Law Forces Evaluation On Batterers If Counseling Necessary, Abusers Will Have To Pay For It
Dave admits he’s gone through several wives over the years, battering and abusing each of them.
“I was a very violent and angry man,” the 53-year-old Spokane resident said, asking not to have his last name used. “I really don’t know why, I think it was from the stress of work.”
That was more than a year ago, before he was found guilty of beating his current wife.
Since then, Dave has been through a yearlong treatment program for batterers, a program that not only changed his marriage, but changed his life as well.
It’s a program that may soon be available to those who abuse their spouses and partners in North Idaho.
A new Idaho law that goes into effect in July requires those convicted of domestic battery to be evaluated at their own cost.
If the evaluation says the abuser needs it, they would have to attend and pay for domestic violence counseling.
“It’s a start, a good start,” said Holladay Sanderson, Coeur d’Alene Women’s Center director. “We’re headed in the right direction.”
Magistrate Judge Eugene Marano said that aside from jail time, the best he can usually do for treatment is send abusers to a one-day “anger management” program. That class would still be an option under the new law.
Sanderson and others who deal with domestic violence say these short-term programs do little to stop the violence.
“The anger management classes I’ve been to before really weren’t that educational,” Dave said. “They just scratched the surface of the problem.”
Washington law requires batterers to attend a yearlong course offered by the Inland Center for Domestic Violence. The YWCA in Spokane originally developed the course.
“This class teaches you how to live with a partner without either person being in control of the other person,” Dave said. “It makes you realize that verbal and physical abuse is very damaging to a relationship.”
The course focuses on the domination, intimidation and control behaviors abusive men use on their partners, said Carolyn Morrison, director of Alternatives to Domestic Violence and a counselor in the batterer program.
Dave said he used to become enraged with his wife if she didn’t want to do the same things he wanted to on the weekends.
But Dave said he doesn’t get mad anymore. Instead, his wife does what she wants, and he does what he wants. Not only has their relationship grown closer, but the course has helped him deal with pressures at work as well.
Since there is no such program in Kootenai County, the North Idaho Coalition on Domestic Violence hopes to bring Spokane’s program to Coeur d’Alene.
The course likely would last six months rather than a year, to make it less expensive.
The cost would depend on how much the batterer could pay, ranging from $315 to $870 for the entire course.
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