Members of the Wood County Domestic Violence Task force are worried. Unless a new bill passes in the Ohio House of Representatives, local programs and services could be cut as an ill effect of the Defense of Marriage Act.

House bill 161 could repair the holes that the DOMA put in domestic violence law.

The problems started last month, when a Cleveland judge ruled that the DOMA could be applied to cases of partner abuse. Since the ruling, unmarried people are not protected under the Ohio domestic violence law.

Since then, cases of partner abuse that would have been called “domestic violence” before the DOMA, must be now filed as “assault” for unmarried couples.

This is a problem for victims and law enforcement because repeat offenders would no longer face escalating charges with each new offense. Offenders under domestic violence law face increasingly severe degrees of charges. First time domestic violence offenders are charged with a misdemeanor, but additional incidents could mean felony charges.

Assault charges are different because they are never escalating charges. Each charge is treated as a first-time misdemeanor.

For this reason, local experts predict a drop in the number of cases filed under domestic violence law.

“Domestic violence [rates] will drop dramatically only because you won’t be able to charge live-in partners or same sex couples with domestic violence; it will have to be an assault. The assault crimes will go up, but the domestic violence crimes will drop dramatically,” said Wood County Sheriff’s Deputy Mary Ann Robinson.

Robinson is a member of the task force and is the Sheriff’s department domestic violence specialist.

“Already we’re starting to see motions to dismiss all over the state of Ohio. We have not had that here, but I’m sure it’s coming,” Robinson said.

Here in Wood County, the recent reinterpretation of the domestic violence law could mean losing grant funded programs that exist to help victims and offenders.

“The biggest shock to me, was the fact that some [programs’] funding is based on the fact that they’re going to be dealing with domestic violence cases,” said task force chair Douglas Cubberley, who is a probation officer and bailiff at the Bowling Green municipal court.

“And if law enforcement is required to go ahead and start filing cases [of domestic violence as assault] … it’s possible that some of these places won’t be able to provide services,” Cubberley said.

That could mean limits on counseling for abusers.

Dr. Daniel Schaefer is a psychologist from Person to Person Resources, in Perrysburg. He counsels abusive offenders who are convicted under the domestic violence law. But if more cases of abuse now fall into the category of assault, Schaefer may soon have fewer clients.

“It’s going to probably affect who gets to the program, because everyone I work with is court ordered,” Schaefer said.

Schaefer’s clients are sent to him for counseling when they are convicted of domestic violence charges.

“I’ve only had one guy in four years refer himself to this program. And then as soon as his wife came back, he left [the program]. So, it’s the court that gets these people here and makes them stay,” Schaefer said.

“Yeah, Issue 1 [DOMA] has definitely become a big problem for women who are in domestic violence situations,” said victim advocate Kathy Mull, who is the VITAL Program Coordinator at the Phoenix Connection in Bowling Green.

“The majority of the women who report domestic violence [in the area] are in live-in situations and they’re not married,” she said. “I think that’s going to cause a huge problem.”

In Wood County, records show more abuse against unmarried people than against married people in Ohio statewide averages.

Although Wood County records show that the majority of victims are live-in partners, statewide percentages show that most victims fall into one of three categories: “wife,” “live-in partner,” or “other.” This is according to statistics from 2003 from the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Identification and Investigation. These statistics were recorded before DOMA went into effect.

Across the state of Ohio in 2003, about 17 percent of reported victims of domestic violence were live-in partners.

Another chunk of reported victims fell into the category of “other,” which was another 14 percent of the study. Wives were about 20 percent of victims and husbands at 7 percent, with a statewide total of 50,247 reported victims in 2003.

The only category of victims that showed smaller percentages than husbands were former spouses at 2 percent and law officers at less than one percent of reported victims.

Wood County’s Domestic Violence Task force is a group of professionals who “have a stake in the issue,” including law enforcement officers and social service providers, Cubberly said.

The task force began in the late 1980s, but it stopped meeting about three years ago, task force chair Cubberly said. Cubberly reunited the task force at the beginning of this year, and members plan to meet monthly. Last Thursday was the group’s third meeting this year.

“We’re all going to get together and we’re going to see if the county and this area is doing everything they can in response to domestic violence,” he said.

“[So far, we’re] just trying to analyze where we are and see where the loopholes are,” Cubberly said. “And I think this whole domestic violence law issue is just another thing that’s come up in the last 3 months.”

“We feel like we’re doing a pretty decent job,” he said and added, “but we’re interested in being more proactive and taking an more of educational stance and getting more education out there, because [domestic violence] is a huge issue that many times does not get addressed until its too late.”