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The US Department of Justice announced 119 arrests in 84 cities in the United States and Canada yesterday, following a two-year, multi-agency investigation into the sale of the “date rape” drug GHB over the Internet. Leaders and midlevel brokers of Internet drug trafficking rings were targeted in the investigation – authorities also seized more than 25 million doses of GHB and its derivatives.

Many of those arrested used Web sites and chat rooms to advertise GHB and its derivatives as industrial cleaning products. In fact, the drug is most often used to commit sexual assaults. Odorless and colorless, GHB is often slipped into women’s drinks without their knowledge. It then renders victims immobile or unconscious and unable to fend off attackers. GHB also affects the memory, which keeps victims from prosecuting for the crime. “We see this drug as part of the club drug scene and it’s particularly heinous,” Jamie Zuieback, spokesman for the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network told the San Diego Union-Tribune. “It’s being used to facilitate drug-induced sexual assaults, like the kindly stranger who offers to drive you home.”

GHB has been linked to 72 deaths, according to the Drug Enforcement Administration. It is often found on college campuses, a 2000 Glamour magazine survey said that 19 percent of female college students know someone who was the victim of the date-rape drug GHB. Despite its many dangerous uses, the drug was approved by the Food and Drug Administration in July for its first legal use as a medical product in the treatment of a complication of narcolepsy.

Deputy Chief Maurice Moore, recently retired from the Los Angeles Police Department, has been implicated by an internal LAPD investigation in aiding his son’s multi-million dollar cocaine ring by helping to store, transport and launder hundreds of thousands of dollars in illicit profits. The LAPD based the report on internal investigation and interviews, as well as on extensive FBI documentation. Moore’s conduct first became suspect to the FBI in the mid-1990’s, and although former Chief Bernard Parks was notified of the investigation at the time, he nevertheless appointed Moore to be one of the key directors of the LAPD’s official inquiry into the Rampart police corruption scandal, which involved many of the same crimes the FBI accused Moore of committing. Police leaders have expressed outrage at the lack of action by the LAPD. Thomas Lorenzen, who wrote the LAPD’s report and is currently the police chief in Taos, New Mexico, said that Moore should have been fired based on the FBI’s information, and that Moore received special treatment based on his high-rank within the LAPD. Interim Chief Martin Pomeroy has requested further analysis before sustaining the six suggested allegations against Moore, which include money laundering and a violation of Department policy forbidding relationships with individuals involved in “an ongoing criminal enterprise.” Because the statute of limitations has run on most of the alleged crimes, the only real punishment of Moore would be an official LAPD reprimand.

The Senate last week unanimously approved the DNA Sexual Assault Justice Act of 2002 (S 2313), a bill aimed at reducing the growing nationwide backlog of DNA evidence for sexual assault cases. Passed out of the Senate Judiciary Committee in August, the bill requires local law enforcement agencies to assess their DNA backlog and provides $335 million over the next five years to facilitate efficient processing of DNA rape kits. Introduced by Senator Joseph Biden (D-DE), the act also boosts federal grants to expand DNA testing, establishes grant programs for evidence collection and handling training, and stipulates upgrades for the FBI’s DNA computer system. Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-WA), the bill’s co-sponsor, praised the Senate’s action: “This legislation will help bring justice to women for whom justice is long overdue.”

The Act includes provisions from a companion bill, the Debbie Smith Act, which requires that health officials test rape victim DNA samples within 10 days of receipt, introduced in the House and Senate by Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-NY) and Cantwell in May.

Prompt testing is particularly critical since the perpetrators are able to roam free in the meantime Ñ which not only adds anxiety to the victim, but also leaves all women at risk, given that the average rapist commits eight to 12 sexual assaults. Adding considerable legal punch, the Act authorizes John Doe/DNA indictments whereby DNA evidence may extend the five-year statute of limitations on a federal sexual offense and also includes privacy requirements for handling DNA evidence.

The legislation was referred to the House Judiciary Committee on Friday.

TAKE ACTION Lifetime Television network is sponsoring an online petition to rally support for reducing the nationwide backlog of DNA evidence for sexual assault cases.

Three people were arrested in New York City recently and accused of bringing at least 30 Russian women into the US and forcing them to dance nude in strip clubs. Two US citizens, Viktoria Ilyina and her husband Lev Trakhtenberg, and one Russian national, Sergei Malchikov will each face 12 different charges, including five counts of attempted forced labor and five counts of trafficking women in a trial scheduled for Nov. 6. They could each face up to 20 years in prison and a fine of $250,000. After their arrest, Ilyina was released on $155,000 bail while Trakhtenberg and Malchikov remain in custody.

