The Judicial Oversight Demonstration (JOD) was designed to test the feasibility and impact of a coordinated response to intimate partner violence (IPV) that involved the courts and justice agencies in a central role. The primary goals were to protect victim safety, hold offenders accountable, and reduce repeat offending. The two primary evaluation objectives were: (1) to test the impact of JOD interventions on victim safety, offender accountability, and recidivism, and (2) to learn from the experiences of well-qualified sites who were given resources and challenged to build a collaboration between the courts and community agencies to respond to intimate partner violence. Dorchester, Massachusetts, and Washtenaw County, Michigan, participated in a quasi-experimental evaluation of the impact of the program. IPV cases reaching disposition during the JOD were compared to similar cases reaching disposition in Lowell, Massachusetts, and Ingham County, Michigan. All IPV cases reaching disposition from approximately January 2003 to November 2004 (see Study Time Periods and Time Frames) were reviewed and included in the sample if appropriate. To be eligible for the sample, cases had to involve: (1) criminal IPV charges; (2) victims and offenders age 18 or older; and (3) victims and offenders who lived in the target jurisdiction at the time of case disposition. Cases that reached disposition more than a year after the incident were excluded to limit loss of data due to poor recall of the facts of the incident and police response. The evaluation design of JOD in Milwaukee differed from that of the other two sites. The evaluation in Milwaukee was based on a quasi-experimental comparison of offenders convicted of IPV and ordered to probation during JOD (January 1, 2001, to May 21, 2002) and before JOD (October 8, 1997, to December 21, 1999). This design was selected when early plans for an experimental design had to be abandoned and no comparable contemporaneous comparison group could be identified. Data for this evaluation were collected from court and prosecutors' records of case and defendant characteristics, probation files on offender supervision practices, and official records of rearrest, but do not include interviews with victims or offenders. This data collection has 20 data files containing 3,578 cases and 4,092 variables. The data files contain information related to each site's Batterer Intervention Programs (Parts 1, 8, and 15), court data (Parts 2, 12, 13, 14, 16, and 18), law enforcement (Parts 3, 11, and 17), and victim data (Parts 4, 5, 6, 9, 10, and 19). The Dorchester, Massachusetts, and Washtenaw County, Michigan, Impact Evaluation Data (Part 7) include baseline and follow-up information for the offender and the victim. The data file also contains Probation Supervision Performance Reports, Victim Services Logs, and Case Incident Fact Sheet information. The Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Impact Evaluation Data (Part 20) include information related to the offender and the victim such as age, race, and sex, as well as arrest records including charges filed.

This study represents a modified replication of the Minneapolis Domestic Violence Experiment (SPECIFIC DETERRENT EFFECTS OF ARREST FOR DOMESTIC ASSAULT: MINNEAPOLIS, 1981-1982 [ICPSR 8250]). The Minneapolis study found arrest to be an effective deterrent against repeat domestic violence. The two key purposes of the current study were (1) to examine the possible differences in reactions to arrest, and (2) to compare the effects of short and long incarceration associated with arrest. Research protocol involved 35 patrol officers in four Milwaukee police districts screening domestic violence cases for eligibility, then calling police headquarters to request a randomly-assigned disposition. The three possible randomly assigned dispositions were (1) Code 1, which consisted of arrest and at least one night in jail, unless the suspect posted bond, (2) Code 2, which consisted of arrest and immediate release on recognizance from the booking area at police headquarters, or as soon as possible, and (3) Code 3, which consisted of a standard Miranda-style script warning read by police to both suspect and victim. A battered women's shelter hotline system provided the primary measurement of the frequency of violence by the same suspects both before and after each case leading to a randomized police action. Other forms of measurement included arrests of the suspect both before and after the offense, as well as offenses against the same victim. Initial victim interviews were attempted within one month after the first 900 incidents were compiled. A second victim interview was attempted six months after the incident for all 1,200 cases. Data collected for this study included detailed data on each of the 1,200 randomized events, less detailed data on an additional 854 cases found ineligible, "pipeline" data on the frequency of domestic violence in the four Milwaukee police districts, official measures of prior and subsequent domestic violence for both suspects and victims, interviews of arrested suspects for eligible and ineligible cases, criminal justice system dispositions of the randomized arrests, results of urinalysis tests of drug and alcohol use for some arrestees, and log attempts to obtain interviews from suspects and victims. Demographic variables include victim and suspect age, race, education, employment status, and marital status. Additional information obtained includes victim-offender relationships, alcohol and drug use during incident, substance of conflict, nature of victim injury and medical treatment as reported by police and victims, characteristics of suspects in the Code 1 and 2 arrest groups, victim and suspect reports of who called police, and victim and suspect versions of speed of police response.

