Table 72 shows the number of all domestic violence incidents reported to the Colorado Bureau of Investigation by sheriff and police departments across the state compared to the number of domestic violence cases reported by the Colorado courts for the years 1998 through 2010. Note that Denver and several other police departments were not included in the CBI data before 2005 and a substantial number of additional departments were added in 2006.Of course many misdemeanor assault cases might be handled in a municipal court in larger cities but in most judicial districts only the state courts handle such cases. Thus, while there is some unknown bias in the reports when comparing police with court data the conclusion is valid.
|
(% increase) 4 |
Colorado Bureau of Investigation 1 |
Colorado Courts 2 (sans Denver and municipalities) 3 |
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|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Incidents 5 (%change) 4 |
(% change) 4 |
citizens 3 |
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|
10,523 6 N/A |
23 6 |
||||||
|
11,215 7 N/A |
24 7 |
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|
11,362 7 (+1%) |
23 7 |
||||||
|
11,636 7 (+2%) |
24 7 |
||||||
|
12,855 7 (+10%) |
26 7 |
||||||
|
12,922 7 (+1%) |
26 7 |
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|
1. Colorado Bureau of Investigation (CBI) cases are from Crime in Colorado and are currently available for the years 1995-2010 (Years 1998-2010 are online). CBI did not list male/female victims separately until 1999. 2. Values for domestic violence court cases are from Colorado Judicial Branch Annual Statistical Reports currently available for the years 1999-2010 but do not include data for the Second Judicial District (Denver) or municipalities within judicial districts. 3. It is estimated that Denver courts handle approximately 3,000 DV cases per year and municipalities within Colorado handle an additional 1,000 DV cases per year. Thus, the state court reports are probably 25% low. 4. Percent increase, or decrease per year are calculated with regard to the previous year. 5. CBI tabulates homicides, forcible sex offenses, robbery, aggravated assault, simple assault, non-force intimidation, kidnapping, non-force sex offenses incidents involving domestic violence. 6. Prior to 2005 the CBI data did not include data from Ault PD, Brighton PD, Denver PD, Greeley PD, Johnstown PD, Kersey PD, Milliken PD, Minturn PD, Weld County Sheriff and Wiggins PD. Thus, 2005 values cannot be compared with previous years. 7. Prior to 2006 the CBI data did not include data from Arvada PD, Blackhawk PD, Campo PD, Cañon City PD, Colorado State University-Fort Collins PD, DeBeque Marshall, Eagle PD, Fort Collins PD, Frederick PD, Gunnison PD, Lone Tree PD, and Manzanola PD. Thus, 2006 and later values cannot be compared with previous years. Better police reporting might also account for much of the +10% jump in DV incidents in 2009. CBI incident-based domestic violence reports are now compiled from NIBRS data submitted by every major Colorado law enforcement agency. |
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One reason that the CBI data understates “domestic violence” is that in Colorado this is an add on charge to virtually any other crime, e.g., shoplifting (it happens). However, the CBI only reports domestic violence associated with eight crimes of violence: homicides, forcible sex offenses, robbery, aggravated assault, simple assault, non-force intimidation, kidnapping, and non-force sex offenses. Even with this caveat it is unlikely that the police and sheriff incidents are under reporting by more than a factor of two, especially since municipal cases and Denver are now included in the CBI tabulation. Conversely, it is certain the court cases are overstating the problem of domestic violence, as evident in the 4th Judicial District.
Note that in 2005 the CBI greatly improved its statistics and added a number of police departments, especially Denver, to its tabulation. The increases in reported domestic violence crimes by CBI seen in Table 72 are more representative of better reporting by more agencies, as well as the increase in population. than any real increase in domestic violence. That probably includes the +10% jump in reported 2009 CBI DV crimes in Table 72.
Conversely, DV court cases reported by the state court administrator do not include an estimated 3,000 domestic violence cases from Denver City and County, which encompasses 12% of the state's population that is now included in the CBI reports. Further, a number of municipalities, or home-rule cities, within Colorado, e.g. Aurora, Arvada, Lakewood, Littleton, etc., prosecute an estimated 1,000 domestic violence cases per year that are also not included in the state court data, but are now included in the CBI reports. Thus, the number of DV court cases reported by the state court administrator understates the total by an estimated 25% widening even further the gap between NCVS estimates, police reports, and the number of DV court cases.
Something is terribly wrong with the Colorado courts and district attorneys!
