Cracking Down on Domestic Violence : Much Remains to Be Done in County to Improve Record

The double-murder case involving former football star O.J. Simpson has focused intensified attention nationally and locally on the problem of spousal abuse. But while this attention has resulted in increased calls to hot lines around the country, concern about how such cases are handled in Orange County has been under scrutiny for some time.

Orange County Superior Court Judge Donald E. Smallwood was a catalyst for the creation of a county task force on domestic violence a year ago, and that panel is now at work with the expectation of producing detailed recommendations in the months ahead. Echoing complaints in other jurisdictions, Smallwood has said that prosecutors and the courts have been overly lenient in Orange County, as well as the nation.

The work of the panel is to be commended, but a review of the record in Orange County reveals just how much work remains to be done. A Times investigation shows that the Orange County district attorney’s office has the worst record among prosecutors in the state’s six most-populous counties for vigorously pursuing spousal abuse cases. During the 1990-1992 period, the most recent for which state figures are available, the office of Dist. Atty. Michael R. Capizzi chose to file the smallest percentage of cases as felonies, had the lowest conviction rate in those cases, and put the smallest percentage of serious offenders in prison. Capizzi answers that the state’s statistical comparisons are incomplete, but the assertion that the state statistics are unsuitable for comparisons on domestic violence is disputed by criminologists and state Justice Department officials. The conclusion seems obvious. The district attorney’s office needs to do better than it has in the past.

The good news is that even though the county may have been slow to recognize and do something about spousal abuse and domestic violence, it is making some progress and has acknowledged that a more aggressive posture is desirable.

The district attorney’s domestic violence unit now has two prosecutors and one investigator for felony spousal abuse cases, and two deputies in each of the county’s five courthouses handle misdemeanor domestic violence cases. The unit is overhauling its system of keeping records so it can track cases, and asserts that many felony arrests are properly filed as misdemeanors anyway.

These intentions and efforts are good. The fact that local jurisdictions elsewhere that make these kinds of cases a priority manage to get results should further encourage the county in these efforts.

The county well might learn something from San Diego County, for example, which has been a leader in aggressive pursuit of spousal abuse cases. As a matter of policy, it presses ahead with charges even if a victim doesn’t cooperate.

The data in Orange County was compiled only through 1992, a period that ended before the new domestic violence unit was set up 15 months ago. And then there is the fact that domestic violence calls are on the increase in Orange County, even though they have decreased in both Los Angeles County and around the state.

The new unit is a clear improvement in priority setting on domestic violence. But the county figures for the period preceding its operation show how much work there really has been to do.