Fact Sheets

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Did you know that...? | Incarcerated Survivors

Statistics on Incarcerated Survivors of Domestic Violence

· At least 6,200 battered women are incarcerated in California.

There are 10,420 women in state prison in California, as of October 15, 2003.

Department of Corrections, State of California. Weekly Report of Population as of Midnight, October 15, 2003.

80% of women prisoners in California report experiencing abuse either in childhood or as adults. Over half (60%) report being physical abused as an adult, primarily by spouses or partners.

Barbara Bloom, Meda Chesney Lind & Barbara Owen. Women in California Prisons: Hidden Victims of the War on Drugs. Center on Juvenile Crime and Criminal Justice Report. San Francisco, CA. p. 3.

· Survivors of battering are incarcerated for a range of crimes, not just for killing abusive partners.

Many battered women are in prison after being coerced into committing crimes by their abusive partners (i.e., homicides, robberies, forging checks, drug-related crimes). Others are incarcerated after using illegal means to survive or cope with the experience of battering (i.e., property/economic crimes, using alcohol or drugs to self-medicate). Battered women may also be convicted of failing to protect their children from the abuser's violence or parental kidnapping.

Mary Gilfus. Women's Experiences of Abuse as a Risk Factor for Incarceration. Harrisburg, PA: VAWnet. 4-5.

· When women kill their intimate partners, it is usually in self-defense.

Of 223 reviewed appellate opinions of battered women's homicide cases, 75% involved confrontations (meaning the woman was being assaulted or abused at the time of the killing).

Holly Maguigan. (1991). Myths and Misconceptions in Current Reform Proposals. University of Pennsylvania Law Review, vol. 140. p. 397.

· When women kill their intimate partners, it is most often after a long history of abuse.

In North Carolina, 75% of incidents where women killed their male partners were preceded by male-initiated violence. In contrast, no evidence suggested that homicides by men were preceded by female-initiated violence.

Paige Hall Smith, Kathryn E. Moracco, and John D. Butts. 1998. Partner Homicide in Context: A Population-Based Perspective. Homicide Studies, Vol. 2, No. 4. p. 410.

· Survivors of battering are convicted at the same rate as other homicide defendants.

A study of 223 reviewed appellate opinions of battered women's homicide cases found that battered women defendants are convicted after trial at roughly the same rate (75-80%) as are defendants in other homicide and serious felony trials.

Holly Maguigan. (1991). Myths and Misconceptions in Current Reform Proposals. University of Pennsylvania Law Review, vol. 140. p. 397.

· When survivors of domestic violence have access to resources for increasing their safety, they are far less likely to kill their abusive partners.

The number of men killed by intimate partners dropped 68% between 1976 and 2000 (from 1,357 men killed in 1976 to 440 in 2000). During the same time period, the number of women killed by intimate partners dropped only 22% (from 1,600 in 1976 to 1,247).

Callie Marie Rennison. 2003. Intimate Partner Violence, 1993-2001. NCJ-197838. Washington, DC: Bureau of Justice Statistics. p. 2.

Homicide Trends in the U.S., Intimate Homicide. Washington, DC: Bureau of Justice Statistics.

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