Victim in Murder-Suicide Sought Protective Order

Oct 4th - 12:11pm

Neal Augenstein, WTOP Radio

FORT WASHINGTON, Md. - Two people are dead in an apparent murder-suicide in Prince George's County.

The murder victim, Jackie M. Lewis, 57, had sought a temporary protective order against the suicide victim, her longtime boyfriend Arthur J. Comer, 57.

The court order, which was denied Aug. 22 by Prince George's County District Court judge Crystal Middlestadt, sought to keep Comer from abusing or threatening to abuse Lewis, from contacting her, from going into her home and from going to the Clinton Post Office where she worked.

Court records show the judge denied the protective order because there were no reasonable grounds to believe abuse had occurred at the time.

Early Wednesday Prince George's County police say Comer called 911 to say he had just shot a woman and wanted to harm himself. The person taking the call then heard another shot. When police arrived at the home the SWAT team they found the two dead.

(Copyright 2006 by WTOP. All Rights Reserved.)

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Iraq seeks oversight of rape-slaying case

By SAMEER N. YACOUB, Associated Press Writer
13 minutes ago

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Iraq's justice minister demanded Tuesday that the U.N. Security Council ensure a group U.S. troops are punished for allegedly raping and murdering a young Iraqi and executing her family, calling the attack "monstrous and inhuman."

Two women legislators also called for Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki to be summoned to parliament to give assurances the U.S. soldiers would be punished for the March 12 attack on the family in Mahmoudiya, south of Baghdad.

The attack was among the worst in a series of cases of U.S. troops accused of killing and abusing Iraqi civilians. Iraq's largest newspaper, Azzaman, said in an editorial Tuesday the rape "summarizes what has been going in Iraq for the past years not only by the American occupation army, but also by some Iraqi groups."

Former private Steven D. Green appeared in federal court in North Carolina on Monday to face murder and rape charges. At least four other U.S. soldiers still in Iraq are under investigation for the slayings, and the military has stressed it taking the allegations seriously.

"If this act actually happened, it constitutes an ugly and unethical crime, monstrous and inhuman," said Justice Minister Hashim Abdul-Rahman al-Shebli al-Shebli, a Sunni Arab. "The Iraqi judiciary should be informed about this investigation which should be conducted under supervision of international and human organizations. Those involved should face justice."

"The ugliness of this crime demands a swift intervention of the U.N. Security Council to stop these violations of human rights and to condemn them so that they will not happen again," he added.

The two lawmakers, Safiya al-Suhail and Ayda al-Sharif, said condemning the attack was not enough.

"We demand severe punishment for the five soldiers involved," al-Sharif said. "Denouncements are not enough. If this act has taken place in another country, the world would have turned upside down."

Al-Suhail said al-Maliki should appear before parliament "to make sure investigations are taking place."

Mahmoudiya Mayor Mouayad Fadhil said Iraqi authorities have started their own investigation and that he had asked the hospital where the victims were taken for more details.

According to a federal affidavit, Green and three other soldiers from the 101st Airborne Division had talked about raping the young woman, whom they first saw while working at a traffic checkpoint near her home.

On the day of the attack, the document said, Green and other soldiers drank alcohol and changed out of their uniforms to avoid detection before going to the woman's house. Green used a brown T-shirt to cover his face.

Once there, the affidavit said, Green took three members of the family — an adult male and female, and a girl estimated to be 5 years old — into a bedroom. Shots were heard. Green allegedly shot the woman in the head after he and another soldier raped her, the affidavit said.

Green was dishonorably discharged from the Army because of a "personality disorder" before the attack came to light, the affadavit said. He is being prosecuted in federal, rather than military court because he is no longer in the Army.

Iraqi authorities identified the rape victim as Abeer Qassim Hamza. The other victims were her father, Qassim Hamza, her mother, Fikhriya Taha, and her sister, Hadeel Qassim Hamza.

The affidavit estimated the rape victim was about 25. But a doctor at the Mahmoudiya hospital gave her age as 14. He refused to be identified for fear of reprisals.

Mahdi Obeid, a neighbor of the victims, said that he was sitting in his house when he saw fire coming from the house on March 12. He rushed over to find Abeer's body on fire. He extinguished the flames and saw bullets in her head and chest.

"It was a horrible scene," he said. "If I could go back in time, I would have not dared enter the house. I cannot wipe those barbaric scenes from my memory."

