[E]arlier this month, Jason Kendall shot his 23-year-old ex-girlfriend near Main Street in Windsor, according to the Vermont State Police. Days later he was found by Kansas police dead of apparent suicide.
The homicide was not an anomaly; according to data from the Vermont Domestic Violence Fatality Review Commission, two-thirds of homicides in Vermont last year were related to domestic violence, with victims ranging from 14 months to 60 years old.
According to the data, domestic violence factored into slightly more than half of the total 248 homicides of all adults over the last two decades.
In such a small state, such grim statistics can feel very personal, said Auburn Watersong, an associate director at the Vermont Network Against Domestic & Sexual Violence.
“It’s so hard to think about these horrible things happening right in our neighborhood,” she said.
The 2014 report, published this week, tracks the fatalities in the state related to domestic violence. It’s an annual product of a 17-member commission that includes representatives of victims and the medical community as well as from departments within the Agency of Human Services, the Attorney General’s office and other state divisions.
Vermont State Police Capt. J.P. Sinclair, who serves on the commission, was reminded of the relevance of the annual report when he had to miss the most recent meeting of the commission to investigate the homicide in Windsor.
According to the report, five of the victims of domestic violence homicides were men in 2014. Four children were killed in domestic violence situations, and one woman. Sinclair said that many of the cases that the Vermont State Police investigates involve a domestic relationship of some type, ranging from parent and child or current or former romantic partners.
“So many of the homicides that we get involved with, the trend will tell you … they are perpetrated by people the victim knew,” Sinclair said.
Sinclair said that police officers are trained to be the primary responders to domestic violence situations. “This is one of these most dangerous calls that you will go on, if not the most dangerous,” Sinclair said.
According to the report, firearms played a role in the majority of domestic violence related homicides over the last 20 years. Seventy-one of the 125 fatalities were gun-related deaths.
“Firearms are a deadly factor,” Watersong said.
The next most common cause of death in domestic violence-related homicides was blunt trauma, factoring into 21 deaths, followed by 17 stabbing deaths.
Watersong said the Network supports implementing universal background checks in the sales of all firearms in Vermont — a proposal that was considered, but tabled, by the Legislature during the session amid staunch opposition from supporters of gun rights.
Evan Hughes, of the Vermont Federation of Sportsmen’s Clubs, said any effort to pursue universal background check in the next legislative session will be met with similar resistance. Vermont has a record of low violent crime, he said. “Mandatory background checks are a solution in search of a problem,” Hughes said.
People will come to their own conclusions about the report, Hughes said, but “the federation’s conclusion is, the laws in Vermont are working just fine.”
Ann Braden of Gun Sense Vermont said guns have the potential to exacerbate situations that involve domestic abuse.
“The power dynamic is always out of kilter when there’s easy access to a gun,” Braden said.
A recently passed law allows judges to remove firearms from the homes of anyone who has been served with a “relief from abuse” order. The purpose of the law is to keep guns away from people who are likely to escalate a domestic altercation. The firearms are to be kept in law enforcement storage lockers.
The firearm removal program, however, hasn’t been effective because few judges use it, according to the report. Weapons storage has only been implemented in one county.
Assistant Attorney General Carolyn Hanson, a member of the commission, said the the commission will look at ways to encourage use of the storage policy.
“We want to eliminate domestic violence and we can,” Hanson said. “We have to nip away at it piece by piece.”
