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Lethality Assessment Protocol Requests Funding For Domestic Violence Prevention

publicnewsservice.org

  The Lethality Assessment Protocol, along with law enforcement, held a domestic violence press conference at the State Capitol Wednesday afternoon. 

A $895,000 request for funding to train 500 additional law enforcement and victim advocates of domestic violence and homicide received support from Utah law enforcement. 

“The Lethality Assessment Protocol is a program that uses eleven evidence-based questions to screen victims of domestic violence to see if they’re at really high risk for intimate partner homicide and then connect them to services. So, it’s a tool that officers can use in the field when they identify victims, and they sense a really dangerous situation, and they ask them these very simple questions. [And] then the officers actually use their phones to make a phone call to the victim service provider, and encourage the victim to talk to the advocate on the phone. ”

Maggie Bale, Lethality Assessment Protocol Coordinator says the funding is important because it will provide more help to those dealing with domestic violence.

“The victim service providers, for many years now, have been at capacity, and so they turn away just as many people as they serve. [Because] they don’t have the space or don’t have enough advocates and funding to be able to meet the needs of our communities. Most of the funding goes to those victim service providers to expand their services to meet the needs of those victims who are at the highest risk.”

According to the Utah Department of Health, in 2012, more than 3,114 people entered shelters to escape domestic violence.