An insurgent group, the Mujahedeen Army, distributed an account of the incident on an Islamist Web site. It appeared the report, which generally corresponded with details already made public, was designed to draw attention to the deaths and stir up hostility against the U.S. military.

The Azzaman newspaper expressed skepticism that the soldiers would be severely punished.

"The U.S. Army will conduct an investigation and the result at best is already known. One or two U.S. soldiers will receive a 'touristic punishment' and the whole crime will be forgotten as it happened with Abu Ghraib criminals," the newspaper said, referring to the abuse of Iraqi prisoners by U.S. guards at a prison in west Baghdad.

___

Associated Press reporters Qassim Abdul-Zahra, Bushra Juhi and Qais al-Bashir contributed to this report from Baghdad.

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Women achieving more politically

By ROBIN HINDERY, Associated Press Writer
Tue Jun 20, 3:39 AM ET

NEW YORK - For all the talk about Hillary Rodham Clinton and Condoleezza Rice battling for the presidency in 2008, the closest a woman has come to the Oval Office is actress Geena Davis, star of the recently canceled TV series "Commander in Chief."

Yet, in other nations, a female leader isn't just the stuff of television drama.

Countries as diverse as Britain, Chile, Liberia and Israel have elected women to their highest political office. When it comes to female representation in national parliaments, the U.S. ranks 68th in the world.

A primary reason for the success of women in politics elsewhere, according to one observer, is the effort on the part of women themselves.

"Women in other countries have made more strong-willed efforts than we have," said Marie Wilson, head of the New York-based White House Project, a nonpartisan group that works to increase women's participation in politics. "They have gelled with each other to say: 'We know women matter in these positions. We must have more women.'"

No woman has ever led the presidential ticket of a major political party in the United States. Only one — Democrat Geraldine Ferraro in 1984 — has been nominated for vice president by either the Republicans or the Democrats.

Clinton, a senator from New York and a former first lady, is considered by many a front-runner for the Democratic nomination in 2008. Rice, President Bush's secretary of state, is mentioned as a possible Republican candidate even though she adamantly denies any interest in national office.

In Washington today, 85 percent of Congress is male. As of mid-May, six months before the November elections, 175 women were considered candidates for the House and 18 for the Senate. In 1992, a record 222 women filed for House seats and 29 for the Senate.

While female representation in Congress has hovered between 13 percent and 15 percent for the past five years, the presence of women has increased significantly in parliaments in many other countries.

Even the new democracies in Iraq and Afghanistan have a greater percentage of female representatives than does Congress, according to the Inter-Parliamentary Union, an international group based in Geneva, Switzerland. The organization ranked 188 countries according to their female representatives.

In 2005, the global average for female representation at the parliamentary level was 16.3 percent, an average that increased from the year before largely due to quotas put in place in several Latin American countries to promote the candidacies of women, according to the Inter-Parliamentary Union.

Such gains for women were not limited to the developing world. Quotas implemented in 2005 within Britain's Labour Party led to the highest number of women ever being elected in that country — 128.

The U.S. has "gotten further and further behind as other countries have adopted quotas and other mechanisms to ensure they are using all their resources, meaning their women," Wilson said. "Those countries implemented quotas because they finally decided that political parity was important enough to be given some teeth."

The Inter-Parliamentary Union found that the average ratio of female parliamentarians in countries that used quotas in 2005 elections was nearly twice that those without such special measures: 26.9 percent versus 13.6 percent.

In 2003, the number of women in Rwanda's National Assembly doubled, largely due to the creation of a constitutionally mandated quota. Since that year, Rwanda has been No. 1 in the global ranking of women in national parliaments, with 48.8 percent of its assembly made up of women.

Experts say the success of quotas does not tell the whole story. Other factors helping female politicians outside the U.S. include financial support, women-focused reforms within individual political parties, and an organized effort by the media and the general public to champion political parity.

"The absolute most fundamental part of a successful policy for gender equality is to give opportunities for women to get economic independence," said Martin Nilsson, a Social Democrat in Sweden's parliament and his party's spokesman on gender equality.

"Major ingredients ... are the creation of a well-funded service sector; individual, and not family based, taxation and social benefits; and finally, and most important, a family policy giving women a real opportunity to combine work and family."

Sweden ranks second in the Inter-Parliamentary Union's ranking.

