Animal advocates from across Arizona met at the state capitol on Feb. 25 for Arizona’s Humane Lobby Day to speak out in favor of animal protection legislation. With 81 attendees (pictured above), including former Humane Society of Central Arizona shelter director Ellie Watson, 24 of Arizona’s 30 districts were represented. At the capitol, attendees were introduced from the House floor, and spent the afternoon visiting with their legislators’ offices. Their effort on behalf of the domestic violence bill was instrumental in its passage.
By MELANIE KISER
Cronkite News Service
PHOENIX (Monday, March 8) _ The state Senate passed two bills Monday intended to curb abuse in family and intimate relationships by expanding the list of crimes that qualify as domestic violence.
SB 1087, which passed 20-8, would add homicide, manslaughter, animal cruelty and sexual assault to the list of crimes that when committed against a family member or intimate partner count as domestic violence.
SB 1086, which passed unanimously, would classify choking in domestic or intimate relationships as aggravated assault subject to a Class 4 felony, which carries a presumptive sentence of 2 1/2 years.
“Sometimes proscutors need to include some of these other violations as part of domestic violence to get recognized crimes against a victim on the books there, to be able to charge them,” said state Sen. Linda Gray, R-Phoenix, author of both bills.
Kendra Leiby, systems advocacy coordinator for the Arizona Coalition Against Domestic Violence, which is pushing for the changes, said expanding the list of crimes considered domestic violence would help ensure that abusers are dealt with as just that.
“Now we’re finding all too often perpetrators of domestic violence falling through the cracks, and that just feeds into the cycle of violence,” she said.
The cycle of violence involves not just the victim but his or her pet, and that is why two offenses involving animal cruelty or neglect were included in the bill, Leiby said.
About 70 percent of pet owners entering women’s shelters nationally reported their abuser had injured, maimed, killed or threatened family pets for revenge or to psychologically control victims, according to a national survey in the Society and Animals Journal.
Meanwhile, experts consider choking, which can render the victim unconscious in 10 seconds, to be a very serious risk factor for escalation to homicide, Leiby said.
Nearly half of female homicide and attempted homicide victims were choked in the past year by their male partner, according to an article in the Journal of Emergency Medicine.
Domestic violence statutes apply if the victim and defendant are:
* Married.
* Live in the same household.
* Have a child in common or if one is pregnant by the other.
* Engaged in a romantic or sexual relationship.
* Are related by blood, court order or marriage as a parent, grandparent, child, grandchild, brother or sister or by marriage as a parent-in-law, grandparent-in-law, stepparent, step-grandparent, stepchild, step-grandchild, brother-in-law or sister-in-law.
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