NIJ Journal Issue No. 266

• NCJ Number: 230409
• Date Published: June 2010
• Author(s): National Institute of Justice
• Publication Series: NIJ Journal

Annotation

This issue of the NIJ Journal features several NIJ-funded studies related to violence against women as part of the commemoration of the 15th anniversary of the Federal Violence Against Women Act (VAWA), and two articles address backlogs of DNA sample processing in the Nation’s crime laboratories as well as backlogs of unanalyzed evidence at police storage sites.

Abstract

One article reports on a study of the effectiveness of civil protective orders in increasing the safety of victims of domestic violence in urban and rural areas of Kentucky. Another article pertinent to reducing violence against women summarizes the contributions of three members of an expert panel featured in a seminar on men who murder their family members and then commit suicide. Offender profiles and factors that increase the risk for such murder-suicides are reviewed. A third article related to violence against women focuses on the findings of research on stalking. It notes the need for increasing public awareness and criminal justice training regarding the nature and severity of stalking. An article on backlogs of DNA samples waiting to be tested by forensic laboratories addresses reasons why the volume of DNA samples being sent to forensic laboratories has exceeded the capacity of the laboratories to conduct timely processing of the samples, even after massive Federal funding that has increased the capacity of laboratories for DNA testing. Another article on evidence backlogs reports on findings from a survey of law enforcement agencies regarding the prevalence and causes of backlogs of evidence that remain unanalyzed for extended periods in storage. An article on Hawaii’s Opportunity Probation with Enforcement (HOPE) program shows how its use of a “swift and sure punishment” approach to probation violations has effectively reduced them.