According to an official indictment, the three began bringing the women into the US through New York Kennedy International Airport in November 1999. The trio, who may be connected to the Russian mob, would take away the women’s identification cards and tickets and force them to dance naked in New Jersey strip clubs. The women were then forced to hand over their $1,200 weekly pay. Malchikov drove the women to the clubs from Brooklyn, where they lived, and forced them to dance by making threats against them and their families, according to Assistant US Attorney Leslie Schwartz. Trakhtenberg obtained entertainer visas for the women by falsely claiming that they were members of an “internationally recognized” singing group, according to Schwartz.

With approximately 50,000 women from the former Soviet Union trafficked abroad every year and forced into sexual slavery, Russia was named as one of 19 countries on the third tier or US State Department’s blacklist in their recently released Trafficking in Persons report. Over the past year, there have been 4 million victims of human trafficking worldwide, with 50,000 sent to the United States, according to the report. Traffickers typically confiscate passports and then beat, rape or drug the women in order to ensure compliance, according to victim advocates.

A Wisconsin appeals court ruled to allow evidence collected by police without a search warrant during a domestic violence call to be used in subsequent proceedings. The appeals court’s unanimous decision supports the power of police in domestic violence situations where an officer has reason to believe an urgent response is necessary. According to court records, the Outagamie County Sheriff’s Department received a 911 call saying Mr. Mark Mielke had kicked his girlfriend so hard that she was spitting blood. Two deputies responded to the call, and found the woman shaking and crying, but with no evident physical damage. The woman told the deputies that nothing was wrong and that they couldn’t come inside the house. 11-year veteran deputy Rachael Miller believed the woman was in danger and physically prevented the door from closing. She then saw Mr. Mielke and received his permission to enter the home, where he was arrested for battery, reckless endangerment of another’s safety, and being armed while under the influence of alcohol. The trial judge ruled that the situation was not urgent enough to justify the officer’s entering the home without a search warrant, and that Mielke’s constitutional rights were violated, forcing the evidence to be disregarded. In a unanimous appeals court decision, the court ruled that because domestic violence victims often refuse to report the abuse, Officer Miller could “reasonably believe” that the woman’s demeanor indicated her safety was threatened. Domestic violence advocates praised the ruling’s implications for the use of police discretion when an officer has reason to believe that a domestic violence victim is in danger.

In the first six months of using digital cameras to document domestic violence, Queens, New York saw domestic violence convictions rise nearly 10%. Following Queens’ lead, the NYPD has decided to expand its use of digital cameras throughout the department, starting with Brooklyn next month. The technology is being heralded as a swifter, more accurate means of documenting visible signs of abuse, like cuts, bruises, swelling and handprints. Most police departments use Polaroid shots to show signs of violence, which often produce blurry images that fail to illuminate the extent of the injuries. These snapshots are critically important, and often the only evidence a prosecutor has to prove abuse, especially when wounds have had time to heal or a victim chooses not cooperate.

Digital photography also dramatically increases the speed at which evidence is produced. Photographs may be transmitted via computer to a judge before an accuser is even arraigned, while standard snapshots usually take days, or even weeks, to be processed. “This is a major, major change,” said Robyn Mazur, associate director of domestic violence programs at the Center for Court Innovation. “By having these pictures instantaneously go directly to the key players, cases can potentially move much faster in those very early precious days.” However, critics of this use of digital photography are concerned the technology gives prosecutors greater license to prosecute offenders against a victim’s wishes and may send victims underground. There is also concern about the ease at which the photographs may be doctored, enhanced or manipulated via computer. “There are serious concerns,” NY Deputy Attorney Susan L. Hendricks told the Times. “I think that given the ability to manipulate them, the courts are going to have to be careful, or they should be.”

According to the Center for Court Innovation, New York will be the first major city to adopt the technology throughout its police department, which handles about 90,000 domestic violence programs annually.

The Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled last week that victims of domestic violence must testify against their abusers regardless of whether they intend to press charges. The unanimous decision that overruled a lower court’s decision was based on an incident in which Kellie Kirkner was choked and beaten by her husband Joseph Kirkner in 1999. Mrs. Kirkner obtained a protection order against her husband last May; however, she refused to testify against him, citing that “she wished to preserve her marriage and family.”

Chester County First Assistant District Attorney Patrick Carmody applauded the ruling saying: “It’s crucial to an effective prosecution in these types of cases. Too many of these cases become homicides.” The Pennsylvania Coalition Against Domestic Violence came out against the ruling, asserting that victims will become even more reluctant to bring charges against their abusers if they know that they will then be forced to face them in a courtroom.

