Increasing Convictions in Domestic Violence Cases: A Field Test in Milwaukee

After years of attempted improvements to criminal justice system responses to domestic violence, it has become clear that victim noncooperation with authorities keeps conviction rates far below those for other crimes. Some experts have suggested that mandatory arrest statutes have pulled into the courts many cases in which victims never wanted the batterer charged and prosecuted. Others have suggested that victims are convinced to change their minds during the court process because of intimidation by the defendant or difficult demands by authorities. This article describes the effects on case processing and victim perceptions of a specialized domestic violence court, which was based upon a novel principle. The court's primary intent was to speed case disposition to limit the amount of time victims had to change their minds about prosecution, reduce case backlogs, increase convictions, and minimize opportunities for pretrial violence. Sample data collected before and after the start of the special court showed that case-processing time was halved, convictions increased by 25 percent (although the proportion of convicted defendants who served jail time declined), and pretrial crime declined.