DOMESTIC VIOLENCE: THE PERSPECTIVE OF POLICE OFFICERS

Abstract

Domestic violence is a multifaceted issue within today’s society. Acts of violence perpetrated against individuals constitute a blatant infringement upon human rights. The majority of such instances are directed at women and children. The legal regulation of domestic violence is defined in Lithuanian and international legal acts. However, shortcomings within the legal framework concerning domestic violence hindered the effectiveness of police assistance to victims. It is of utmost significance to highlight that the new Law on Protection from Domestic Violence came into effect on July 1, 2023. This legislation has introduced a novel legal mechanism in the form of a Domestic Violence Protection Order. The legal aspect of domestic violence is examined in the scientific literature; however, it lacks analysis of the personal positions of police officers who are the first to go to the crime scene after receiving a domestic violence call. Thus, the aim of the article is to reveal the peculiarities of legal regulation of domestic violence and empirically investigate the insights from the perspective of police officers. In order to achieve this goal, the analysis of scientific literature and legal acts were used for defining the concept of domestic violence and the peculiarities of legal regulation. A written survey was conducted for the empirical investigation of police officers’ insights about domestic violence; the collected data were processed using quantitative analysis methods. The analysis has shown that domestic violence is understood as all intentional physical, mental, economic, sexual and other actions of the abuser towards the victim, if these actions violate the victim's constitutional rights and freedoms, and cause economic, physical, mental or moral damage to the victim. Police officers must respond immediately to a call of domestic violence and be the first to arrive at the crime scene. The newly adopted 15-day order restraining the abuser from the victim is a very important tool for solving the problems of domestic violence. However, as the experience of foreign countries shows, even after the adoption of appropriate laws to solve this problem, there are psychological and organizational obstacles in providing qualified assistance to victims of domestic violence. After conducting a survey of police officers, it was found that in most cases the reasons of domestic violence are alcoholism, drug addiction, unemployment and poverty. Most frequently the age of abusers is between 31-40 years; in most cases violence occurs in families after living together from 1 to 12 years. The victims of violence are mostly women. When preventing domestic violence, first of all, continuous prevention is necessary. Police officers lack psychological and practical knowledge the most when solving these issues. Police officers are not capable of solving these problems alone, the involvement of the prosecutor's office, courts, psychologists, and social workers is also needed here.