LEARN MORE Domestic Violence Hotlines and Resources

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A Montgomery County, Maryland judge with a long history of rulings against women has angered law enforcement officials for a decision that may have led to further sexual abuse of a now 15-year-old girl. Circuit Court Judge Durke Thompson allowed Sidney Richardson, the girl’s stepfather – who had already pleaded guilty to earlier sexual abuse of the girl over the course of 17 months when she was 9 and 10 – to return to live with her. The stepfather’s return in January 2001 allegedly resulted in further sexual contact that was reported to authorities after the girl gave birth in November. In May, the girl’s mother told authorities that she suspected that Richardson, her husband, had fathered the child. Richardson has been a fugitive since then. The case only came to light publicly this month when law enforcement added Richardson to a new Web site listing fugitives in the county located just outside of Washington, DC.

“It doesn’t take omniscience to see the red flags in this case. It’s not news that sexual offenders are likely to repeat their crimes,” the Washington Post wrote in a recent editorial condemning Thompson for his gross lack of judgment. “The judge had a responsibilityÉto protect a child who had no other recourse, and if the facts alleged in this case are true, he failed miserably.”

In March 1998, Richardson was sentenced to 18 months in jail after pleading guilty before Thompson to child abuse and a third-degree sex offense for sexual contact with the girl when she was 9 and 10. When Richardson was released in October 1999, Thompson allowed him to periodically visit with his wife and stepdaughter. Last year, Thompson allowed Richardson to return to live in girl’s home despite objections from the prosecutor, Richardson’s therapist and parole officer. “I’m not responsible for people committing crimes,” Thompson told the Post. “People violate probation all the time.”

Two years ago, Thompson told an 11-year-old sexual assault victim during the sentencing hearing for her assailant: “It takes two to tango.” While the assailant, 23-year-old Vladimir Chacon-Bonilla, could have been sentenced to up to 20 years in prison, Thompson imposed a lenient sentence of 18 months in prison and three years’ probation, including a ruling not to require the perpetrator to register as a sex offender. In March, Thompson overturned a jury’s guilty verdict in a rape case – claiming that the victim, an illegal immigrant from Indonesia, might have been seeking revenge against the defendant, who had been her boyfriend, because he refused to marry her, according to the Post.

Eddie Joe Lloyd walked out of a Michigan prison a free man last week after spending 17 years behind bars for a rape and murder that DNA tests prove he did not commit. “To wake up in prison today and walk out this afternoon into the outside world is truly a miracle,” Lloyd exclaimed after his release. After a 30-minute deliberation in 1985, a jury convicted Lloyd of raping and strangling 16-year-old Michelle Jackson. Lloyd was a patient in the Detroit Psychiatric Institute at the time of the murder, and maintains that police coaxed him into confessing.

In 1995, Lloyd contacted the Innocence Project, a New York-based DNA advocacy group, and with their help was exonerated after semen samples taken from the crime scene proved he couldn’t have been the killer. Lloyd is the 110th convicted person to be exonerated using DNA testing through the Innocence Project. Although DNA evidence is one of law enforcement’s most valuable tools for catching criminals, agencies around the country are failing to quickly and adequately process DNA samples, including rape kits. In fact, it is estimated that there is a backlog of nearly 600,000 DNA samples waiting to be tested and uploaded into the FBI’s national database. In an effort to force agencies to handle DNA samples properly, the Senate Judiciary Committee recently passed the DNA Sexual Assault Justice Act of 2002.

Sergeant Michael Coker, a 20-year veteran of the Portsmouth Police Department in Virginia, has resigned rather than be fired, after the city paid $300,000 to settle complaints of sexual harassment against him. Three female officers in the department allege that Coker made harassing comments to them, touched them inappropriately, and tried to kiss them while they were on duty. They filed their complaints with the department last fall, and after no response, took their complaint to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which found merit in their claims. Coker denied all allegations, saying that he didn’t work directly with the women, and actually considered himself to be a mentor to two of them. Because he was able to take early retirement instead of being fired, Coker will receive life-long health benefits, and a yearly income equal to 60% of the average of his three highest years of pay.

