When Will the Tide Turn?

Last week brought more grim news of domestic violence-related murder/suicide in Florida, where a mother of four was shot by her estranged boyfriend, who killed himself. Then there were plain old murders of women by their intimate partners: In Minnesota, a pregnant mother of a 2-year old daughter was killed by her boyfriend, and in Georgia, three women were murdered. In one of those Georgia cases, a man killed his ex-girlfriend and her mother, and wounded her brother.

The collateral damage of domestic violence continues to mount Last week, a top scientific publication, The New England Journal of Medicine, published an editorial detailing the public health costs of domestic violence. But even this distinguished journal failed to mention the deaths of children, relatives, lawyers, friends, and others close to the victims of domestic violence.

There is some good news. Colorado’s new Domestic Violence and Child Welfare Task Group met for the first time on Sept. 22, a year after the death of a 10-year-old boy at the hands of his father, who’d been convicted of domestic violence and who committed suicide. Although the Colorado Department of Human Service had known about the case for three years, it was complicated by the fact the father’s abuse was excessive, coercive control, rather than beating and bruising.

One Colorado state lawmaker has embraced the cause of fighting domestic violence and has vowed to make changes that will prevent another tragedy like the young boy’s death. The legislator has introduced a bill to add more protections to an existing law to ensure that domestic violence perpetrators turn in their guns, and another bill to create a family court dedicated to domestic violence and child abuse. A small pilot court in one Colorado county was successful in providing victims with “a more informed bench, better opportunity to respond to the needs of the case, and…great benefits when the family’s problems are severe.”

Pheonecia Ratliff, 24, of Canton, seen here in a Facebook post with her baby daughter, was kidnapped and killed by her ex-boyfriend Jamarquis Black on May 14, 2020. Black then took his own life.

Mississippi has joined Colorado’s effort to combat domestic violence by setting up its own task force. Mississippi’s group is unusual in that it was formed by a federal official, Mike Hurst, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of Mississippi. And it’s named Operation Pheonecia, after a 24-year old woman whose stalker ex-boyfriend killed her and himself on May 14, 2020. Last week, Mississippi also was awarded its annual allotment of more than $6 million to combat domestic violence from the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office on Violence Against Women.

Of course, where there is money, there might be corruption. In Florida and California, executive directors of groups dedicated to combating domestic violence have embezzled millions of dollars in funding. MCIR will keep an eye on what Mississippi and other states do with their new monies.

Meanwhile, our Justice Squad of undergraduate journalists is looking for a Mississippi state lawmaker who might champion victims of domestic violence.

 Ann Marie Cunningham is a Columbia University Lipman Fellow for 2020 who will be working with the Mississippi Center for investigative Reporting. She is a veteran journalist/producer and author of a best-seller. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Technology Review, The Nation and The New Republic. Contact her at amclissf@gmail.com.