Young Lawyers Division 2000-2001

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 1999

Domestic Violence Facts And Statistics

Each year, medical expenses from domestic violence total at least $3 to $5 billion. Businesses forfeit another $100 million in lost wages, sick leave, absenteeism, and non-productivity.
(Domestic Violence for Health Care Providers, 3rd Edition, Colorado Domestic Violence Coalition, 1991.)

Alcohol is present in more than 50% of all incidents of domestic violence.
(Collins, J.J., and Messerschmidt, M.A., Epidemiology of Alcohol-Related Violence, Alcohol Health and Research World, 17(2):93-100. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, 1993.)

Women who leave their batterers are at a 75% greater risk of being killed by the batterer than those who stay.
(Barbara Hart, National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, 1988.)

A 1993 national poll found that 34% of Americans have directly witnessed an incident of domestic violence.
(Family Violence Prevention Fund, Men Beating Women: Ending Domestic Violence, A Qualitative and Quantitative Study of Public Attitudes on Violence Against Women, New York, conducted by EDK Associates, 1993.)

Nearly one in three adult women experience at least one physical assault by a partner during adulthood. (American Psychological Association, Violence and the Family: Report of the American Psychological Association Presidential Task Force on Violence and the Family (1996), p. 10.)

Due to space limitations, for every one woman accepted into a battered women's shelter, two women and her children are turned away. In some urban areas, five to seven women are turned away for every two women served.
(Facts on Domestic Violence, National Coalition Against Domestic Violence (NCADV).)

Nine of ten murdered women are murdered by men. Four of five are murdered at home. Three of four are murdered by husbands or lovers. Almost none are killed by strangers.
(Pennsylvania Coalition Against Domestic Violence and the Domestic Violence Fact Sheet Prepared by the YWCA of Greater Harrisburg.)

Only about one-seventh of all domestic assaults come to the attention of the police.
(Florida Governor's Task Force on Domestic and Sexual Violence, Florida Mortality Review Project, 1997, p. 3.)

Domestic violence is the leading cause of injury to women between the ages of 15 and 44 in the United StatesÐmore frequent than car accidents, muggings, and rapes combined.
(Uniform Crime Reports, Federal Bureau of Investigation, 1991.)


Lori Davis is an assistant editor of The Affiliate and is an administrative law judge/hearing officer with the Kentucky Cabinet for Health Services in Frankfort, Kentucky.