Another common denominator among some of the governments with the highest rates of female participation was a shift in the political balance of power following a period of violent conflict, said Anders Johnsson, the secretary general of the Inter-Parliamentary Union.

"Some of the success stories we've seen are stories where women had to assume roles during conflict that were traditionally dominated by men," Johnsson said, singling out Rwanda, Mozambique and Burundi.

"When the conflict was over, the women were not willing to give up the power that they had attained, and they promoted systems that then allowed them to be elected into office," he said.

Experts point to a number of problems the U.S. needs to solve to bring more women into office: the cost of running a competitive campaign, redistricting that favors incumbents — most of them male — and stagnant numbers at the state legislature level.

Quotas appear an unlikely option for increasing female representation in American government.

"Some people have discussed it in the U.S.," said Debbie Walsh of the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University, "but people in this country tend to run when you say 'quota.'"

****(Angela Merker Chanceller of German and USA Condolezza Rice, Secretary of State)

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Dating violence

Breaking the Silence:
Talking About Dating Violence

Dating violence can be tough to talk about honestly. It can be uncomfortable to bring up and embarrassing to acknowledge. But with dating violence a fact of life for many teen couples, we’ve got to break the silence.

This page offers some ideas for kicking off a discussion about teen violence. The information was compiled from a number of sources, including the San Diego City Attorney's Office, National Crime Prevention Council, Utah Attorney General's Office, San Diego City Schools, California Attorney General's Office, Washington State PTA, Liz Claiborne, Inc., and various Internet resources on domestic and teen violence.

Use this information to educate teens and adults in your community. Encourage your school or community organization to start a peer education program or a program to help abusers conquer their behavior.

Included on this page is a typical dating-violence scenario that teens or adults can use to help spur discussion. Sometimes it’s easier to explore thoughts and feelings using this kind of example than it is to talk about our own experiences.

A Typical Dating Violence Scenario

Brenda is 15 and has never had a boyfriend before. She recently started dating Frank. She thinks he is so cute. Her friends all tell her how lucky she is because she has a boyfriend. At first, Brenda thought it was sweet that Frank began calling her all the time. He always wants to know whom she is with, where she is, and when she'll be home. He has told her that she was meant to be with him and him only, forever.

Recently, Frank has started belittling her in front of his friends, insulting her, and telling her she is fat. He doesn't want her to spend time with certain of her friends - he thinks they are a bad influence. He threatens to break up with her if she won't do what he says, and that no one else will ever want her. Brenda wants to make Frank happy. In fact, she'll do anything to keep her boyfriend. She thinks this is what being in a relationship is all about.

Sound familiar? Unfortunately, many teens face this same dilemma.

Relationship violence often starts as emotional or verbal abuse and can quickly escalate into physical or sexual violence. And although many teens know at least one student who has been a victim of relationship violence, most parents either don't know it exists or don't know it is an issue.

Although there are no "perfect" ways to lead a discussion about relationship or dating violence, emphasizing some of the following points can help you focus on the facts while providing some general information to get teens talking.

Relationship Violence is

A pattern of behavior used by someone to maintain control over his or her partner.
It can take the form of verbal, physical, emotional, or even sexual abuse.
Relationship violence is not about getting angry or having a disagreement.
In an abusive relationship one partner is afraid of and intimidated by the other.
How often does it happen?

24% of female homicide victims are between 15 and 24 years old.
70% of severe injuries and deaths occur when the victim is trying to leave or has already left the relationship.
Relationship violence is the number one cause of injury to women between the ages of 15-44.
63% of boys ages 11-20 arrested for murder were arrested for murdering the man who was assaulting their mother.
38% of date rape victims are young women between the ages of 14 and 17.
70% of pregnant teenagers are abused by their partners.
Who is involved?

Relationship violence occurs between two people who are currently or formerly involved in a dating relationship.
The abuse can begin at a very young age, as young as 11 or 12 years old.
Friends of the couple are usually aware of the abuse and may be drawn into the situation.
Where can it happen?

Relationship violence can occur at school — in the hall, in the classroom, in the parking lot, on the bus, at after-school activities, at a student’s workplace, at a school dance, or at a student’s home.
In teenage dating relationships, the abuse is often public with peers witnessing the abuse; however, the abuse can also occur in private.
Signs that you are in an abusive teen dating relationship.

