While it may not be a comfortable topic, domestic violence (DV) is a lot more common than you might think, both in the United States and around the world, and services that provide safety, support, and compassion for victims are crucial. Today’s guest is Marsetta Lee, Esq, who is the President of the Association of Black Women Lawyers of New Jersey. She is an Adjunct Professor at Wilmington University, where she teaches various courses, including ethics and criminal justice, multi-cultural issues, and criminal justice, women in criminal justice system, constitutional law, and psychology and the law. Marsetta also serves as the Criminal Justice Coordinator for South Jersey. In that role, she is the liaison for the satellite offices and the main campus. She collaborates with hosting colleges to host events and conferences related to criminal justice, including career days and domestic violence symposiums. She counsels students on course selection and career choices, and provides oversight and adjunct faculty attorneys and law enforcement officers. In this episode, we cover the services offered by the Victims of Crime Compensation Office, the age-old question of why victims stay with abusers, and the impact of COVID and shelter in place regulations. Tune in today!
Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:
Association of Black Women Lawyers of New Jersey
Victims of Crime Compensation Office
While it may not be a comfortable topic, domestic violence (DV) is a lot more common than you might think, both in the United States and around the world, and services that provide safety, support, and compassion for victims are crucial. Today’s guest is Marsetta Lee, Esq, who is the President of the Association of Black Women Lawyers of New Jersey. She is an Adjunct Professor at Wilmington University, where she teaches various courses, including ethics and criminal justice, multi-cultural issues, and criminal justice, women in criminal justice system, constitutional law, and psychology and the law. Marsetta also serves as the Criminal Justice Coordinator for South Jersey. In that role, she is the liaison for the satellite offices and the main campus. She collaborates with hosting colleges to host events and conferences related to criminal justice, including career days and domestic violence symposiums. She counsels students on course selection and career choices, and provides oversight and adjunct faculty attorneys and law enforcement officers. In this episode, we cover the services offered by the Victims of Crime Compensation Office, the age-old question of why victims stay with abusers, and the impact of COVID and shelter in place regulations. Tune in today!
Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:
Association of Black Women Lawyers of New Jersey
Victims of Crime Compensation Office
EPISODE 05
[INTRO]
[00:00:04] RW: Welcome to this episode of We Hear You, from Harambe Social Services in South Jersey. We Hear You is designed to give a voice to victims and survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault. This forum is for survivors and their allies to discuss issues that impact them and their families, as well as to educate communities.
In the coming segments, we will hear from survivors. They will tell us their stories and what they would like for us to know. As allies, we want to hear how we can support them.
[EPISODE]
[00:00:45] RW: Well, welcome to our audience tonight for this episode of We Hear You. Tonight's special guest is Marsetta Lee, Esquire. She is the President of the Association of Black Women Lawyers of New Jersey. She is an Adjunct Professor at Wilmington University, where she teaches various courses, including ethics and criminal justice, multi-cultural issues, and criminal justice, women in criminal justice system, constitutional law, and psychology and the law. Miss Lee also serves as the Criminal Justice Coordinator for South Jersey. In that role, she is the liaison for the satellite offices and the main campus.
She collaborates with hosting colleges to host events and conferences related to criminal justice, including career days and domestic violence symposiums. She counsels students on course selection and career choices, and provides oversight and adjunct faculty attorneys and law enforcement officers.
Back in 2017, Miss Lee was retired as the Assistant Attorney General with the Attorney General's Office, division of criminal justice. After a 27-year career, she retired as the Executive Director of the Victims of Crime and Compensation Office, where she oversaw the agency's 15 million-dollar budget. She implemented an overhaul of the office to ensure compliance with federal and state laws, and oversaw the upgrading of its technology, which allows victims to file and track claims online.
She traveled throughout the United States representing the agency and even abroad into Kosovo in 2016, to provide technical assistance in creating compensation program and offer legal consultation on developing regulations. She also provided training to South African delegation to discuss and provide expertise on educating government officials and human rights groups on compensation policies. Miss Lee also served as the manager and legal counsel at various agencies, including the State Medical Examiner's Office, victims assistance, and ceasefire initiative.
On that, I’m just going to welcome Miss Lee to our podcast. How are you?
[00:03:44] ML: I am well. Thank you so much for having me. It's an honor to be with you.
[00:03:49] RW: Thank you so much for taking the time. That schedule sounds tremendously busy. We're happy that you were able to come on, especially in the midst of COVID, I’m wondering how you're managing juggling all of that?
