Statistics of Tennessee Domestic Violence – Painful Persistence

Domestic violence in the U.S. is not a new trend. Instead, it is a painfully persistent problem from which Tennesseans are not immune.

Statistically, most victims of domestic violence in Tennessee are women.

Marybeth Conley and Alex Coleman interviewed Memphis TN attorney Miles Mason, Sr., for WREG News Channel 3’s Live @ 9 on the subject of domestic violence in our state. You can watch the video on YouTube or by visiting Domestic Violence & Tennessee Divorce Law | Get Safe Now.

Tennessee Investigates Domestic Violence

Last September, the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation released its compilation of Domestic Violence 2010-2012 Statistics. Three years of crime data on domestic violence incidents were gathered through the state’s Tennessee Incident Based Reporting System (TIBRS), according to bureau director Mark Gwyn.

Some quick stats in the bureau’s report stand out:

● 69.2% of all domestic violence offenses were simple assaults. With simple assault, victims may have sustained minor physical injuries with cuts and bruises. A simple assault is a Class A misdemeanor in Tennessee, committed when someone intentionally, knowingly, or recklessly injures another. Or frightens the victim with imminent bodily injury. Or deliberately makes physical contact in such a way that a reasonable person would be extremely offended or provoked. T.C.A. § 39-13-101.

● Women and girls account for 71.9% of all domestic abuse victims.

● 58.1% of juvenile victims reported parental abuse.

● 1 in 3 perpetrators charged with forcible rape or forcible fondling of a juvenile were family members of the victims.

● Reported incidences of domestic violence are highest among unmarried opposite sex couples, at 44.2%.

● Regarding incidences of domestic violence among homosexual partners, 41.6% of reports involved African American women – victims and perpetrators.

● Divorcing an abusive spouse ends domestic violence for many victims. (“[V]ictims were 6 times more likely to be abused by a spouse than an ex-spouse in domestic offenses.”)

● Domestic violence kills too many Tennesseans. In the three-year study period, 275 victims of domestic incidents were murdered. These were not accidental or negligent homicides.

One statistic remains steadfast – most victims of domestic violence are women. In the U.S., every year about 1.3 million women will fall victim to acts of physical domestic abuse. However, any abusive behavior pattern intentionally used to control another person in an intimate relationship, whether control is psychological or sexual, could also be domestic violence.

Financial Cost of Domestic Violence

There is an economic price to be paid as well. In 2013, the Tennessee Economic Council on Women released its Economic Impact of Violence Against Women study based on 2012 data.

The council put a dollar amount on “domestic violence, human sex trafficking, and sexual assault” in Tennessee:  $886,171,950 was spent in 2012 alone. That figure does not include the cost associated with providing for the children of adult victims, which the council estimates is a substantial portion of the annual Dept. of Children’s Services (DCS) budget of over $527 million. But the greatest economic impact according the council, perhaps over a billion dollars, is the price of victims’ lives interrupted or frustrated forever by such violence:

Estimated to target women in 70 – 80% of cases, and measuring in excess of 82,000 incidents annually in this state, domestic and sexual violence foster dependency and isolation; they derail careers, educations, and personal development; and their effects create a global cost to the community by dealing significant immediate damage and immense lasting trauma to 1 in 3 women in their lifetime.

The financial cost is another painful reminder of the persistence of domestic violence in Tennessee.