Is one partner afraid of the other? Afraid to break up with the other?
Does one partner call the other names, make the other feel stupid, or tell the other that they cannot do anything right?
Is one partner extremely jealous?
Does one partner tell the other where they can and cannot go or who you can and cannot be with or talk to?
Does one partner tell the other that no one else would ever go out with them?
Is one partner being cut off from their friends and family by the other partner?
Does one partner feel if they say no to sexual activities they will be in trouble?
Does one partner feel pushed or forced into sexual activity?
Does one partner say it's the other's fault or that the other caused them to be abusive?
Does one partner shove, grab, hit, pinch, hold down or kick the other?
Is one partner really nice sometimes and really mean at other times (almost like they have two personalities)?
Does one partner make frequent promises to change or say that they will never hurt the other again? Or do they say that the other is "making too big a deal" out of it?
If you can answer "yes" to any of these questions, then your partner is being abusive towards you. You may want to look at your relationship more closely and find out more about teen dating violence.

YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO A HEALTHY RELATIONSHIP.

What You Can Do:

Look around your community, is there someone you know who might be affected by relationship violence? Remember that anyone can be a victim. If you suspect relationship violence, there are places you can go for help and information, people you can talk to about the problem. Get help from someone you trust. Do something before the relationship gets worse or the violence increases. By reaching out, you may save someone's life, including your own.

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Study reveals domestic abuse is widespread in Syria

By Rhonda Roumani, Correspondent of The Christian Science Monitor
Tue Apr 25, 4:00 AM ET

DAMASCUS, SYRIA - This country's only shelter for abused women is largely a secret. Victims learn about it through local churches, aid agencies, or lawyers. It has just 10 beds for the 22 people who were recently staying there.

But a new study released earlier this month that says as many as 1 in 4 Syrian women may be victims of physical violence is beginning to reveal just how widespread a problem domestic abuse is throughout the country.

The study, funded by the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) and conducted by the state-run General Union of Women, is the first of its kind to try to quantify and explain the types of violence Syrian women face.

"Violence is in every home in the Arab world," says a woman who works at the shelter and asked for anonymity because of the sensitivity of their work.

"The number of abused women is more than 1 in 4. We hope that with a hotline we'll be able to help the largest number of women possible. We hope we can provide these women with a type of hope so they can know themselves and can rebuild their self-esteem," she says.

The shelter is currently working on acquiring a larger home and is trying to set up a hotline for domestic abuse. There are no domestic abuse hotlines in Syria.

Women's rights activists pin the problem of violence against women on societal shame associated with divorce, a lack of education on what exactly abuse entails, a shortage of shelters, and weak laws that fail to protect women who face abuse.

"There is a type of traditional thinking that it's [shameful] to go to the police with such problems," says Maen Abdul-Salam, who heads Etana Press, a publishing house dedicated to women's issues. "Families usually feel ashamed. They don't want to talk about it. There needs to be more education to change the mentality."

The study of nearly 1,900 families found that violence against women was more prevalent in the countryside than in cities, that domestic abuse was more likely to happen in homes facing economic hardship and in homes where men were less educated or where women married at very young ages.

Yahya Aous, the editor of Thara.com, a website dedicated to women's issues, says a major problem is that many women are not even aware that they may be victims.

"Women start to feel like abuse is a normal part of life," says Mr. Aous. "She no longer believes it is violence. And if a woman is facing violence, there is no place she can go where they will help her with the law and with her situation."

While activists hailed the report as a first step in tackling the problem of abuse, they also said that discrepancies in the numbers and the wording of the report pose real concerns.

"This is a good report because it is the first time there is an official recognition that women are facing violence, especially to this extent," says Bassam Kadi, an activist who heads the Syrian Women's Website. "But the language in the report is not objective. In one way or another, it holds the same biases that are available on the ground."

The report says that violence often takes place because of "mistakes" made by the women or because they neglected their household duties or because they asked too many questions.

In one segment of the report, the statistics show that nearly a quarter of Syrian women are victims of physical violence. But elsewhere in the study, statistics used show that the number of women who have been beaten is closer to 1 in 10, leading to confusion about the actual number.

Like many other Arab countries, statistics on domestic abuse are hard to come by because few studies are done on the subject. Activists blame the statistical discrepancies in this newest report on a lack of professional statisticians trained to conduct such studies.