[00:04:03] ML: It's so interesting you asked that. I was on a social justice CLE last night and they asked me that also. I always say, it goes from day to day with this new world, upside-down world we're living in. Today, I’m well and I’m blessed, and I’m glad you are, and I hope our listeners are also. I’ve concluded that sometime you have to give yourself permission to have up days and then down days. That's okay when you have the down days. It took me a while to get there, but now I’m like, it's okay. It's okay, because this is very uncertain and strange times. We are only human. I realized I’m blessed in light of everything else so many other people are going through. I’m going to try not to complain.
[00:04:57] RW: That is so important to be able to see the silver lining, because we do always have a blessing in the midst of every storm, there's still a part of us that is experiencing blessings. That's a great attitude to take.
I wanted to ask you because, again, you talked about being retired from the Victims of Crime Compensation Office. For the audience, can you tell us a bit about that office, what exactly does that office do?
[00:05:27] ML: It's my pleasure. That office is an amazing office that's located – Victims of Crime Compensation Office, we call it VCCO. Each state has a victim of crime office. They may call it a board or different name, but the former President Reagan started a study into how victims was being treated and this commission came back with this huge report on how victims were treated despicable, how there was no room for victims. A murder victim mother could be sitting next to the offender's family and they were intimidated.
The court system and the prosecutor's offices, during those early 80 days, just victims was not their priority. Since that report came out, huge changes happened in the creation of the various legislation and governmental agencies that focused on victims and appropriated sufficient funds. Each state, each of the 50 states and our territories, has a compensation office. Those offices are responsible for reimbursing victims of crime that are eligible for losses that they incurred as a result of the crime, as long as it's statutorily permitted.
In New Jersey is one centralized office, although there is a satellite office, well, there was in light of COVID, the whole world is turned upside down. For the most part, it's a centralized system. We have 21 county prosecutors office. They have victim witness coordinators, who assist the victims in the early stages of the process of going to court to compliment, if the victim doesn't have clothes to wear to court, or babysitting issues. They assist in the hands-on process and 21 counties are amazing victim witness coordinators. The money piece comes from the state. That’s what the VCCO in New Jersey does, it pays, or reimburse the victims for costs as that occurred as a result of the crime.
[00:07:49] RW: How does a victim of crime access the service? Do they get linked through law enforcement, or do they have to get a number and call themselves? How does that come about?
[00:08:01] ML: Yes. There are lots of ways to do it. Well, usually the victim witness coordinator and the county prosecutors will direct the victims that come through the prosecutor's office, but all victims do not come through a prosecutor's office. Some victims are coming through municipal court. Someone in the process should alert the victim that they should pursue compensation, or you can go online. They have a beautiful website. The website is still up. It is www.njvictims.org. You can go and they have still amazing information.
In fact, I’m looking at some of it and the designs were created when I was there. Of course, some of the information has been updated. Again, that's www.njvictims.org. Or they have the toll-free number is 1-877-658-2221. Of course, with COVID, state workers often are working from home, so the systems are a little different than they were when I was there. I know they will provide excellent instructions, because there's an amazing staff up there.
[00:09:17] RW: Sounds great. These services are for any type of victim, not merely domestic violence or sexual assault, but any victim of crime, or murder, or from some other reason, or robbery, or something like that.
[00:09:33] ML: Right. Absolutely. Pursuant to the New Jersey statute and every state has his own statute, the state legislate on what will be determined, a crime that they were paid for. In New Jersey, the typical ones are assault, of course, arson, biased crime, certain types of biased crimes, domestic violence, human trafficking, kidnapping, manslaughter, certain types of motor vehicle offenses, murder, robbery, sexual assault, stalking, and threats to do bodily harm.
It's usually violent crimes, not white-collar crimes, or financial crimes are typically not covered. That information, a list of eligible crimes, it will be on the website.
[00:10:23] RW: I see. I think it's so important that were clearly was an important piece for victims of domestic violence and sexual assault, because sometimes there is a break-in, or damage to the home, or other property involved. They certainly are [inaudible 00:10:43] for people to move away, or checking box and things like that. Those are things and where you can be covered. Is that correct?
