Vermont

Notes:

1. The domestic violence related homicide counts include only adult victims.
2. Vermont’s Domestic Violence Fatality Review Commission classifies events as domestic violence related if they involve family or household members, as defined by Vermont law, as well as homicides in which “
   1. the responsible party killed a household member of an estranged intimate partner;
   2. the responsible party killed a current partner’s estranged household member;
   3. the responsible party killed a family member’s current or estranged household member;
   4. the responsible party killed a bystander while attempting to harm a family or household member. It would also include a law enforcement-related death where the officer is forced to kill in the line of duty when responding to a domestic violence incident or when a law enforcement officer is killed in the line of duty while responding to a domestic violence incident. It also includes domestic violence related deaths that are ruled justifiable homicide. It also includes fatalities that result from a murder/suicide involving family or household members and suicides where there is a documented history of domestic violence.”
3. Each year, Vermont’s Domestic Violence Fatality Review Commission releases their annual domestic violence report, which includes data and information on domestic violence homicides.

Intimate Partner Violence* Victimization and Related Impacts*

The lifetime prevalence* of any contact sexual violence*, physical violence,* and/or stalking victimization* by an intimate partner* in Vermont is:

Note:

State participation in the National Crime Information Center protection order file is voluntary, thus the extent to which states enter the orders into the system varies. Regardless of how each state refers to such orders, these records are uniformly referred to as “protection orders” in the National Crime Information Center database.

Definitions

• Contact sexual violence: Combined measure that includes rape, being made to penetrate someone else, sexual coercion, and/or unwanted sexual contact.
• Domestic violence related homicide: Vermont’s Domestic Violence Fatality Review Commission classifies events as domestic violence related if it involves family or household members, defined by Vermont law, as well as homicides in which “(1) the responsible party killed a household member of an estranged intimate partner; (2) the responsible party killed a current partner’s estranged household member; (3) the responsible party killed a family member’s current or estranged household member; (4) the responsible party killed a bystander while attempting to harm a family or household member. It would also include a law enforcement-related death where the officer is forced to kill in the line of duty when responding to a domestic violence incident or when a law enforcement officer is killed in the line of duty while responding to a domestic violence incident. It also includes domestic violence related deaths that are ruled justifiable homicide. It also includes fatalities that result from a murder/suicide involving family or household members and suicides where there is a documented history of domestic violence.”
• Intimate partner: Romantic or sexual partner and includes spouses, boyfriends, girlfriends, people with whom they dated, were seeing, or “hooked up.”
• Intimate partner violence: The five types of intimate partner violence measured in the NISVS include sexual violence, stalking, physical violence, psychological aggression, and control of reproductive/sexual health. Sexual violence includes rape, being made to penetrate someone else, sexual coercion, unwanted sexual contact, and non-contact unwanted sexual experiences.
• Intimate partner violence related impacts: For each perpetrator of domestic violence, the NISVS survey asks victims about specific direct impacts related to intimate partner violence to better understand the consequences of contact sexual violence, physical violence, and/or stalking by an intimate partner.
• Lifetime prevalence: Proportion of a population who, at some point in life, have ever experienced the characteristic or condition.
• Protection orders with a disqualifying Brady Indicator: Protection orders related to domestic violence that have been identified as those that prohibit the individual from receiving or possessing firearms under federal law.
• Physical violence: A range of behaviors from slapping, pushing, or shoving to severe acts that include being hit with a fist or something hard, kicked, hurt by pulling hair, slammed against something, tried to hurt by choking or suffocating, beaten, burned on purpose, or used a knife or gun.
• Stalking victimization: Pattern of harassing or threatening tactics used by a perpetrator that is both unwanted and causes fear or safety concerns in the victim.