Mr. Kadi and others also say that the report fails to address the root of the problem by tackling the inadequacies in the Syrian law.

"They say the Syrian laws are good, but they are not," says Kadi. "A woman needs to have her nose broken before she can really do anything. The laws do not deal with all types of violence, like mere beating. There should be details on the role of the laws in promoting violence. They needed to ask for new laws that protect women from all types of violence."

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Domestic Violence in Puerto Rico

Aquí presento un discurso que preparé para mi clase de Public Speaking, que pongo a disposición de todos. Espero traducirlo pronto y presentarlo, si Dios quiere, en la presentación de LO QUE NO DIJE, en mayo.

Domestic Violence in Puerto Rico

It’s time to know. Most college students are in a relationship, or they are looking for one. In this University, two years ago a student that had a protection order finished, had to face the look of her aggressor. She was scared of what could happen, he studied here but she wanted to be the best she could be. She started a relationship when she was 14, that lasted two years that ended in court, but some women end up dead.

Domestic violence is an aggressive behavior that includes physical (and/or) emotional damage, from one person in a relation to another. Between 1900 and 1996; 11,450 victims of domestic violence reported to the police, were less than 20 years old. The Police of Puerto Rico established on December 31 of 2005, that in that year 19,317 were reported.

How does domestic violence occur? Even though the criminal process is called like that, in young people it’s name dating violence; mostly because young women don’t live with their partners. They are three types of violence in a relationship: physical, emotional and sexual. I have to mention that the reason that campaigns are for women, it’s because 98% of reported cases of violence are to women. Only 2% occurs to men in Puerto Rico and 1% occurs from the father or partner of the women to her sons that are grown up.

Violence to women it’s not mostly physical as many people think. This is something cultural, because you can notice browses more than emotional damage. The physical damage includes pushing, kicking, pulling hair, bites, punches and others like throwing stuff to hurt. One of the offices of Puerto Rico, Peace for Women Commission reported in June on there magazine Voice of Voices that is 94% of physical abuse wouldn’t happen if there were no emotional abuse.

Emotionally abuse is silenced under cultural beliefs. Most Puerto Ricans have been educated to form what is considered a traditional relationship; one that seems acceptable jealousy as a way of protection. The Women Office of Puerto Rico established in 2001 that emotionally abused is based on control. Violent partners limit their freedom by establishing whom should she talk, how to dress, where to go. This includes looks, a threat, and manipulative talks that he uses to prove that he is right, that if she loves him she could do those sacrifices.

How does sexual abuse occur? If I could give an idea to Internationa Amnesty it would be a campaign that could say: “A headache in their case it’s not an excuse”. Sexual abuse in a relationship happens when the aggressor rapes her but uses to emotionally abuse using questions as: why not? It’s not considered a rape because there is a relationship established. Policemen say that this is the least women report and sometimes they don’t report it because they fear the exams. We are talking about the victims but how can we detect an aggressor?

There is no definition of aggressor’s characteristics beyond their actions and conducts. They come at any age, race, social status, sexual orientation and religion. By the cases reported to the Police in the past three years, the Women Office established some signals. If he is extremely jealous, blame other people for their actions, brake objects, have a control conduct, use physical violence as games on sexual relationships, change their temper easily, you may be near an aggressor or possible one.

In the Penal Code, there is only two laws that provide protection, Law 54 and the Law 284. Law 54 applies only if you have sexual relationships. That is why this law doesn’t protect to much young people, unless they are sexually active and prove that, wish is kind of hard if the abuse is emotional only. The law 284 restricts the aggressor to follow or harass women on their jobs or houses. This is what most people call a protection order that makes a criminal accusation on the man, if they don’t follow it, they could be arrested. This law protects the victim for a year, and you have to prove more harassment to make it longer. Most women are afraid to ask for law protection because they have to face their aggressors on court and they expect more violence after the case, if they don’t prevail.

Domestic violence in Puerto Rico, it’s higher that other countries that triple our size. In France 6 women die a month in hands of their husbands or partners. International Amnesty reports that in Africa 1 women dies every six hours. Statistics show the social problems that this brings to our country. Most of you have maybe heard of a case of domestic violence or know a victim or an abuser. Information gives us ways of fighting it or prevents it in a future relationship. Think, that women could be the one at your side, someone you love, it could be you, like a while ago it was me.

Imagen de www.virgenesuicidas.com

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