[00:10:52] ML: Right. The typical issues, and this is general, because when you sometime, you have a rule and then you have a nuance, an exception. Generally, if it's involving domestic violence victims, they will want relocation and the relocation costs, I think since I left, has increased to $3,000, so that would be $3,000 to assist the victim in relocation. Loss of support, if the abuser was the person who was taking care of the household, or the child, or etc., that's up to $600 per week. Mental health counseling, up to $20,000.
The overall cap is still $25,000, I think. There has been some new legislation, but I don't think the cap changed. I think the subparts of the cap changed. It caps out at 25. If you only need counseling, then you can get $20,000 worth of counseling. If you need loss of earnings and that's $10,000 and then you need relocation and that's $3,000. Or crime scene cleanup, which is another $4,000, then the amount that you would use for counseling would be reduced because you have used up 15, or $17,000 with other costs. What would be left for counseling would be $8,000. You're eating off that $25,000 for different needs.
[00:12:19] RW: Well, it still sounds a considerable sum of money, for some victims who may not know anything about this, trying to either relocate, or repair some of these damages in the home, or even get the counseling that they need.
[00:12:39] ML: Absolutely. The $25,000 is good. Some states have more. When I was there, we tried various times to have it increased to $35,000. Of course, the state budgets and etcetera is always – and in these times like we have now, the government is crunching numbers. Absolutely, some states are only $10,000. It depends upon what the priorities of that office, or the legislators is with respect to victims of crime.
[00:13:11] RW: I asked you about how you access the services, but can you clarify for me if a victim chooses not to prosecute, not to cooperate with the prosecution of the perpetrator, would they still be entitled to these funds?
[00:13:30] ML: That's an excellent question. During my tenure there, that was one of the most challenging areas, because at that time the statute mandated that victims cooperate. I think that the statute may have been modified to reduce the strictness of that and indicate where it's reasonable to cooperate. I think that is a good thing. If you can show essential circumstances that the person has threatened to kill you, or your children, or your parents, etc., and you're afraid to testify, then those factors will be looked at in determining why you failed to cooperate.
It's very challenging, because on the one hand, you want abusers and defendants and people to be punished and taken off the streets, so they don't abuse other people. At the same time, you don't want the system to also end up re-victimizing the victim. It's one of those tight ropes that you walk. New Jersey tends to be more liberal and I know that many victim advocate groups have gotten changes since I left, which is really a good thing, to make it more lenient. Some of the southern states are extremely restrictive. New Jersey tends to be very liberal in victims rights and services.
If a person is listening, always apply. It never hurts to apply, and explain if you have documents that this person threaten you, you alert the prosecutor, person threaten you, you still have to test messages, or e-mails that they sent, then you say, “No, I didn't cooperate, but I had a legitimate reason not to cooperate with law enforcement.”
[00:15:27] RW: I’m so glad that you clarified that, because I think that that is an issue, that whole issue around the intimidation of the victim, that it is not only that they intimidate the victim, but they very often use the family and the children, the mother – whoever they have access to try to intimidate them.
[00:15:50] ML: Sometime Rose, they will even threaten animals, because the person has left the home and they left the pet there and people loved the pets and animals. They were threatened to do awful things to the animal. Predators like abusers are ruthless in what they try to do, because we all know that it's a power thing. The office is still – the staff, as I stated to staff, it's amazing. I think the acting director is Mary Ellen Bonsper now, who was the chief investigator when I was there, and Craig DiFiore and Melissa coordinates the intake unit. They are a group of amazing managers up there, along with investigators who are extremely compassionate.
[00:16:38] RW: That's wonderful. You really touched on part of the next question that I had was every time I mentioned that I work with victims of domestic violence, I am very often asked the question, “Why do women stay?” Which is an irritant in many ways, but it's still a question that the average person who is uneducated about domestic violence know that answer.
Well, so why do you think that people stay?
[00:17:09] ML: That is an age-old question. I must be honest. 20 years ago, I probably was one of those people who were asking that question also. I didn't fully understand the trauma part. I had not received training. In law school, we were trained on criminal justice and evidence and criminal procedure and ethics and constitution. During the time I was in law school, I didn't take a domestic violence class. We weren't trained. Unless you have a social work, or sociology background, or mental health background, how would you get that information?
I understand why it was frustrating, but I know I had to learn and I had to listen for a decade on victims and counselors and psychologists explaining that abuse, the mentality of a predator is fear, oftentimes is fear of the person. There's no one particular, because it's not a cookie-cutter. All victims are not the same. All survivors are not the same. I know sometimes, people prefer to be called survivors. No disrespect with my terminology.
