By Kevin Haas
Rock River Current
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ROCKFORD — The city is creating a new division of the Mayor’s Office of Domestic and Community Violence Prevention centered around preventing potentially deadly instances of domestic violence and intimate partner homicides.
The Lethality Prevention Division will oversee three teams that respond to some of the most serious instances of domestic violence, including non-fatal strangulation, which is considered a precursor to potential homicide. The risk that someone will be killed by their partner within the next year increases 750% for those who have been previously strangled, according to The Journal of Emergency Medicine.
The new division will include a strangulation response team that oversees a comprehensive response to strangulation that starts with emergency dispatch through prosecution.
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There will also be a domestic violence fatality review team, which aims to prevent future domestic violence-related fatalities and reduce the severity of domestic violence by evaluating various interventions put in place.
The final component, a domestic violence enhanced response team, works to identify high-risk domestic violence cases and create individualized intervention plans designed to keep survivors safe.
A coordinator will be hired to develop the teams and an additional case manager will be hired to help survivors navigate the system.
The program is funded by $895,000 in state grants secured by state Sen. Steve Stadelman.
“We recognize the need for law enforcement, but we should also emphasize prevention and intervention,” Stadelman said. “That’s why the work at the Mayor’s Office of Domestic and Community Violence and the Family Peace Center are so important. Their efforts are proactive, looking at root causes, finding ways to intervene and reducing the chances of crime happening in the future.”
The new program was announced Monday at a news conference at City Hall. The city has held several news conferences this month to highlight its efforts to curtail domestic violence because October is Domestic Violence Awareness Month. Previous announcements included the Barbershop Project, which aims to help barbers and beauticians support the mental well-being of their clients, and a news conference detailing efforts to increase conviction rates on domestic violence and stalking charges.
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Surveys of survivors who entered the Rockford Family Peace Center from Feb. 1 to Oct. 12 show that 52% experienced strangulation. About 76%, or 140 survivors, experienced something that puts them at high risk of death.
“We know that the survivors who are coming into the Rockford Family Peace Center and into our other partner agencies around this community are experiencing indicators that should make us all concerned that they are in high danger of risk of death,” said Jennifer Cacciapaglia, who leads the Mayor’s Office of Domestic and Community Violence Prevention.
The teams will work in coordination with Rockford police and Winnebago County sheriff’s deputies as well as prosecutors, medical professionals and the Rockford Fire Department. Cacciapaglia said they will collect several data points to evaluate whether their work is successful.
Stadelman said it’s part of a comprehensive approach to curtailing crime that includes law enforcement and advocates. About 42% of the city’s violent crime stems from domestic violence.
“We need long-term community-based solutions,” he said. “We need to deal with the root causes with long-term approaches so that we can change behaviors and hopefully down the road we see those metrics and improvement in the overall crime stats.”
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This article is by Kevin Haas. Email him at khaas@rockrivercurrent.com or follow him on X at @KevinMHaas or Instagram @thekevinhaas and Threads @thekevinhaas