Posted on 08/23/2007 9:43:07 AM PDT by FreeManDC
Mary Winkler of Selmer, Tennessee was set free last week. Winkler had admitted to gunning down her husband, the popular town preacher, in March 2006 while he was in bed asleep. As he lay dying with blood foaming from his mouth, the man of the cloth incredulously asked her, "Why?"
With that, Mary packed their three daughters into the car and drove down to Alabama for a beachside vacation.
If Mrs. Winkler had been convicted of intentional murder, she could have been sentenced to 60 years of hard time. But all she got was 67 days in a mental health facility. Stunned by that wrist-slap of a sentence, former New York district attorney Jeannine Pirro fumed, "Justice was definitely not served here."
Apart from its farcical mockery of our legal system, the Winkler case raises another question: Are we doing enough to help abusive women to prevent future disasters like this?
Recently Representative Ted Poe of Texas introduced a bill on domestic violence. Known as House Resolution 590, the bill laudably calls on Congress to support Domestic Violence Awareness Month, observed every year in October.
But is there any mention of the pressing need to help the perpetrators of domestic violence resolve their anger, to resolve their emotional pathology, or kick the drug habit? No.
A clarion call to help persons like Mary Winkler before they reach their tragic breaking points? Sorry to disappoint.
Or even a passing mention of the existence of such women? Wrong on all three counts.
The resolution states, "Whereas male children exposed to domestic violence are twice as likely to abuse their own partners." But research shows that girls exposed to domestic violence are also at much greater risk of perpetuating the cycle of violence -- why does the bill include no mention of that?
In some places, the resolution misleads, such as its claim that "adolescent girls who reported dating violence were 60 percent more likely to report one or more suicide attempts in the past year." But in truth, it's adolescent boys subjected to dating violence who are more like to attempt suicide, says the U.S. Centers for Disease Control.
And in other places, the resolution is flat-out wrong, like its claim that "one in four teenage girls has been in a relationship in which she was pressured into performing sexual acts by her partner." The actual figure is 12% of teenage girls and 6% of teenage boys.
Our elected officials in Washington earn a pretty decent salary -- can't they at least get their numbers right?
A few years ago family violence researcher Murray Straus wrote an essay called "Women's Violence toward Men is a Serious Social Problem." Not only did women engage in partner violence at least as often as men, but women were actually more likely to deliver the first blow. Indeed, "every study finds that women initiate violence in a large proportion of cases," Straus noted.
Apologists for female violence will try to tell you that women who attack their partners are only acting in self-defense. But research shows that accounts only a small fraction of cases -- maybe one in five.
Nicola Graham-Kevan of the University of Central Lancashire reveals, "self-defense is cited by a minority of women." And Daniel Whitaker of the Centers for Disease Control notes in his recent research, "studies of community samples found that a relatively low percentage of women endorsed self-defense as a primary motive for violence."
So why are services for female batterers as rare as a hailstorm in August?
Part of the problem stems from the Violence Against Women Act, which blithely pretends the problem doesn't even exist. If a woman calls a VAWA hotline to get help, she's likely to get a dismissive "He must have done something to provoke you" brush-off.
Dr. Laura Petracek is a San Francisco-based psychologist who specializes in treating angry and violent women. She says the lack of female-specific services can be traced back to widespread social denial. "Women are raised to be caregivers and to be nurturing and loving. Society has a very difficult time seeing women in an aggressor role." Petracek explains.
As a consequence of this collective tunnel vision, female batterers have nowhere to turn. For that, countless innocents have paid dearly.
Meanwhile back in Tennessee, the three daughters of Matthew Winkler still mourn the fact that they will never see their loving father. And the jarred memories of the Selmer residents will take many years to heal.
But one thing is clear -- the framers of House Resolution 590 should not allow this terrible legacy of neglect to continue.
“Stripper shoes and a slimely lawyer in Steve Farese got her out.”
Along with the dumbest jury this side of a John Grisham novel.
Any Constitutional scholars out there know which one is the “helping abusive women” clause?
The fact that was a preacher (and hence a domineering, pedantic taskmaster, etc) was a major factor in the minds of many.
I knew a couple of women on the jury. You must know them too....They were all Democrat for what its worth.
< /s >
So much for being gender neutral.
Sounds like this case fits the first profile: She was involved in a scam and murdered her husband for her own convenience. No amount of preemptive "counseling" could've saved him from her. (I don't believe counseling really fixes either type, though sometimes the maturity that comes with age does.)
But, I must say, the article takes a giant leap to this statement:
Not only did women engage in partner violence at least as often as men, but women were actually more likely to deliver the first blow.
There are completely different cases out there that cannot be summed up with statistics. I remember one woman in particular whose husband would walk up close to her, without touching her, screaming in her face until she was backed against the wall. When she would push him away, he would punch her. Once, the cops arrived, and she had a busted lip. The husband told them, "She pushed me first. I reacted in self-defense." And the police offered to arrest her. So, now, I always question the type of incident that counts in the statistics of women delivering the first blow. I'd say the woman I described here is very different from the first woman who shot her husband in cold blood.
This dame sounds nuts!!
I’ve worked with women who have been abused & assaulted in the past and this is not the behavior of someone who just snaps (like a Francine Hughes). IF she were innocent, you’d think she would want to expose him to his congregation by going to the public or filing for divorce and safely getting her kids out of the house. Generally, abuse cases have police reports, failed restraining orders, etc. This was cold blooded murder.
There are MANY male abused folks. One famous story comes from the book A Child Called IT is about a boy who was abused by his mother his entire life in very sadistic ways. (I read that one in one sitting) She makes Sybil’s mom sound like SuperNanny! Sad thing is men are less likely to seek help as they fear ridicule for not “being a man” & being abused by a woman.
Here in suburban Chicago, we had a woman who bought her toddler age children toys, filled a gas can full of gasoline, and while the kids were playing she set them on fire (and herself too). Then there’s Susan Smith who drowned her babies for a man... Andrea Yates drowning her babies in the bathtub... Women are capable of some sick stuff and are treated like little victims. If a man did those things, he’d be killed in prison.
I’m willing to leave it to a jury to decide whether a crime like this resulted from selfish intent, mental illness, or some combination of both. But it shouldn’t make any difference in the minimum amount of time for involuntary confinement. Anyone whose mental problems are severe enough to do something like this needs to spend decades in a secure mental hospital, at a minimum.
Severe mental illness doesn’t just go away. In cases involving violence, the violent tendencies often go away after the person reaches old age, with its accompanying hormonal changes and reduced physical abilities. But the notion that someone crazy enough to do something like this is safe to release into society after a few months is . . . well, crazy.
Only if the 10 women were angry divorcées, especially anti-Christian ones. Faithful wives and moms would have grabbed the defendant out of her chair in the courtroom and strangled her.
Defense lawyers have described to me the Herculean difficulty of getting a heavily female jury to acquit an attractive female defendant. Women do not necessarily identify with women. They stick up for their way of life, whatever that is.
Similarly, in electoral politics, there is no "gender" (i.e., sex) gap. There's a marriage gap. In broad terms, GOP = married or optimistic about marriage. Dems = angrily divorced or single and pessimistic.
Interesting points to ponder.
I concur. A public defender I know said she tries to keep women off the jury if she has a woman client and plans to use a battered wife defense.
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