I would say first it’s fear, because we know that the most dangerous time is when you decide to leave and how many restraining orders – people have restraining orders that unfortunately, being or killed, because that escalate the process. When people say, “Just leave,” that's what a layman say. I’ve heard that. I’ve heard that said in too many forums. I’ve heard women say it. I’ve heard men say it. I’ve heard the preacher say that. That's why it's important for everybody who come into contact with victims and want to help them to get quality, professional training and not just speak off the cuff, and not know what they're talking about. Fear, finances, because we know that most Americans, most middle-class, or working-class Americans depend on two incomes to maintain their household.
[00:19:21] RW: Absolutely.
[00:19:22] ML: Even with the reporting. If you report him and he loses his job, your income may go from a $150,000 to $50,000, or it may go from $70,000 to $25,000 and you still have your mortgage to pay. Of course, that's where the Victims of Crime come in, but that $25,000 only is going to go so far. That's just the reality of this find is depend upon the resources the person have saved, who's making more money, how many family support can you get, because it's hard to replace $75,000 or a $100,000. That's what people are looking at.
And it’s hard, we may look at it and say, “Wow. Your life is worth more than that.” I always say, we're in our comfortable home with the air-conditioner, drinking coffee and looking at cable. It's easy for us to say that we're not taking all our children who are afraid and maybe going to a shelter.
[00:20:20] RW: Totally uprooting their entire life, because if it is a situation where it's no longer safe to stay at that residence, then they do leave. If they go to a shelter, or they're trying to actually get another apartment, the whole requirement to have that month security, a month rental. In New Jersey, one of the highest rents in the country is in New Jersey. You're talking about $3,000, $4,000. Who has that in an emergency?
[00:20:55] ML: Absolutely.
[00:20:55] RW: Paycheck to paycheck.
[00:20:57] ML: That's why Victims of Crime come in, but it's that's $3,000. That may get you security in the first month rent in New Jersey. You have to have the second and third. At the same time, you're working and you have the children obligations; getting them to day care, or child care. It's complicated. Other factors in addition to the fear, the finances, is also what family thinks. In a lot of our communities, there's pressure to stay married, especially in some ethnic communities, Hispanic and Black communities, you have that religious piece, where people want you to stay together, or you perceive that it's going to be frowned upon, especially if he is someone in the community that the community thinks highly of.
Then you would be ostracized if he is a officer in a church. Then where are you going to go to church? All that support system may be looking at you. Or you may feel ashamed. Some people feel ashamed like, “How did I let that happen to me?” Because people be like, “How you let him beat you, how you let him do this to you?” You're embarrassed. You have police officer. We've seen the cases, where police officers were victims, female, and they didn't want to tell anyone, because people will state, “You carrying a gun. How you let someone beat you?”
[00:22:34] RW: So much more complex than that.
[00:22:37] ML: It's very complex. Then, sometimes people simply want to keep their family unity together. They may have sons who they feel isn't critical. They have those sons there, they may live in a challenging neighborhood where you have people on the corner. If it's a husband, or a boyfriend, whatever that intimate partner is, you feel like that's what's protecting your son from the outside world. You don't want to break up that family and maybe you were from a home where you didn't have a father. These abusers could be great fathers, but they are beating you at the same time. The kids love them to death. You feel you can sacrifice yourself for the children.
[00:23:20] RW: That can definitely can happen. Then, can you speak a little bit, because that touches on that a little bit. Speak to the issue around the guy who basically is the wonderful person that everybody loves, except he beats his wife, or his partner. On the outside, everybody thinks he's Joe Wonderful, inside he's not. When you try to have him arrested, you become the bad guy.
[00:23:52] ML: Right, right. We've seen that. I’m not a mental health specialist, or social worker, so I can't speak to the psychology of people like that. I call them sociopaths, but that is just my layman way of referring to them. I have no expertise in the area. I’m a lawyer. The answer is yes, you see that happen, because when the police officer come, they are the reasonable one. They're the reasonable one. They're cool and calm. You are frustrated and angry. When I would go to training, they would have victims not only training, but also at conferences, because we will always have victims speak.
They will tell stories of how when they walk in. Sometimes, the police officer knew who it was. You say, “Hi, brother. How are you? I haven't seen you in a while.” Automatically, the victim is shut down. That's right. He may have been coaching the baseball team. He may be one of those small businesses who sponsor the baseball team, or he may be the brother-in-law of a police officer you know. When you do that, you've already shut the victim down.
