Morgan City man charged with stealing vehicle driven in fatal crash
October 6, 2009
James "Jim" Templet
October 8, 2009
Domestic violence is a serious problem in Louisiana.
Federal Bureau of Investigation statistics from 2007-08 indicate that Louisiana leads the nation in domestic violence murders at 57 deaths. Of those, one occurred in Terrebonne Parish.
The FBI’s Violence Policy Center releases the figures every two years. Louisiana jumped from being in fifth place to number one in a more recent study.
“We are shocked by the report,” Lafourche Parish Sheriff Craig Webre said. “Too many times, we found that Louisiana tends to rank high on some lists. But this is not a list that we would want to rank high in.”
Many of those families had protection orders in place to protect the abused victim from the attacker. However, those orders are not always monitored closely, giving the attacker access to the victim.
“The risk of violence is often greater for victims of domestic violence and their children after leaving an abusive situation,” said Lt. Karla Beck, director of the sheriff’s office’s Social Service Unit. “We want to provide a safe, secure and supportive environment for visitations and exchanges.”
A domestic violence study conducted in Duluth, Minn., shows that one-third of abusers violated protection orders while parents were exchanging children during unsupervised visitations.
The Lafourche Parish Sheriff’s Office responded to 170 reported protective order violations in 2008. According to sheriff’s office statistics, calls for services are on track to be even higher in 2009.
To date, the sheriff’s office has responded to 116 reported protective order violations.
To curb the number of protective orders that are violated in Lafourche, the sheriff’s office now offers a safe haven for supervised visits and exchanges called the Parents and Children Together Place, or P.A.C.T Place in Lockport.
The center, located in the Lockport Civic Complex, started offering supervised visits and exchanges in June of this year. Pam Guidry, the center’s director, said they have monitored 22 supervised family visits.
However, Sheriff Webre announced the official opening of the center at a press conference on Monday.
“If we can remove the potential for conflict, especially in the area of visitation and custody exchanges, we hope to provide a mechanism to foster healing in our families that have been touched by domestic abuse violence,” he said.
The U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Violence Against Women awarded the sheriff’s office a $386,520 three-year Safe Havens grant to fund the center.
P.A.C.T Place offers supervised visitation and monitored exchange services for families with a history of or potential for domestic violence, dating violence, child abuse, sexual assault or stalking.
Guidry said the purpose of the center is to prevent the further impact of domestic violence on children and their abused parent.
“The center is designed so there is never any contact between parents during the visits or exchanges,” Guidry said. “Nowhere is the potential for renewed violence greater than during visitation.”
According to Webre, P.A.C.T Place is one of five facilities of its kind in the state. The other four facilities are in New Orleans, Lafayette, Lake Charles and Monroe.
“Experts in the field tell us that no other law enforcement agency in the state has undertaken what we are doing to take the danger out of a situation that should be pleasant for parent and child,” Webre said. “The other four are run by nonprofit organizations.”
Though the facility will be located in Lafourche Parish, Guidry said any person ordered to have supervised visits and exchanges as a result of domestic violence can use the center.
Capt. Kyle Cressione of the Thibodaux Police Department has one family that used the police station for its supervised visits. He said he looks forward to them being able to use P.A.C.T Place in the future.
Lafourche Parish Sheriff Craig Webre unveils the P.A.C.T. Place in Lockport. * Photo by SOPHIA RUFFIN
