NCJ Number
108084
Journal
Annual Survey of American Law Issue: 4 Dated: (October 1986) Pages: 839-862
Date Published
1986
Length
24 pages
Annotation
This article examines recent trends in family law relating to domestic violence: the movement toward eliminating the marital exemption from State rape statutes; novel uses of expert testimony to support a battered woman's plea of self-defense; and special evidentiary considerations necessary to protect abused children.
Abstract
Courts are recognizing that both civil and criminal actions in the context of domestic violence often necessitate the abandonment of outmoded structures of common law or inflexible evidence rules. First, a review of cases illustrates how a groundswell of reform in most State legislatures is correcting the historic injustice whereby the law allowed husbands to rape their wives without fear of prosecution. An increase in sympathy for victims of domestic violence is revealed by the line of 'battered women syndrome' cases in which courts have accepted expert testimony to explain the special circumstances under which criminal defendants have acted against their battering spouses. Other cases show how creative approaches to evidentiary procedure have promoted both treatment for and prosecution of child abusers. 194 footnotes.