In 2000, the NYPD launched a much-praised domestic violence database that tracks stalking and violence with the intention of preventing serious domestic assault by assessing threat levels of victims. But this year, the system has become so backlogged that the Department has acknowledged that it is not adequately protecting women, as evidenced by the 16 women who were killed by their partners this year, and who had filed domestic violence complaints with the Department. Of the 290,000 domestic violence reports filed this year, roughly 94,000 cases have not been reviewed by a domestic violence police officer and a commanding officer, as required by the NYPD. In response to the scourge of recent domestic homicides, NYPD Chief, Joseph Esposito, has instructed the Department that they must bring the database entries up to date. Some experts have blamed the backlog on lowered police ranks combined with an increasingly large volume of domestic violence calls; others have pointed to additional NYPD duties as a result of September 11th. While there has been complaint from some officers that the system is too cumbersome, most domestic violence advocates believe that the NYPD’s database is a model threat assessment system when used correctly.

Two Prince George County, Maryland sheriff’s deputies were fatally shot last week while trying to serve an emergency psychiatric petition. One of the victims was Elizabeth MacGruder, who had been on the force for less than 2 years, and is the first female officer to be killed in the line of duty in the Department’s history. The other victim was 13-year veteran officer James Arnaud. A spokesperson for the Department said that the incident was the most serious to strike the sheriff’s office in the 306 years since its establishment. The National Center for Women & Policing extends its sympathies to the families, friends and colleagues of the victims.

Sergeant Carl Christopher Miller, a 14-year veteran of the Menlo Park Police Department in California, killed himself in late August with a single shot to his temple while police, who were responding to a domestic violence call from his ex-wife, surrounded his vehicle. Miller allegedly choked his ex-wife Lisa Miller for so long that she was left unconscious for nearly an hour. There was no history of reported domestic violence, although Ms. Miller hinted in news interviews following the incident that there had been unreported abuse. The couple divorced in June and had a 7-year old daughter together. Domestic violence runs higher in police departments and in the military than in the population as a whole.

According to new figures released by the federal government, a record 6.6 million individuals in the U.S. are currently under the supervision of the nation’s correctional system. The number of adults in prison, on parole, or on probation, rose by 2.3%, or by 147,700 people, between 2000 and 2001. Marc Mauer of the Sentencing Group, which advocates increasing the usage of alternatives to incarceration, commented that “the overall figures suggest that we’ve come to rely on the criminal justice system as a way of responding to social problems in a way that’s unprecedented.” Groups like the Sentencing Project note that over _ of the U.S. prison population is incarcerated for non-violent drug offenses, and that incarceration generally does little to stem drug problems, often instead increasing an individual’s likelihood to continue drug abuse and to get rearrested. The release of the federal figures comes on the heels of a study by the Justice Policy Institute which found that the number of black men in jail or prison has grown significantly in the past 20 years, to the point where there are now significantly more black men incarcerated than in college or university.

After the killings of four women this summer in Fort Bragg, North Carolina allegedly by their enlisted husbands, three of whom had recently returned from Afghanistan, the US military announced yesterday it will screen soldiers heading home for signs of mental health problems. Investigators are also looking into the possible side effects of Larium, a common drug prescribed to soldiers to protect against malaria. While its manufacturer, Hoffman-LaRoche, Inc. warns that side effects can include “neurological and psychiatric disorders,” the World Health Organization estimates that severe effects are only experienced by five out of 100,000. Frank Ochberg, former associate director of the National Institute of Mental Health, told the Associated Press that studies have not shown a strong correlation between domestic violence and the post-traumatic stress disorder commonly experienced by soldiers returning from combat. Ochberg points out that “far more often domestic violence has to do with bullying, jealousy, desire to control a spouse.” In the military, the rate of domestic violence incidents rose from 18.6 to 25.6 per 1,000 military personnel between 1990 and 1996. Since then, the rate has decreased to 16.5 per 1,000 in 2001, but still remains much higher than in the civilian population, which has 3.1 incidents of domestic violence per 1,000 people, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Though numbers are not available for the past 10 months, the downward trend may be reversing, according to Christine Hansen, executive director of the Miles Foundation, a non-profit organization that provides services to domestic abuse victims in the military community. “We have seen through our clients alone an increase in the number of domestic violence incidents since mid-October as well as an increase in the severity of abuse,” she told the Journal-Constitution.

