Domestic Violence is a pattern of Coercive tactics that can include physical, psychological, sexual, economic, and emotional abuse, perpetrated by one person against an intimate partners, with the goal of establishing and maintaining power and control.

Domestic Violence occurs in all kinds of intimate relationships, including married couples, people who are dating, couples who live together, people with children in common, same-sex partners, people who were formerly in a relationship with the person abusing them, and teen dating relationships.

Abusive behaviors are not symptoms that someone is angry or out of control. An abuser makes a choice to exert power and control over his or her partner. Abusive behaviors include physical, emotional, sexual, social, and financial abuse.

Physical Abuse

Physical abuse often begins with less violent assaults such as pushing. As the abuse continues, however, it becomes increasingly violent. Abusers often target areas of the body that are usually covered with clothing because the injuries are less likely to be visible to others. Acts of physical abuse include:

• Pushing
• Restraining
• Shaking
• Slapping
• Biting
• Punching
• Kicking
• Throwing objects at the victim
• Target hitting
• Sustained beating
• Abuse planned to cause the victim to miscarry
• Using weapons
• Strangulation
• Homicide

Emotional Abuse

Emotional abuse is a tool used by those who want to make their partners feel scared, crazy, worthless, or responsible for the abuse. The abuser's goal is control over the victim. Emotional abuse may include:

• Making jokes about the victim
• Insults
• Criticizing the victim's competence
• Ignoring the victim's feelings
• Withholding affection as a form of punishment
• Blaming the victim for all problems
• Yelling at the victim
• Humiliating the victim in front of others
• Accusing the victim of being the abusive partner
• Threatening to take the children away from the victim
• Threatening physical violence
• Threatening suicide to punish the victim

Sexual Abuse

Sexual abuse is one of the least discussed, but most common, forms of domestic violence. Sexual abuse includes:

• Sexual jokes that make the victim uncomfortable
• Treating women as sex objects
• Criticizing the victim's sexuality
• Using sexual jealousy as a tool of control
• Uncomfortable or unwanted touch
• Withholding sex as punishment
• Demanding sex
• Flaunting affairs
• Rape
• Sex after beatings
• Forcing the victim to witness or participate in sexual activity with others
• Sexually assaulting the victim in front of the children
• Sexual torture

Social Abuse

Social abuse is used to isolate the victim from others in the community. The fewer people the victim is connected with, the more control the abuser has over the victim. Examples of social abuse include:

• Insisting that the couple spend all time together
• Discouraging the victim from seeing friends or family
• Forbidding the victim to see friends or family
• Monitoring the victim's mail or phone calls
• Checking the odometer
• Restricting access to the car or car keys
• Telling others the victim is crazy or abusive

Financial Abuse

Abusers often attempt to establish financial control over victims. Victims who are financially dependent on abusers have fewer resources for escape. Financial abuse includes:

• Making all financial decisions for the household
• Keeping financial secrets
• Monitoring the victim's spending
• Controlling the victim's access to cash
• Controlling the victim's access to checkbook or credit cards
• Refusing to let the victim work
• Forcing the victim to turn over income to the abuser

Children and Domestic Violence - Resources

• Safety planning for Children: Strategizing for Unsupervised Visits with Batterers, part of Children and Domestic Violence: Risks and Remedies, by Barbara J. Hart, 1997
• Helping Children Exposed to Domestic Violence: Law Enforcement and Community Partnerships: Final report to the National Institute of Justice, by Barbara E. Smith et al.; American Bar Association Center on Children and the law; San Diego Association of Governments, 2001 h
• Effects of Domestic Violence on Children and Adolescents: An Overview, by Joseph S. Volpe; American Academy of Experts in Traumatic Stress, Inc. - AAETS, 1996
• Working with Young Children and Their Familes: Recommendations for Domestic Violence Agencies and Batterer Intervention Programs, by Abigail Gewirtz and Resmaa Menakem; Univ. of Iowa, 2004
• Young children's exposure to adult domestic violence: Toward a developmental risk and resilience framework for research and intervention, by Abigail Gewirtz and Jeffrey L. Edlerson, Jeffrey L.; Univ. of Iowa 2004
• Learning to listen, learning to help: Understanding woman abuse and its effects on children, by Linda L. Baker and Alison J. Cunningham; Centre for Children & Families in the Justice System, Ontario, Canada
• Batterers and Fathers: Rethinking and re conceptualizing policy and practice, by David Mandel, 2002

FAMILY ABUSE PROTECTION ACT ORDERS

The law offers the protection of Family Abuse Protection Act (FAPA) orders to victims of domestic violence, whether or not a victim has reported the abuse to the police. A FAPA order is free, and a victim does not need an attorney to get one, although an attorney is recommended if an abuser contests the order.

FAPA orders are available in every county in Oregon. Once issued, a FAPA order is effective for one year unless the court terminates or extends the order.

The court must hold a hearing, by telephone or in person, the day or the day after a victim files for a FAPA order.

A sheriff or another qualified person must serve the abuser with a copy of the order. After the abuser receives it he has 30 days to ask for a hearing, which must be held within 21 days of that request (5 days if a child is involved). The judge may change or cancel the order based on information received at the hearing. Changes in custody or visitation rights may be requested at any time while the order is in effect.

Police must enforce FAPA orders. An abuser who violates a FAPA order can be jailed for up to six months and fined up to $300.

If a victim and an abuser later divorce, and the provisions of the divorce decree are different from the provisions of the FAPA order, the divorce decree will take precedence.

It is important to remember that a FAPA order does not guarantee safety. If you are a victim of domestic violence contact an advocate to make a safety plan.

Who Can Obtain a FAPA Order?

A victim of domestic violence is eligible to obtain a FAPA order if she meets the following criteria:

• She was the victim of abuse within the past six months; or she was the victim of abuse more than six months ago, and the abuser has been in prison or jail or has lived more than 100 miles from her in the past six months;
• And The abuse was bodily injury, or attempted bodily injury, or the threat of immediate serious bodily injury, or sexual abuse, or rape;
• And She is related to or intimately involved with the abuser--that is, she is the abuser's wife or former wife, or the abuser's in-law or relative, or is in a sexually intimate relationship with the abuser, or is the biological co-parent (with the abuser) of a minor child;
• And She is at least 18 years old, is an "emancipated" minor, or is younger than 18 but married to or sexually intimate with an abuser who is 18 or older.

What a FAPA Order Can Do

A FAPA order can:

• Require an abuser to stop abusing, threatening, or interfering with a victim and with children in her custody;
• Forbid an abuser to enter a victim's home, school, place of business, or other specified place;
• Order an abuser out of the home if a victim is sole or part owner of the home;
• Require police to stand guard while the person leaving the home removes personal belongings;
• Give a victim temporary legal custody of the children if the children are in her physical custody or, if they are not, grant her visitation rights.