The purpose of the research project was to examine the extent to which the perception of procedural fairness by suspects arrested for spouse assault effectively inhibited their subsequent violence. The data for this study were collected for the MILWAUKEE DOMESTIC VIOLENCE EXPERIMENT, 1987-1989 (ICPSR 9966), which was conducted from April 1987 to August 1988. In this experiment, all cases of misdemeanor domestic battery where probable cause to arrest existed were randomly assigned to one of three conditions: (1) warning with no arrest, (2) arrest with a brief detention period (average of 3 hours), and (3) arrest with a longer detention period (average of 11 hours). Variables include demographic and background information, as well as descriptive variables pertaining to the domestic violence incident.

The purpose of this project was to evaluate the level of domestic violence prosecution throughout the United States and to promote effective prosecution approaches through dissemination of information. The project sought to identify and connect local attorneys' needs for information with the best knowledge available on the most effective prosecution methods. In order to appraise domestic violence prosecution in the United States, the researchers mailed a survey to a nationally-representative sample of prosecutors to assess prosecution strategies in domestic violence cases (Part 1, Prosecutors' Survey Data). Smaller jurisdictions had such a low response rate to the initial survey that a modified follow-up survey (Part 2, Prosecutors' Follow-Up Data) was administered to those jurisdictions. From these surveys, the researchers identified three sites with pioneering specialized domestic violence prosecution programs: Duluth, Minnesota, King County, Washington, and San Francisco, California. In these three sites, the researchers then conducted a case file analysis of a random sample of domestic violence cases (Part 3, Case File Data). A survey of a random sample of female victims was also undertaken in King County and San Francisco (Part 4, Victim Interview Data). In addition, the researchers conducted on-site evaluations of these three specialized programs in which they interviewed staff about the scope of the domestic violence problem, domestic violence support personnel, the impact of the program on the domestic violence problem, and recommendations for the future. The qualitative data collected from these evaluations are provided only in the codebook for this collection. Parts 1 and 2, the Prosecutors' Surveys, contain variables about case management, case screening and charging, pretrial release policies, post-charge diversion, trial, sentencing options, victim support programs, and office and jurisdiction demographics. Questions cover the volume of domestic violence prosecutions, formal protocols for domestic violence prosecution, ways to deal with uncooperative victims, pro-arrest and no-drop policies, protection orders, types of evidence used, and collaboration with other organizations to prosecute domestic violence cases. In addition, Part 1 includes variables on diversion programs, victim noncompliance, substance abuse problems, victim support programs, and plea negotiations. Variables in Part 3, Case File Data, deal with reporting, initial and final charges, injuries sustained, weapons used, evidence available, protection orders issued, victim cooperation, police testimony, disposition, sentence, costs, and restitution for each domestic violence case. Part 4, Victim Interview Data, includes variables concerning victims' employment history, number of children, and substance abuse, opinions about the charges against the defendant, decision-making in the case, and prosecution strategies, and victims' participation in the case, amount of support from and contact with criminal justice agencies, safety concerns, and performance evaluations of various levels of the criminal justice system.

