assisting victims with Protection Order petitions should routinely ask victims about the abuser’s access to weapons. Advocates should help victims determine whether to submit a Petition for Surrender of Weapon (11) along with a petition for a temporary or full Protection Order. (74)
Domestic violence victim advocates based in law enforcement agencies should follow up with victims in all domestic violence incidents to offer resource information, even when no arrest is made. (79)
Domestic violence programs should include information about stalking as a tactic of abuse in outreach and community education materials and inform victims of stalking that they can call a domestic violence program for support and safety planning. (82)
Domestic violence programs and batterer’s intervention programs should make connections with juvenile probation officers, juvenile offender treatment providers, and professionals conducting assessments of juvenile offenders to provide training about domestic violence and how to identify intimate partner violence in screening, and to facilitate referrals when intimate partner abuse is identified. (84)
Domestic violence programs should develop domestic violence resource information and outreach materials specific to teens and provide these to law enforcement agencies. (86)
2006: If I Had One More Day…
Domestic violence advocates and everyone working with domestic violence victims should receive training on how to routinely screen for suicidality, how to recognize suicide warning signs, and what to do when these signs are identified. (36)
Domestic violence advocates and other professionals working with domestic violence victims should talk to victims about increased safety risks at the time of separation from an abuser and continue to regularly discuss safety planning after a victim has ended an abusive relationship. (43)
The goal of safety planning should not be to encourage the victim to end all contact with the abuser; rather, efforts should focus on how to be as safe as possible even when contact with the abuser is ongoing. (43)
All professionals working with domestic violence victims should: routinely ask about the abuser’s access to firearms; talk with victims about the increased homicide risk posed by the availability of firearms; and connect victims with an advocate to talk about safety planning. (44)
Domestic violence advocates and others engaged in problem solving or safety planning with victims should routinely ask victims if calling 911 is a viable option for them. If barriers to calling 911 exist, advocates should work with victims to address these barriers as well as identify alternative safety planning strategies. (45)
Domestic violence programs and other services designed to support victims should acknowledge that victims may be using alcohol, other drugs, and/or violence and address the impact of these issues on their safety, sobriety, and ability to access resources. (65)
Domestic violence programs, law enforcement, prosecutors, court clerks, and civil attorneys should routinely provide information to domestic violence victims that describes the differences between various types of civil and criminal protective orders. (79)
Domestic violence programs should incorporate suicide prevention into community engagement strategies for domestic violence prevention and should include information about suicide and depression in outreach to victims. (37)
Domestic violence programs should include questions on their crisis line, intake, and safety planning forms to ensure that advocates routinely ask about abusers’ suicidal attempts or threats and safety plan accordingly. (40)
Domestic violence programs should include discussion of abusers’ suicidal threats or attempts and the danger these pose to victims in their community education efforts. (41)
Domestic violence programs should include questions on their crisis line, intake, and safety planning forms to ensure that all advocates routinely ask victims about the presence of, and abusers’ access to, firearms and discuss safety planning strategies specifically related to firearms. (44)
Domestic violence advocates should routinely discuss safety planning with all domestic violence victims, even if the abuser has not used physical abuse as a tactic of control. (46)
Funders and domestic violence programs should recognize teen dating violence education, peer advocacy, and prevention efforts as a part of core services. (48)
Domestic violence programs should collaborate with those in the community already working with teens, such as camp counselors and youth group leaders, to build community capacity to provide information and support around teen dating violence. Individuals who have developed expertise in this area should be visible in the community and at events where teens gather. (48)
Domestic violence coalitions and community-based programs should work together to develop model materials for parents of teens who are being abused and develop best practice models for providing outreach and services to families of teen victims. (49)
Domestic violence programs and their funders should include community education, outreach, prevention efforts, public awareness campaigns, and other strategies for building the capacity of communities to respond to domestic violence as a core part of their work. (52)
Community education about domestic violence should include tools and strategies for how to: identify abuse, talk to victims or abusers, report abuse, and stay safe. (52)
Domestic violence programs and task forces should engage community informants, such as friends and family of domestic violence victims, to learn how to increase the visibility of the range of services available. Such efforts should address the distinct opportunities and challenges for rural and remote communities and for marginalized populations. Funders should support pilot projects to begin this process. (52)
Domestic violence programs should include stalking information in brochures and other outreach materials to increase awareness that anyone can call a domestic violence program for support and safety planning regarding stalking. (53)