Police officers who are trained are trained not to do that. At one time, they simply did not know to separate the parties. Officers are trained to handle that much better than they were 15 to 20 years ago. If the person is a “upstanding citizen,” you know how that is, you believe that people will believe them more. That's why attorneys who provide counsel to victims as they prepare, because everything is in planning. It's planning, planning. If you can plan before you leave, then you're getting that information. You're getting the documentation. You're keeping those text messages. You're keeping those voice-mail where he's calling. You're taking pictures of bruises on your body. You're getting hospital records. That’s when you go to the hospital.
You're gathering that information, if you are fortunate enough to be able to do that, because you're already traumatized, so it's a lot to ask you to do. Sometimes it is necessary if you want to be able to keep your children and make sure that you are financially able to doing that transition before that divorce.
[00:26:09] RW: Now the idea that there certainly are some key reasons why people stay in these abusive relationships, just fear of the abuser and he's threatening either them, or threatening their family members, or their pets and their children. Finances, just not having the money that they need to have to get out and make it on their own.
[00:26:35] ML: Absolutely.
[00:26:36] RW: They keep wanting, maybe even for religious reasons, or other reasons to keep the family together and believe in the children, who have a right to a family. Shame. Just not wanting to admit and not wanting to feel like they are stereotype of being the wife that's being beaten. You must have a low self-esteem and don't care about yourself, so [inaudible 00:27:00].
[00:27:03] ML: If I can add, I have seen this in people who I know personally, who, once they made the decision to leave, the children – and this is no research. This is just anecdotal information that I’ve heard from women I know, who once they left, the children was so happy, because they could have peace. Having that shell outside of that family and inside is broken, and the children are afraid, because if the person comes home and he is upset, or if he's drunk, they know there's going to be violence going on, so they live in fear.
It's still like, children who live with alcoholists have fear, because they never know what to expect. The research shows that sometimes, that DV piece and that alcohol, or drug abuse intersect, it's not the cause, but it's a progenitor.
[00:28:02] RW: Intersects. That’s a good point, because some people will even – victim survivors say, “Well, he wouldn't be like that if he wasn't drinking, or he was using.” What the people said, many people drink and abuse drugs and never harm anybody. It's important for maybe somebody's listening that believes that. We want you to know, that is not the cause of domestic violence. People get drunk and just go sit down and don't bother anybody, or make jokes, laugh. They don't beat people up, because they're drunk, so that it's not the cause of domestic violence. Not at all. They use that as an excuse to do what they want to do.
[00:28:44] ML: A prosecutor said, at one training that I went to, and she showed how she cross-examined the person during the trial. Most of these cases don't go to trial. She pointed out the fact that, “Did you go to work that day? Did you hit the boss? Did you hit the security guard?” She decided that all these people that he was upset that day and he opted not to hit. “Did you beat up the bartender?” All of these people, you didn't, but you decide to hit the person who you feel who's not capable of defending themselves physically.
[00:29:19] RW: Absolutely. That's an excellent point.
[00:29:22] ML: I apologize. If I may correct. I need to say that very clear to the audience and I should have said it upfront. I apologize. We fully recognize that men are also victims of domestic violence.
[00:29:34] RW: Absolutely.
[00:29:36] ML: Is tradition to refer – the percentage of men is far less, far less than women. Some stats have three out of every 10 women, four out of every 10 women. It may be one out of every 10 males. With those males, it's often same sex. You have the heterosexual abuse. Then you have the same sex abuse on both sides, male-male, female-female.
We recognize that. I’m speaking generally, because this is a very general conversation. At no point do I want anyone to think that we don't recognize that men are victims. It's an entire different topic when you have the challenges that gay men, or trans encounter when they have to report to police.
[00:30:30] RW: Yeah. That actually is a whole topic that maybe, if you come on again, to talk about that, because we have on a few of our episodes, try to make that disclaimer, that because the preponderance of the cases do impact women, that we do tend to use feminine gender as we're talking about the issue. We certainly do not want to imply that we don't recognize that men can be used by women and that women can be batterers, as we know it, in terms of taking the power and control in the relationship and then using violence, or other forms of intimidation to abuse men. That does happen.
[00:31:24] ML: Yes, absolutely.
[00:31:25] RW: Thank you for bringing that up.