The goal of this study was to identify factors that influence whether city misdemeanor domestic violence cases in which batterers are arrested by police result in dismissals, acquittals, or convictions in the courts, and how these cases are processed. The researchers sought to examine factors that influence court officials' decision-making in domestic violence cases, as well as factors that influence victim and witness reluctance in bringing batterers to successful adjudication. In Part 1 researchers merged pretrial services data with information from police and prosecutors' reports in the urban area under study to answer the following questions: (1) What is the rate of dismissals, acquittals, and convictions for misdemeanor court cases and what are the conditions of these sentences? (2) What factors in court cases are significantly related to whether the disposition is a dismissal, acquittal, or conviction, and how are these cases processed? In Part 2, judges, prosecutors, and public defenders were asked detailed questions about their level of knowledge about, attitudes toward, and self-reported behaviors regarding the processing of domestic violence cases to find out: (1) What roles do legal and extra-legal factors play in decision-makers' self-reported behaviors and attitudes? (2) How do decision-makers rate victim advocate and batterer treatment programs? (3) How do court professionals view the victim's role in the court process? and (4) To what degree do court professionals report victim-blaming attitudes and experiences? For Part 3 researchers used a stratified random sample to select court cases of misdemeanor domestic violence that would be transcribed and used for a content analysis to examine: (1) Who speaks in court and how? and (2) What is considered relevant by different court players? In Parts 4-103 victim surveys and interviews were administered to learn about battered women's experiences in both their personal lives and the criminal processing system. Researchers sought to answer the following questions: (1) How do victim/witnesses perceive their role in the prosecution of their abusers? (2) What factors inhibit them from pursuing prosecution? (3) What factors might help them pursue prosecution? and (4) How consistent are the victims'/witnesses' demographic and psychological profiles with existing research in this area? Domestic violence victims attending arraignment between January 1 and December 31 of 1997 were asked to complete surveys to identify their concerns about testifying against their partners and to evaluate the effectiveness of the court system in dealing with domestic violence cases (Part 4). The disposition of each case was subsequently determined by a research team member's examination of defendants' case files and/or court computer files. Upon case closure victims who had both completed a survey and indicated a willingness to be interviewed were contacted to participate in an interview (Parts 5-103). Variables in Part 1, Pretrial Services Data, include prior criminal history, current charges, case disposition, sentence, victim testimony, police testimony, victim's demeanor at trial, judge's conduct, type of abuse involved, weapons used, injuries sustained, and type of evidence available for trial. Demographic variables include age, sex, and race of defendants, victims, prosecutors, and judges. In Part 2, Professional Survey Data, respondents were asked about their tolerance for victims and offenders who appeared in court more than once, actions taken when substance abuse was involved, the importance of injuries in making a decision, attitudes toward battered women, the role of victim advocates and the police, views on restraining orders, and opinion on whether arrest is a deterrent. Demographic variables include age, sex, race, marital status, and years of professional experience. Variables in Part 3, Court Transcript Data, include number and type of charges, pleas, reasons for dismissals,

The researchers sought to add to the incipient literature on randomized studies of batterer treatment, by conducting an experimental study that compared batterers assigned to treatment to batterers assigned to a community service program irrelevant to the problem of violence. The study was conducted using a true experimental design and consisted of 376 spousal assault cases drawn from the Kings County (New York) Criminal Court which were adjudicated between February 19, 1995, and March 1, 1996. Batterers were mandated to attend a 40-hour batterer treatment program or to complete 40 hours of community service. The random assignment was made at sentencing, after all parties (judge, prosecutor, and defense) had agreed that batterer treatment was appropriate, the defendant agreed to treatment and was accepted by the Alternatives to Violence (ATV) program, and the program was available based on the random assignment process. Interviews were also conducted with both the batterer and the victim at sentencing as well as 6 months post-sentence and 12 months post-sentence. These interviews collected data in areas regarding demographics (first interview only), recidivism, beliefs about domestic violence, conflict management strategies, locus of control, and for victims, self esteem. Administrative records were also used to obtain data regarding any new crimes committed.

