When the Police Officer is a Perpetrator

officers dealing with cases of domestic violence get their knowledge within the course of 2-4 hours. It is undeniable that, in that amount of time, police officers are not able to gain deep and practical knowledge on domestic violence. In comparison, it should be noted that according to international criteria such courses should be at least 40 hours, if designed for specialists who have prior gender sensitivity.15

Recommendation:

1. All police officers entering police force must undertake at least 40 hours of training in domestic violence based on internationally approved curriculum

2. Policemen working directly with cases of domestic violence must have additional in-depth training

When the Police Officer is a Perpetrator

The WSC has had several cases when the perpetrator of DV was a police officer. In these cases, we noticed that the authorities were completely biased towards and protective of the officer and even attempted to intimidate both the victim and staff of the WSC NGO. When the victim arrived at the precinct, together with a WSC social worker and lawyer, she was even addressed as “Officer X’s wife” and the perpetrator was seen drinking coffee and making jokes

15 See https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4231530/.