[00:31:27] ML: On that level, the men are embarrassed. The men are embarrassed. We've had conversations at meetings, and I have not seen this happen when I was at the office, but some of the victim’s advocates would say that the man would rather be considered an abuser than being victimized by a woman, because that whole manhood thing. That you are not a man if you “allow.” I use that as people say.
I saw an interesting – this may have been about 15, 20 years ago on 60 Minutes. I wish I had maintained a video of it. It involved a case involving someone in the military. He had been arrested for abusing his wife. The truth was he didn't want to tell his superiors, it was his wife who was doing the abuse. They gave an interview and he said, he had been trained so well by his family not to ever, ever hit a woman. He said, he just could not do it. I just thought it was so brave of him on national TV to just break down and say that had been happening. He was willing to take all of the negative consequences. In the military, there's a zero-tolerance, supposed to be.
I will throw that out there as also that men are more ashamed than women sometimes. That's anecdotal. I don't have the research on the number, but I’ve heard those conversations in the training.
[00:32:59] RW: As I said, that is a whole topic in of itself in that the shame of it, I think would skew any numbers that we do have and I know we have very, very few numbers [inaudible 00:33:11]. Those numbers are totally skewed, because you think of the shame that women face, then how much more is the shame, because it's the abuse, plus the implied gender roles for males as being the dominant person in the relationship. Then it gets into a whole another dynamic. Again, as I said, that's a full episode or two.
[00:33:36] ML: Yes, absolutely.
[00:33:37] RW: We could discuss there. I want to roll into this area of services for Black and African-American women and whether you see or witness barriers for that particular population getting services, or even seeking services. Can you speak to that?
[00:33:55] ML: Well, as I stated before, I will put the caviar, because now I’m teaching that I have not been intimately and daily involved in direct services. I participate in many trainers, as you have been to with Wilmington University and Rowan University and other organizations on these issues, not at just the seeking service first.
I think it depends upon where you are. I think, and this is anecdotal, people in urban areas appear to be more assertive in seeking services. We saw that in the word of mouth, if you live in an apartment building, you got 500 people there. You don't have anyone with the 500-apartment building in South Jersey, I don't think. Harley, below Gloucester County. This is just my observations, not a scientific. People in rural areas are less assertive and seeking our services. It may be because it's the distance. You have to drive so far. You don't just jump on a bus and get there.
It may be you're fully aware of the services, or you may be less likely to even want to seek services, because when we talk about barriers and reasons why women stay and people stay, if you take it to a rural area, everybody know everybody and you're living on the land, on the acres of land that's been in his generation, or her generation for four or five generations, and everybody know everybody and people leave their doors open and you can walk in. Those communities are so tight-knit that you don't want to rock the boat.
It's really, we didn't touch upon, it is really challenging when you get to rural areas. The suburbs are similar when I was at the AG's office. If you have someone who's a hospital administrator and he's making $495,000 and you report it, he could lose his job. That's the half million-dollar home, that's a private school, that’s everything going down the drain and how some people may look at it. That's just the reality. That's just reality in the humanity of it all, so it's not easy.
People don't want to move from a home to an apartment, let alone from that home to a shelter. That's some of the systemic barriers internally that the system has nothing to do with for the most part. It's just the way we are socialized. The limited services, it depends upon in some areas where you have lots of problems, lots of other issues. If you have an area like Newark, you have the mental health issue, you have the homelessness issue. You have so many issues and you have limited services and you have a limited tax base. Absolutely. Everybody do not have sufficient shelters, or beds. I must say that the people who are working those areas do a herculean job to find the resources.
[00:37:02] RW: Well, you've covered quite a bit of ground tonight and some areas that we really needed our audience to hear. Is there anything we didn't touch on that you'd like to mention?
[00:37:14] ML: The one thing that I would like to mention and I looked for information on there, but it's not a whole lot of information out there, what has been the impact of COVID? One psychologist or psychiatrist said it very well. She's like, “We don't know, because we weren't able to get to the victims, the person who would be the victim, just because you have people who are under stress already and marriages are under stress.” We know how abuse can escalate. I’ve known situations where the person may just push the person for six months and then do anything else. It's a test. How much more I can get away with? How much more I can get away with?
It's going to be interesting. It's a little scary as I think about people who were forced to stay in the same place out of necessity, because the shelters were closed. So many places and services was closed. What was happening to those victims? I would actually think about, although that's not my job now, but I would think about, God, I complain that I can't go to the corner store, because I went yesterday. But I’m at peace. I’m in a home where I’m safe. I have cable. I have air. I can teach online. I thought about that a lot. Other people have talked about it, but they don't have the data on it, just because we're still shut down in a certain step.
