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For the glib, angry men who pummel their wives, a brush with the law sometimes has a sobering effect. A recent Police Foundation working paper concluded: "It is clear that the recidivism measure is lowest when police make arrests." New York's Karla Digirolomo agrees: "In general, arrests work because they give the message to the man that such behavior is inappropriate. They also give the message to the woman that somebody will help her."
The crackdown represents an important shift in how the nation views wife abuse. No longer does a woman have to go it alone in a legal system that is stacked against her; no longer does she have to deny the suggestion, either stated or implied, that she got what she deserved. Now the courts and the community are swinging to her side—and the bullying husband is beginning to pay the price. —By Jane O'Reilly. Reported by Barbara B. Dolan/Duluth and Elizabeth Taylor/New York
*Courts and social agencies use terms such as marital abuse, spouse abuse and wife battering to describe serious or repeated injury by a person with whom the victim has a relationship involving cohabitation and sexual intimacy. Some 50% of the incidents involve persons no longer or never legally married.