The Criminal Justice Response to Same-Sex Domestic Violence

• In Event: Criminal Justice System's Response to Violence Against Children, Women, and Intimate Partners

Abstract

Domestic violence has garnered a lot of attention by the criminal justice apparatus, the media and, academia. Domestic violence laws have seen drastic changes over the past hundred years often coupled with the changes of culture and society. Though domestic violence surely warrants that attention, the growing and important issue of same-sex domestic violence (SSDV) has largely been ignored. The ongoing struggle of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community for equality has not as of yet been a catalyst for drastic legal change. Using intersectionality theory as my theoretical framework, this paper attempts to explain how and why the criminal justice apparatus has responded (or not responded) to the issue of same-sex domestic violence. Inherently this essay attempts to cover two separate but related issues. The first being the literal criminal justice responses to it, meaning how law enforcement have attempted to handle instances of SSDV. The second is the legal response meaning what legislative actions have or have not been accomplished to include SSDV into domestic violence laws. The topic of SSDV is tremendously understudied in criminology and a better understanding of the criminal justice response would be immensely beneficial.

Author

• Lucais Wallen, Eastern Kentucky University