Custom Fit
January 1, 2008
Anyone who’s ever tried on an article of clothing knows that items labeled “one-size-fits-all” never actually fit anybody.It’s the same in the court system: For decades, family courts have treated nearly all domestic violence cases in a similar fashion— regardless of the unique situations of the families. From the outside, this “streamlined” approach may appear to be more efficient, but like multi-sized clothing, it’s rarely the perfect fit for victims, perpetrators, or their families.
Nancy Ver Steegh, William Mitchell professor of law, knows all too well about this problem. A former legal aid attorney and consultant in domestic violence counseling, litigation, and law reform, she’s seen first-hand the negative effects such treatment can have on the very people the system seeks to protect.
“The one-size-fits-all approach to domestic violence does everyone a disservice,” says Ver Steegh, who is recognized as a national leader in the field. “These cases are way too complicated and complex to be squeezed into one mold.”
While experts generally agree that a one-size approach to handling domestic violence cases doesn’t work, what complicates matters more is that researchers and practitioners who work in the field have struggled for years to reconcile conflicting research about the frequency and nature of domestic violence.
“There’s still a significant amount of disagreement about domestic violence,” Ver Steegh explains. “Over the years, different schools of thought have developed.”
Experts now believe that there may be patterns of domestic violence. For example, according to Ver Steegh, research suggests that some violence is control-instigated and involves an escalating pattern of coercion and intimidation. In contrast, isolated incidents of conflict-instigated violence may occur when partners have poor conflict resolution skills.
Being able to differentiate varying types of domestic violence helps lawyers, judges, and advocates figure out the next course of action for each case. Loretta Frederick ’78, senior legal and policy director of the Battered Women’s Justice Project, National Resource Center on Domestic Violence Law, says, “Nancy has been doing very important thinking and research about how we become more nuanced in treating cases of intimate partner violence and how we figure out the best intervention for both the victim and the perpetrator.”
In February 2007, Ver Steegh and Frederick worked with the Association of Family and Conciliation Courts and the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges to convene the Wingspread Conference on Domestic Violence and Family Courts. They brought together leading researchers and practitioners to discuss ways to more effectively meet the needs of families experiencing domestic violence. Participants included members of the domestic violence advocacy community; family court judges and administrators; mental health, dispute resolution, and other professionals working in the family court system; and academics from the fields of law and social science. While conference attendees did not reach clear consensus on all the issues raised, “difficult-but-rewarding progress was made,” Ver Steegh says.
Much of the consensus that was reached centered around the need for attorneys, judges, and other court workers to fully investigate all cases of domestic violence before court proceedings take place.
“We are giving people a framework to be more discerning, to ask more questions, to make sure that they are comprehensively evaluating a case in order to be able to provide better counseling to victims and perpetrators,” Ver Steegh says. “We want to make sure the complete picture is looked at as much as possible.”
Conference participants have already agreed to continue the important work that began at Wingspread, Ver Steegh says. “In the future, conference participants will work on developing some common language so that when we’re dealing with domestic violence cases we all know that we’re talking about the same things.”
Wingspread was an important first step, but there’s still work to do, Ver Steegh cautions. “More investigation and research is going on.”
Still, Ver Steegh and others believe that their work of isolating and describing specific patterns of violence will in the future provide practical guidelines and assistance to professionals working in the family court system, helping them to differentiate types of violence and to know which treatments and legal actions have been found to work best in each case.
Another way to continue this progressive work on domestic violence issues is to train family court judges to recognize the complexities inherent in domestic violence cases. Because they are both recognized experts in the field, Ver Steegh and Frederick conduct judicial training seminars on domestic violence. These seminars aim to educate judges and other court professionals about how to recognize and understand the nuances in such cases.
“When I work with judges, one of my goals is to explain why one sort of offender generally needs to be distinguished from another,” Frederick says. “If you don’t do this, you are going to harm people by choosing the wrong interventions for them. For instance, some types of offenders benefit from probation; others do not. This is a basic idea, but it’s an important one that still too often is overlooked.”
Adds Ver Steegh: “It may be that we’re witnessing a changing course, that each domestic violence case will soon be treated individually, that the best solution will be found for each distinct case.”