Prosecutors in several states are working around the statute of limitations on sexual abuse cases in order to prosecute priests for child molestation and rape that occurred over the past several decades, according to the New York Times. This week, five priests were arrested in Detroit and Boston using a loophole that “stops the clock” when suspects move out of state, the Times reports. Other state legislatures, including Colorado and Connecticut, have lengthened the period of time in which abuse victims can file civil suits against their alleged abusers. California Governor Gray Davis recently signed a law that allows victims of childhood abuse to file charges against third parties who knew of the abuse and did nothing for up to three years after discovering any psychological damage. In addition, the Times reports that Davis also signed a law suspending the statute of limitations for one year, which is expected to lead to many lawsuits for abuse by priests that occurred over the past several decades. Four Detroit priests were charged using a loophole in the statute of limitations – all four left or have been removed from the ministry; one was voluntarily defrocked in the early 1990s. However, Michael Duggan, a prosecutor for Wayne County, Michigan, told the Detroit News that while there was evidence against 15 other Detroit priests, he was unable to charge them because of the statute of limitations. One of the four priests, Robert Burkholder, now 82 and a resident of Oahu, Hawaii, admitted to abusing children throughout his years as a priest – starting from his ordination in 1947, according to the Detroit News. “The boys work in the rectory with the priest and you just get friendly. You sit down in the rectory and have a Coke. It’s a mutual deal. An affectionate thing and a friendly thing,” he said, according to the Times. He also said that he mostly fondled boys that he abused but sometimes had oral sex with them, claiming his relationships with the boys were “always a two-way thing,” the Times reported.

Convicted Utah polygamist Tom Green received a lenient sentence of five years to life yesterday for child rape of his 13-year-old “spiritual wife.” Fourth District Court Judge Donald Eyre sentenced Green to the minimum sentence for the first-degree felony conviction – he will serve this sentence concurrently with his 2001 bigamy sentence of up to five years. Green, who has already spent one year in prison for his bigamy conviction, could be out of jail in as few as four years, according to the Salt Lake Tribune. Green, 54, was found guilty of child rape on June 24 for having sex with 13-year-old Linda Kunz in 1986. Last year, he also was convicted of being married to five women at the same time, all of whom were 16 or under when they married Green – a practice he claims adheres to the original tenets of the Mormon Church. The state of Utah decided to prosecute Green after he took his five wives and 29 children on national television to promote the idea of polygamy. He also was charged with failing to pay back the state for child support that was given for his children. Up until 1890, Utah was a place where polygamy was openly practiced by members of the Mormon Church – it was then banned by the church in exchange for Utah’s statehood. Currently there are an estimated 30,000 polygamists throughout the state. Following Green’s conviction, authorities announced a new offensive on the practice – they intend to focus on the crimes against children, incest and welfare fraud, according to the Salt Lake Tribune. “Polygamy is much like domestic violence was several decades ago,” Juab County Attorney David Leavitt, who led the prosecution against Green, told the Tribune. “In the 50s and 60s, when a woman reported she had been abused, the police said, ÔWell, what did you do to deserve it?” Rodney Holm, a police officer in Hilldale, Utah who has three wives, one of which he admitted to impregnating when she was 16 and he was 32, could be charged as early as next week, the Tribune reported.

A Philadelphia judge took a stand against domestic violence recently when he sentenced a man to 11-22 years in prison for the all too common crime of assaulting his wife. Common Pleas Court Judge Rayford Means gave Darryl Blackwell the maximum possible sentence for 12 misdemeanors by stacking the penalties for each charge back to back. Typically, misdemeanors such as those of which Blackwell was found guilty garner sentences of no longer than two years. “I think that finally somebody was able to see the big picture,” Assistant District Attorney Gina Smith told the Philadelphia Tribune. “If you looked at the entire evolution of this, it represented a very scary situation.” Blackwell began assaulting his wife, Ari Cohen-Blackwell just two months after their wedding. Blackwell allegedly beat Cohen-Blackwell on several occasions – at one point she was admitted to the hospital for compressed vertebrae in her back and swelling on her head – and raped her twice. He also threatened her family and threatened her own life – he even left a body bag in her car. Although arrested several times and given court orders prohibiting him from contacting Cohen-Blackwell, Blackwell repeatedly posted bail and violated the court orders. Finally, after holding Cohen-Blackwell hostage and raping her – Blackwell was arrested and charged with rape and 13 other charges from four prior incidents. This time, Means ordered Blackwell be held on a $50,000 bail. A jury then found Blackwell guilty of the assault charges and not guilty of the rape charges. Domestic violence and intimate partner violence remain an epidemic in the United States. According to a Department of Justice study released in October 2001, close to one-third of women in the US who are murdered each year are killed by their current or former partners, usually a husband. Approximately 1 million women annually report being stalked. In 1999, more than 85 percent of the 800,000 reports of intimate partner violence were committed against women. LEARN MORE Domestic Violence Hotlines and Resources TAKE ACTION Stop Violence Against Women