Police defend domestic work

Press, 20 April 1982, Page 6

Police defend domestic work

PA Wellington The police have said that they act firmly and promptly at violent domestic disputes, where there is evidence of an offence, and where a victim is decisive about what is to be done.

Superintendent lan Mills has rejected accusations by the authors of a booklet for battered wives that the police do not act to protect victims of domestic violence.

He said that most policemen had had a bitter experience in dealing with indecisive complainants. The police had seen victims refusing to give evidence in court and walking away hand in hand with their assailant.’ The booklet, which is entitled “The Police and You,” was w'ritten by a senior lecturer at Canterbury University, Dr John Church, and

his wife, Doris, who is the coordinator of the Christchurch Battered Wives’ Support Group. Mr Mills said that the booklet contained some good advice and that if it helped women to decide what they wanted of the police and to stick to that resolve, the police would find it far simpler to settle domestic disputes. But the value of the booklet was somewhat diminished by an attempt to persuade women to put pressure on the police by alleging police inaction.

The 18,000 domestic disputes which the police had attended last year represented 17 per cent of the police workload. If each dispute had been given the detailed analysis sought by the authors of the booklet other community needs would have suffered.