Back to the drawing board: barriers to joint decision-making in custody cases involving intimate partner violence

[...] the vast majority of jurisdictions in the United States list domestic violence as a statutorily required factor for consideration.6 The weight afforded to evidence of domestic violence is, however, unclear.7 In an effort to provide added protections for battered parents and to clarify the weight to be given to evidence of intimate partner violence, twenty-six states have enacted legal presumptions against awarding custody to a batterer.8 In many instances, however, the victim faces a heavy burden in order to trigger that presumption. Additionally, when a victim contacts the police, there is no guarantee that her abuser will be arrested, charged, or convicted for the crimes he has committed against her. Because these crimes are either never adjudicated or the batterer is charged with a lesser offense,11 the criminal evidence often carries little weight during any subsequent child custody trial.