[00:38:39] RW: I think that's such an excellent point. I’ve actually asked that on the podcast for a couple of guests, but it really comes back to the data is not in yet. Have some anecdotal information and have some assumptions based on what we know, what would typically happen, and just the tactic of isolating your victim and using that. Quarantine of course, it's prime time.
[00:39:04] ML: You can't get away.
[00:39:05] RW: You can't get away. It will be interesting to hear what these numbers are. Maybe it'll be six months before we know, or maybe longer before we know some of this. Then of course, again, how will they even measure it? Yeah, we do suspect that women and men who are in abusive situations have really gone through hell during quarantine, as they're more or less trapped in situations, where they can't get out. Maybe their only relief was their job to get out so many hours a day to work. Then if they're working from home now –
[00:39:49] ML: Yes, yes. If both of them are working from home and that's stressful for people who are in perfectly functioning marriages, who are now being distressed.
[00:39:58] RW: When you're not, you're working from home and now the kids are home, all of these pressures, additional pressure, and heaven help if the job has been lost, then that's another –
[00:40:10] ML: Yes, absolutely. I wanted to add this. It's hard to be comprehensive when you're speaking more in general. Just a reminder that we know that abuse is physical and psychological.
[00:40:22] RW: Absolutely. Yes.
[00:40:23] ML: Some predators will play the psychological game on you, so you don't think you're in an abusive relationship. I went to this website. I’m just going to throw some out of relationships that are abuses that people don't realize it. The intimate partner say you never do anything right. They're extremely jealous. You have to check in several times constantly during the day. They want to keep you away from your friends and your family. They're insulting you about the way you look, whether it’s your hair, whether you have gained weight, you don't have access to money. They control every aspect of what you do.
Any decisions you make, you're afraid because they're going to blow off the handle. Hitting walls, putting holes in walls, because they know subliminally, you're going to see that fist could have gone in my face and not that wall. All of those type of tactics that people do to create and that's breaking you down. It's breaking you down. It's destroying you from the inside-out.
Sometimes, people don't think that it has to actually be physical contact. That is so common when you see people who are extremely broken, because you can't put your hand on it. If a person physically hit you, you can clearly see that. Over time, those little comments, now we call them with respect to racists and then microaggressions. It's like, how many cuts, how many little nips are you going to be before you I just bleed out totally.
Just a reminder, because some people because of this whole culture of sometimes, we get too much from the pop entertainers, or the rap entertaining about these toxic relationships, but they still love each other. Well, that's fantasy. That's not real life. That's not good for young girls.
[00:42:06] RW: They're unhealthy. They’re in relationships, but they’re unhealthy –
[00:42:09] ML: Or anyone.
[00:42:10] RW: – relationships. Having more understanding and more education around the difference between a healthy relationship and unhealthy relationship.
[00:42:22] ML: Absolutely. Because sometimes, they've grown up with this type situation, they don't know the difference, because we emulate what we see sometimes.
[00:42:31] RW: That's so true. Thank you so much. We want to just thank Marsetta Lee Esquire for coming on tonight. You have really given us a wealth of information. One more thing, before you sign off, if you would just give that website again if you have that?
[00:42:51] ML: Absolutely. www.njvictims.org.
[00:42:58] RW: Thank you so much. We so appreciated having you on tonight and want you to stay safe.
[00:43:06] ML: Thank you.
[00:43:06] RW: Bye now.
[00:43:07] ML: Bye-bye.
[END OF EPISODE]
[00:43:09] RW: Thanks for joining We Hear You Podcast with our host, Rose Williams from Harambe Social Services, a grassroots organization in South Jersey. Harambe is Swahili for pulling together in unity. We use the principles of the Ingusa Saba in all of our services, to educate communities about domestic violence and sexual assault.
Our primary focus is to provide counseling services to victims and survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault. If you or someone you know needs to talk to us, please call 609-225-6936. Again, that number is 609-225-6936. Our counseling services are free of charge.
Be sure to follow Harambe Social Services on Instagram and Facebook. We would love to hear your feedback about tonight's focus. Tell a family member and a friend about the show. You can help us get the word out and go to buzzsprout.com to make a review.
Thank you. Be safe. Be well.
[END]