Predicting Case Outcomes and Women’s Perceptions of the Legal System’s Response to Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault: Does Interaction Between Community Agencies Matter?

Abstract

The goals of the current study were to assess if domestic violence and sexual assault case outcomes and women’s perceptions of legal system response can be predicted by the level of interaction between community agencies and the level of legal system response after communities receive STOP funding. A total 1,509 interviews were conducted with women living in 26 communities. Two samples were included: (a) a Help Seeker sample recruited from nonprofit victim service agencies and their legal system agency partners, and (b) a Community sample of women ages 18 to 35 recruited through random digit dialing of households. Results show that women’s perceptions of whether community agencies were working together to assist her and her case significantly and positively related to arrests in domestic violence and sexual assault cases and to convictions in domestic violence cases. It also increases women’s beliefs that law enforcement and prosecution are effective agencies.