Domestic violence programs should receive ongoing training and consult with national resources, such as the Stalking Resource Center, to build their capacity to address stalking. (53)
Domestic violence programs, law enforcement agencies, and prosecutors should collaborate and cross-train one another on issues related to domestic violence stalking, including how to assist victims in documenting the stalking, the use of technology to stalk, an overview of statutes on domestic violence and stalking, and safety planning. (53)
Domestic violence programs should create strong linkages with grassroots organizations serving marginalized communities to build these organizations’ capacity to address domestic violence in their community. (55)
Domestic violence programs’ community education and outreach materials should include information about what to expect when calling 911 to report a domestic violence crime, what information 911 operators collect from callers, and strategies for how to report a crime anonymously. (56)
Domestic violence programs should collaborate with those in the community already working with children to build their capacity to provide domestic violence information and support. (56)
Domestic violence programs should collaborate with people who routinely come into contact with homeless and transient individuals, such as food bank workers, railroad police, and community organizers, in order to build community capacity to provide this population with safety planning information and referrals to domestic violence resources. (61)
Domestic violence programs should develop and implement a plan for engaging their community in work aimed at increasing economic security and the availability of financial education for domestic violence victims. Funders and domestic violence programs should recognize this work as a part of core services. (62)
Domestic violence programs’ outreach materials, community education, and safety plans should inform people of the increased lethality risks when the abuser is using alcohol or other drugs and should include referrals to community resources available for abusers, victims, and their friends and family. (63)
Domestic violence programs should provide services to substance-using domestic violence victims by developing policies and procedures that maintain safety for all program participants while addressing the needs of substance-using victims. (65)
Domestic violence and chemical dependency programs should collaborate to provide cross- training to providers and services to individuals struggling with both domestic violence and chemical dependency. Because so many individuals face both challenges and because so many barriers exist to disclosing either domestic violence or substance abuse, domestic violence and chemical dependency programs should make information about one another’s programs consistently available to everyone using their services. (65)
Domestic violence programs should have clear protocols to determine eligibility for victim services, rather than relying on the legal system’s identification of the victim and abuser, or other methods. Programs should receive training in the use of domestic violence assessment tools designed to identify the victim of an ongoing pattern of power and control in a relationship, and programs should have policies that direct advocates on how and when to use such tools. (74)
Domestic violence programs should conduct outreach to the jails in their community to provide information and resources to domestic violence victims in custody. (74)
2004: Every Life Lost Is a Call for Change
Domestic violence programs should develop policies and procedures that maintain safety for all program participants while providing services to substance-abusing domestic violence victims. (49)
Domestic violence programs should prioritize resources and work to make their services relevant and accessible for domestic violence victims with limited English proficiency. (49)
Domestic violence programs that do not provide outreach and services to friends and family of domestic violence victims should consult with programs that do provide such services for assistance implementing similar practices. (49)
Domestic violence programs should become familiar with the court process for resolving outstanding warrants and offer victims assistance with this process. (49)
Domestic violence programs should develop policies and procedures that maintain safety for all program participants while providing services to substance-abusing domestic violence victims. (49)
Domestic violence advocates should always ask victims about abusers’ suicidal threats or behaviors. If victims reveal a history of suicidal ideation, advocates should inform and educate them about the risk of homicide and intensify safety planning. (49)
Funding should be allocated for domestic violence advocacy programs to hire or contract with attorneys trained on domestic violence to represent victims. (61)
Domestic violence advocates should develop safety planning tools to assist friends and family members of victims who call domestic violence crisis lines. (83)
Domestic violence programs should evaluate how their own program policies reinforce isolation for victims and make changes in order to promote victims’ connection with their friends, family and community. (83)
Domestic violence advocates should strategize with shelter residents to help them maintain or rebuild connections with friends and family while living in confidential shelter. (83)
Funders and domestic violence programs should recognize community education and prevention efforts as a part of core services. (83)
2002: “Tell the World What Happened to Me”
All organizations mounting public education campaigns regarding domestic violence should include messages about building the capacity of friends, family and neighbors to support battered women and (when safe) encourage change on the part of the abuser. (45)
Public education should provide people with concrete examples of how to recognize the level of danger, intervene and support a victim of domestic violence. (45)
Domestic violence agencies should critically examine their philosophies, mission statements, policies and procedures and eliminate barriers within their agency to providing support to friends and family of battered women. (45)