Number of male victims reported by the Colorado Bureau of Investigation
It is also of great interest to note that the number of male victims reported by the CBI between 1999 and 2010 is consistently 20-23% of the total (Table 72).
The 2% drop in percentage of male victims in 2005 when CBI added in Denver police data suggests sex discrimination in DV cases by the Denver legal system. Note that in 2006 when a number of additional police departments were added to the data set (Table 72) that the percentage of male victims jumps up to 23% in 2006, further evidence that the Denver police department practices sex discrimination in domestic violence cases. Reasons for the drop back down to 20% male victims reporting in 2007-2008 probably involve even more sex discrimination against men but that is speculative.
However, there is little question that a man is a damn fool to call 911 in a domestic dispute as he is the one most likely to be arrested. So not only are men quite unlikely to call police when they are assaulted, they are likely the one to be arrested if they do call even though they are the victim, which skews the male victims reported in Table 72 even further.
Estimates of false allegations
Based on state court data
The judicial districts shown in Table 67 represent 57% of the sampled population of Colorado. Thus, we can reasonably infer that, with proper judicial oversight to better ensure equal protection under the law, the state-wide rate through 2010 should have been approximately 54 ±2 protection orders per 10,000 residents (mean of values for each district in Table 67) per year. That estimate would imply approximately 24,000 domestic violence and abuse cases should have been prosecuted under current laws in Colorado, outside of Denver, in the year 2010. The actual number was 31,659 (Table 62).
The implication from this calculation is that probably 7,700, or 24% of all domestic violence and abuse cases in Colorado were based on false allegations in 2010.
With current court statistics it is also possible to separate protection orders from domestic violence cases. The glaring example is the incredible number of domestic violence cases in the Fourth Judicial District, encompassing El Paso (includes Colorado Springs) and Teller counties, compared with three similar judicial districts as shown in Table 65. In year 2010 (Table 62) there are still nearly three times (3,407) the predicted (~1,275) number of criminal DV cases in the Fourth and more than twice the per capita numbers in the First and Eighteenth Judicial Districts (105 vs. 46, Table 62). Conversely, note the good agreement in the First and Eighteenth judicial districts between the NCVS estimates and the court cases of domestic violence (Table 41) for the 2000 census. That agreement is diverging by 2010 but still remains reasonably close to the NCVS estimate in the 1 st and 18 th judicial districts.
As shown in Table 66, filings in the Fourth Judicial District for other misdemeanors are near average, and unemployment before 2008 was negligible, so the problems there are not inherent in the populace.
The Fourth Judicial District is thus prosecuting two to three times the number of domestic violence cases as other comparable population centers in Colorado.
In El Paso and Teller counties, at least two thirds of the domestic violence charges are made without reasonable basis. It is also clear from Table 74 that these draconian practices are causing citizens to fear law enforcement more than they do an abusive partner. The same abuse of process is almost certainly true of the other six judicial districts listed in Table 64.
Further, the data shown in Table 69 and Table 70 make it clear that the number of domestic violence cases are two to three times any reasonable estimate of the actual number of incidents.
Therefore, any estimate based on court data must assume that at least half the cases are false allegations.
Based on Colorado Bureau of Investigation data
The statement (I used to say suggestion but the data are now incontrovertible) that a majority of protection orders and domestic violence charges are false allegations is reinforced when we compare police reports of domestic violence cases (Table 72) with court cases. For 2010 CBI data gives a total of 12,922 (Table 72) criminal DV cases. Court cases reported by the state court administrator sans Denver totaled 18,402 in 2010 (Table 72), and there were an estimated 4,000 additional court cases in Denver and home-rule cities that do not appear in the state court administrator report. Thus, there were more than 10,000 domestic violence cases that were either false allegations or did not involve actual violence, e.g., harassment, menacing, or telephone interference.
However, in 2010 the state courts only reported 202 cases of menacing and 2,016 cases of harassment (Table 30). Even if every one of those cases somehow involved “domestic violence” there would still be a minimum of 7,500 cases.
Therefore, 33% of the cases statewide were false allegations of domestic violence.
It bears repeating that in Colorado domestic violence is an add-on charge and virtually any crime can be labelled as domestic violence. In October 2006 the Colorado Domestic Violence Offender Management Board (DVOMB) released a preliminary report on court-ordered treatment for DV offenders. That report provides some insight into the ridiculous applications to which Colorado's domestic violence statutes have been applied. Treatment providers reported more than 60 different offenses under which their clients had been sentenced for domestic violence. These crimes included shoplifting, indecent exposure, false identity, fraud, DUI, and etc. (p. 11 of the DVOMB report), which appear to be a long way from violent crimes against an intimate partner. For example, if the couple are intimate, seemingly a prerequisite for domestic violence, how is indecent exposure a crime of violence?
