No Visible Bruises: What We Don’t Know About Domestic Violence Can Kill Us

by Rachel Louise Snyder

But the code of silence that often keeps fellow officers from outing colleagues they know or suspect to be violent isn’t simply tribalism: an “us against them,” cop-versus-civilian philosophy (though most police officers I’ve met feel this to some degree). Domestic violence charges brought against law officers can carry an outsized weight for the perpetrator; they often equate to an officer losing his or her job, since convicted abusers are not allowed to possess firearms. At the same time, the stresses of the job result in higher rates of familial violence, as well as alcoholism, divorce, and suicide. The lessons of the male role belief system that I’d learned sitting in classes by Jimmy Espinoza operate every bit as strongly in any given police department as they do in the San Bruno jail.