Breaking Rank: A Top Cop's Exposé of the Dark Side of American Policing

by Norm Stamper

Listened in on her phone conversations? • Read her mail? • Followed her? • Interrogated her when she got home, demanding to know what she did, who she was with? • Expected or demanded sex when she didn’t want it?

Selected her friends for her? • Prevented her from having friends? • Threw the family kitten or puppy against the wall? • Scissored up her photos? • Threatened to leave her? • Screamed at her? • Glared at her? • Made a fist, shook it in her face? • Gave her the silent treatment? • Compared her body to photos in magazines? • Threw things? • Punched holes in the wall? • Left a threatening note? • Forced her to have sex when she was asleep? • Called her a whore? • Made yourself unavailable to watch the kids when she was counting on you? • Took the car, leaving her unable to get where she needed to go? • Refused to allow her to have male friends? • Accused her of flirting, or of having an affair? • Sabotaged family/social affairs? • Blamed her for financial problems, or troubles with the kids? • Told her she was a bad mother? • Told her she was a lousy lay? • Told her she was mentally ill? • Made light of your abuse, minimizing its effects? • Forced

Told her it was the alcohol or the drugs that made you do it? • Told her that if you couldn’t have her no one could? • Idolized her? • Obsessed about her all the time? • Flew into rages? • Went cold, and stayed cold? • Drove recklessly with her (and/or the kids) in the car? • Failed to give her messages from people who called? • Defined and dictated her role as mother, homemaker? • Got jealous when she bought new clothes, put on makeup, got a new hairstyle? • Goaded her into talking about other men, then condemned her no matter what she said? • Checked the phone bills for suspicious calls? • Refused to stop the car when she requested it? • Followed her to work? • Questioned or threatened her coworkers? • Used sex to “make up” for your violence, expecting her to forgive you? • Pulled the phone out of the wall? • Fought in front of the kids? • Used violence against her?

She’s afraid she’ll lose her kids • She’s accepted his apologies and promises, and figures he won’t do it again • She feels pressured by her religion or her family to stick it out • He’s made threats, and she believes he’ll act on them • She still loves him • She hasn’t the money to leave

She feels she’s to blame • She believes he’ll commit suicide • She doesn’t think she’ll find another partner • She believes the negative things he has said about her, and hasn’t the self-confidence to take control of her life • She has no support system, no place to go, no one to talk to • She doesn’t trust the police or the courts to help • She thinks abuse goes with the territory • She doesn’t want to be a failure, in her eyes or in the eyes of others

DOMESTIC VIOLENCE IN AMERICA Nearly one in every three adult women experiences at least one domestic violence assault as an adult. Four million American women are victims of a serious assault by an intimate partner during an average 12-month period. Every year about 600,000 men are arrested for violence against women. Women are six times less likely to report violence by an intimate partner than by a stranger. At least 1,300 women are killed each year by an intimate partner (mostly by handguns); spotty reporting leads some experts to put the number at between 1,500-4,000. Every year approximately 3 million cases of child abuse are reported to official agencies such as child protective services. Approximately 1,300 children die of child abuse or neglect every year. Fifty-seven percent of children under 12 who are murdered are killed by a parent. In a given year, 3.3 million kids are exposed to violence by male family members against their mothers or female caretakers. Sixteen to 34 percent of girls and 10 to 20 percent of boys are sexually abused, most by a family member or trusted family friend. A family member is involved in nearly one-third of the murders of people aged 60 or older.

WAGE WAR ON CRIME, NOT DRUGS

Prostitution, as it’s commonly (but by no means exclusively) framed, i.e., males buying sex from females, is degrading and demeaning to women. • Beyond the most talked about health risks—violence, HIV, and other STDs—women who engage in high-volume vaginal sex risk major structural damage to their sexual and other organs. • Many women don’t choose prostitution so much as have it chosen for them. • While many prostitutes don’t work for pimps, those who do are exploited and otherwise mistreated, physically, emotionally, financially. • Significant numbers of young girls, including the occasional preteen, find their way into the trade.

QUESTION: A ban prohibiting the sales of assault rifles and high capacity ammunition magazines expires on September 14. Would you favor or oppose continuing this ban? QUESTION: In general, would you say you favor stricter gun control, or less strict gun control?

Become a student of that which you seek to change.