In large measure charges of domestic violence and abuse are being indiscriminately and inappropriately applied to far-fetched cases.
Since it has become more difficult to file false allegations of criminal domestic violence, as noted above, redfems have taken to filing more protection (restraining) orders and promoting the reporting of violations as neither requires proof. Additionally, the later results in an immediate warrantless arrest of the man. That is well illustrated for the Filthy Fourth Judicial District and for the entire state in Table 63.
The obvious redfem objective is to destroy as many children, men, and women as possible.
Based on National Crime Victimization Survey data
The National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) is reviewed under the article on How Common Is Domestic Violence? Surveying actual victims of violence puts the crime of domestic violence in the range of 0.2% to 0.7% of households. The average is 0.4% to 0.5% or, stated another way, in a given year 4 or 5 households out of 1,000 are likely to experience criminal domestic violence for which a competent prosecutor could prove both mens rea and actus reus beyond a reasonable doubt to a jury. It is also important to note that NCVS data includes incidents that are reported to police or other authorities as well as unreported incidents. Thus, NCVS estimates should be somewhat higher than police and court statistics to account for unreported incidents.
For the year 2000 (Table 41) census and again in 2010 (Table 62) a direct comparison was made between NCVS estimates and DV cases for each judicial district. In 2000 the NCVS estimate suggested 8,290 reported and unreported domestic violence occurrences in Colorado exclusive of Denver and there were 11,951 court cases, or 44% more than predicted (Table 41). In 2010 the NCVS estimate is 8,750 cases, again exclusive of Denver, and there were 18,402 reported, or 110% more than predicted.
But is this increase in cases real?
Table 73 makes it clear that over the 20 years from 1990 to 2009 an ever larger percentage of the population in Colorado Springs calls 911 at least once each year. Yet it is equally clear from the plots in Table 74 and Table 75 that the major impact of the 1994 passage of draconian domestic violence laws in Colorado was to make citizens afraid to call 911 in a domestic disturbance.
Table 73 shows that from 1990 to 1994 7.2% to 8.7% of all 911 calls were for a domestic disturbance. The chart in Table 74 well illustrates the dramatic drop in 911 calls in 1995 and ensuing years that are now known to be a direct result of the 1994 passage of the DV laws.
By 2008-2009 only 4.1-4.5% of all 911 calls are for a domestic disturbance. That is despite a 37% increase in population and an increase in the percentage of residents who call 911 for any reason from 38% to 48%.
It is thus obvious the number of domestic violence cases is not increasing because of increased demand by couples calling 911 for help. What must be happening is that law enforcement officers are arresting and district attorneys charging an ever-increasing percentage of the uninformed citizens who make the mistake of calling 911 in a domestic disturbance.
Anecdotal evidence also makes it clear that it is ever more rare for intimate partners to call police. But nearby busybodies, indoctrinated by incessant DV propaganda, are increasingly likely to call police when they hear couples arguing. Naturally a very large fraction of such calls will not meet the criteria for criminal prosecution and are, in essence, false allegations and to be counted as such.
In brief, the statistical approximation provided by the NCVS, the best available survey of crime in America, suggests 30% of the police reports in the CBI data are false allegations and more than 50% of the court cases are without basis.
Summary of estimates of false allegations in domestic violence cases
Based on state court data — At least half of all DV cases
Fourth Judicial District — At least two thirds of all DV cases.
Based on Colorado Bureau of Investigation data — One third of all DV cases
Based on National Crime Victimization Survey data — 30% of police cases and more than 50% of court cases.
No matter how it is calculated, based on available data roughly half the domestic violence cases in the Colorado courts are false or unprovable allegations.
In some jurisdictions, e.g. the Fourth Judicial District, more than half of the protection orders issued have no legal basis. Worse, redfems are responding to the increasing difficulty in getting criminal DV convictions by getting more and more bogus protection orders. Once a protection order has been issued it is also clear a statewide redfem campaign is underway to “encourage” women to report, if not stage, any violation of the order to get the man arrested and convicted.
But one thing is certainly clear, the draconian domestic violence and abuse laws passed in 1994 have not served to lessen the problem. If anything, these laws have made the problem much, much worse and have certainly acted to destroy children, families, marriage, and sow mistrust between men and women.
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