This study consisted of an in-depth analysis of the trial strategies used by the prosecution and the defense in domestic violence-related felony cases. The research objectives of this study were (1) to catalog the evidentiary constraints in domestic violence-related cases -- specifically, the types of character evidence and prior acts of defendants allowed during trial, (2) to show how the prosecution presented its case in domestic violence trials by identifying the key prosecution themes and strategies, (3) to present the specific evidence used by the prosecution to prove the elements of a case, and (4) to describe the themes and strategies used by the defense to counter the prosecution's case. Researchers focused on the admission of evidence of other acts of violence, known as "context" evidence, which characterized the violent relationship between the defendant and victim. The design involved a qualitative analysis of felony trial transcripts in Iowa from 1989 to 1995, in which the defendant and victim were involved in a domestic relationship. Part 1, Coded Transcript Data, contains the coded themes from the text analysis program. Background information was gathered on the length and type of relationship at the time of the incident, and the substance abuse and criminal histories of the defendant and the victim. Incident variables include current case charges, type of trial, description of physical injuries, whether hospitalization was required, type of weapon used, and whether the defendant or the victim owned a firearm. Other variables describe prosecution and defense strategies regarding evidence, identity, credibility, the nature of the relationship between the defendant and the victim, the intentions of the defendant, and how the police handled the case. Demographic variables include the race of the defendant and the ages of the defendant and the victim. Parts 2-40 consist of the actual court transcripts.

The purpose of the study was to examine the processes of resistance in domestic violence offenders. Study One (Part 1, Study One Quantitative Data) was developed to refine and offer preliminary validation of the draft processes of resistance measure. In the summer of 2004, group facilitators collected data from 346 domestic violence offenders recruited from domestic violence agencies in Florida, California, Georgia, and Rhode Island. The 88 item draft processes of resistance measure was administered as part of a 280 item paper-and-pencil survey that took approximately 60 minutes to complete. Resistance items were placed in random order in the measure and in 50 percent of the surveys, resistance items were placed in reverse order within the measure. Study Two (Part 2, Study Two Quantitative Data), administered the processes of resistance measure to a separate sample of domestic violence offenders at batterer program intake and again two months later. Participants included 358 domestic violence offenders recruited from domestic violence agencies in Florida, Virginia, Rhode Island, Michigan, and Calgary, Canada, between January and December 2005. In Study Three (Part 3, Study Three Expert Interview Qualitative Data), 16 of the 18 domestic violence experts who were interviewed in Study One during the drafting of the resistance measure were invited by telephone or email to participate in a 1- hour interview on best practices for dealing with resistance. Thirteen experts who agreed to be interviewed were mailed a list of processes of resistance measure items and asked to give recommendations on how domestic violence counselors can respond to a client engaging in those behaviors in treatment. Interviews were conducted by telephone in November 2005, with an interviewer and note taker, and audiotaped. Part 1 (Study One Quantitative Data) and Part 2 (Study Two Quantitative Data) include demographic variables such as age, race, level of education, employment and income level, relationship to the domestic assault victim, months in batterer treatment, and criminal history. Both Parts also include variables to measure stage of change, decisional balance, processes of change, self-efficacy, physical and psychological aggression, social desirability, at risk drinking, and physical and mental health. Additionally, Part 2 includes variables on program attendance and completion. Part 3 (Study Three Expert Interviews Qualitative Data) includes domestic violence experts recommendations for managing eight types of resistance in batterer treatment including system blaming, problems with partner, problems with alliance, social justification, hopelessness, isolation, psychological reactance, and passive reactance.