Domestic violence agencies should consider providing support, problem-solving strategies and information to friends and families as an important part of their work. (45)
Domestic violence advocates should consistently ask battered women if they can help them talk to their support system about the abuse and how their support system can help them (and their children) stay safe. (45)
Funders of domestic violence agencies should see building the capacity of communities surrounding battered women to respond to domestic violence as a legitimate and important part of domestic violence agencies’ work. (45)
Curricula and trainings focused on effective advocacy should address working with family and friends to increase their capacity to support battered women. (45)
Domestic violence programs throughout Washington State need more information about strategies and models for community organizing-based approaches to domestic violence prevention and intervention. (46)
Domestic violence programs should develop “best practices” models for friends and family which emphasize working collectively, deciding who to involve, obtaining expert help with clarifying the issues and problem solving, deciding when (and when not to) call law enforcement, and safe, ethical communication with battered women and abusers. (46)
Domestic violence agencies should ally with organizations working for greater police accountability in their communities. (48)
Advocates should always ask a victim about the abuser’s suicidal behaviors. If there is a history of suicidal ideation, they should inform/educate women about the risk of homicide and intensify safety planning. (50)
Safety plans for women reporting homicide and suicide threats should include getting weapons out of the house and car. (53)
Domestic violence and chemical dependency programs should partner with one another to provide cross-training as well as services to one another’s clients. (54)
Domestic violence and chemical dependency programs should develop policies and procedures that maintain safety for all program participants while providing services to substance-abusing domestic violence victims. (55)
Domestic violence and chemical dependency programs must take into account the fact that calling 911 may not be an option for women dealing with substance abuse and assist the victim in developing alternative safety-planning strategies. (55)
Domestic violence programs should provide outreach to women in chemical dependency treatment programs, jails, prisons and homeless shelters to reach women who are not being connected with domestic violence services. (55)
Domestic violence agencies should include stalking in brochures and other outreach information, discuss stalking as a part of abusers’ tactics and inform people that they can call a domestic violence agency for support and safety planning around stalking. (58)
Domestic violence agencies should extend safety planning efforts to include friends, family, co- workers and neighbors of the victim. (58)
Domestic violence agencies should designate at least one advocate to receive specialized training on stalking and develop it as their area of expertise. (58)
Domestic violence agencies should track the number of clients and crisis line callers who are victims of stalking, in order to generate prevalence statistics to assist with community education and to identify the need for resources. (58)
Domestic violence agencies, law enforcement and prosecutors should develop and distribute tools that assist victims in documenting stalking, such as a stalking log. (59)
All courts issuing civil Protection Orders should establish Protection Order advocacy programs for domestic violence victims. Counties should strive to establish Protection Order advocacy programs that (minimally) meet the needs of their largest non-English-speaking populations. (76)
Protection Order advocacy programs should have access to interpreters, or ideally, the advocacy should be done in the victim’s first language. (76)
2000: Honoring Their Lives, Learning from Their Deaths
Public education should indicate that intimate partner violence combined with suicidal threats. (33)
Domestic violence programs should create stronger linkages with community organizations serving homeless women, substance abusers, women in the sex industry, and public defenders. (40)
Domestic violence programs should extend advocacy and education efforts into drug treatment programs, jails, and prisons in order to reach marginalized battered women. (40)
Domestic violence programs should offer help in resolving outstanding warrants, and become familiar with the processes for doing so. (41)
Mainstream organizations and funders should support self-determination and self-definition of problems and solutions in limited English-speaking communities. Mainstream organizations and funders should work in collaboration, provide resources and expertise, and help build leadership and resources within the limited English-speaking community. (46)
Mainstream organizations should also work to make their own programs and services relevant and accessible for battered women with limited English skills. Community-based domestic violence programs should implement strategies to reach out to limited English-speaking communities and provide battered women from those communities the services they want and need. (46)
Domestic violence organizations and/or coalitions of social service providers may want to consider creating a pool of paid, on-call translators with specialized domestic violence training who can be available to the police, prosecutors, and probation officers, as well as community- based organizations. (49)
Bilingual/bicultural advocates should be supported by their workplaces in efforts to network and connect with others doing similar work. (51)
Domestic violence program literature should emphasize that services are free. (51)
Community-based domestic violence advocacy programs should seek resources to set up domestic violence Court Watch programs as an avenue for increasing understanding of the local judiciary’s approach to domestic violence. (77)