New City Police Unit Targets Domestic Violence

San Diego Police Chief Bob Burgreen on Monday announced the formation of a police unit that will specifically follow domestic disputes--intervening in times of crisis, and later assisting city and county prosecutors to build cases against those accused of abuse.

In a joint news conference in Mayor Maureen O’Connor’s chambers, the mayor said she will also propose a city ordinance that will strip guns from suspected spousal abusers once temporary restraining orders are issued against them.

The two-pronged approach comes as San Diego experiences a sharp increase in reported domestic violence cases, from 5,000 in 1986 to more than 11,700 last year, according to a report by the San Diego Assn. of Governments. The jump from 1990 to 1991 was 59%.

The figure for 1992 is expected to increase to 14,000, said Assistant Chief Rulette Armstead, who heads the 2-month-old Family Protection section of the department, of which the new unit is a part. Rulette is the department’s first female assistant chief.

Based at police headquarters downtown, the domestic violence unit has 16 detectives and two detective sergeants, all of whom have augmented the state-mandated minimum eight hours of domestic violence training with at least 32 hours of additional officer training. The unit began taking calls last Friday.

The domestic violence unit was touted by police officials as the largest in the nation, San Diego being among the few departments with such a specialty team, Burgreen said.

Since October, 1991, when O’Connor appointed a task force to study the increasing domestic violence, the group has been studying what measures are necessary to keep disputes from turning deadly.

O’Connor said she has instructed the Mayor’s Domestic Violence Council to study the feasibility of an electronic monitoring system for people under court order to cease contact with family members.

Other recommendations made earlier by the council include: increasing the number of prosecutors assigned to domestic violence and child abuse matters and increasing the minimum requirement for law-enforcement domestic violence training.