As part of its organization-wide transition to community policing in 1989, the Portland Police Bureau, in collaboration with the Family Violence Intervention Steering Committee of Multnomah County, developed a plan to reduce domestic violence in Portland. The creation of a special police unit to focus exclusively on misdemeanor domestic crimes was the centerpiece of the plan. This police unit, the Domestic Violence Reduction Unit (DVRU), had two goals: to increase the sanctions for batterers and to empower victims. This study was designed to determine whether DVRU strategies led to reductions in domestic violence. Data were collected from official records on batterers (Parts 1-10), and from surveys on victims (Parts 11-12). Part 1 (Police Recorded Study Case Data) provides information on police custody reports. Part 2 (Batterer Arrest History Data) describes the arrest history during a five-year period prior to each batterer's study case arrest date. Part 3 (Charges Data for Study Case Arrests) contains charges filed by the prosecutor's office in conjunction with study case arrests. Part 4 (Jail Data) reports booking charges and jail information. Part 5 (Court Data) contains sentencing information for those offenders who had either entered a guilty plea or had been found guilty of the charges stemming from the study case arrest. Data in Part 6 (Restraining Order Data) document the existence of restraining orders, before and/or after the study case arrest date. Part 7 (Diversion Program Data) includes deferred sentencing program information for study cases. Variables in Parts 1-7 provide information on number of batterer's arrests for domestic violence and non-domestic violence crimes in the past five years, charge and disposition of the study case, booking charges, number of hours offender spent in jail, type of release, type of sentence, if restraining order was filed after case arrest, if restraining order was served or vacated, number of days offender stayed in diversion program, and type of diversion violation incurred. Part 8 (Domestic Violence Reduction Unit Treatment Data) contains 395 of the 404 study cases that were randomly assigned to the treatment condition. Variables describe the types of services DVRU provided, such as taking photographs along with victim statements, providing the victim with information on case prosecution, restraining orders, shelters, counseling, and an appointment with district attorney, helping the victim get a restraining order, serving a restraining order on the batterer, transporting the victim to a shelter, and providing the victim with a motel voucher and emergency food supply. Part 9 (Police Record Recidivism Data) includes police entries (incident or arrest) six months before and six months after the study case arrest date. Part 10 (Police Recorded Revictimization and Reoffending Data) consists of revictimization and reoffending summary counts as well as time-to-failure data. Most of the variables in Part 10 were derived from information reported in Part 9. Part 9 and Part 10 variables include whether the offense in each incident was related to domestic violence, whether victimization was done by the same batterer as in the study case arrest, type of police action against the victimization, charges of the victimization, type of premises where the crime was committed, whether the police report indicated that witnesses or children were present, whether the police report mentioned victim injury, weapon used, involvement of drugs or alcohol, whether the batterer denied abuse victim, number of days from study cases to police-recorded revictimization, and whether the recorded victimization led to the batterer's arrest. Part 11 (Wave 1 Victim Interview Data) contains data obtained through in-person interviews with victims shortly (1-2 weeks) after the case entered the study. Data in Part 12 (Wave 2 Victim Interview Data) represent victims' responses to the second wave of interviews,

This study is a replication and extension of an experiment conducted in Minneapolis (MINNEAPOLIS INTERVENTION PROJECT, 1986-1987 [ICPSR 9808]) to test the efficacy of three types of police response to spouse abuse. Three experimental treatments were employed: (1) advising and possibly separating the couple, (2) issuing a citation (an order to appear in court to answer specific charges) to the offender, and (3) arresting the offender. The main focus of the project concerned whether arrest is the most effective law enforcement response for deterring recidivism of spouse abusers. Cases were randomly assigned to one of the three treatments and were followed for at least six months to determine whether recidivism occurred. Measures of recidivism were obtained through official police records and victim interviews. Cases that met the following eligibility guidelines were included in the project: (1) a call involving a misdemeanor offense committed by a male offender aged 18 or over against a female victim aged 18 or over who were spouses, (2) ex-spouses, (3) cohabitants, or (4) ex-cohabitants. Also, both suspect and victim had to be present when officers arrived at the scene. Victims were interviewed twice. The first interview occurred shortly after the "presenting incident," the incident that initiated a call for police assistance. This initial interview focused on episodes of abuse that occurred between the time of the presenting incident and the day of the initial interview. In particular, detailed data were gathered on the nature of physical violence directed against the victim, the history of the victim's marital and cohabitating relationships, the nature of the presenting incident prior to the arrival of the police, the actual actions taken by the police at the scene, post-incident separations and reunions of the victim and the offender, recidivism since the presenting incident, the victim's previous abuse history, alcohol and drug use of both the victim and the offender, and the victim's help-seeking actions. Questions were asked regarding whether the offender had threatened to hurt the victim, actually hurt or tried to hurt the victim, threatened to hurt any member of the family, actually hurt or tried to hurt any member of the family, threatened to damage property, or actually damaged any property. In addition, criminal histories and arrest data for the six-month period subsequent to the presenting incident were collected for offenders. A follow-up interview was conducted approximately six months after the presenting incident and focused primarily on recidivism since the initial interview. Arrest recidivism was defined as any arrest for any subsequent offense by the same offender against the same victim committed within six months of the presenting incident. Victims were asked to estimate how often each type of victimization had occurred and to answer more detailed questions on the first and most recent incidents of victimization.