I want to get a tripod, right?

I feel like I'm like, we should go to these cabinets.

I can sit over there then.

People come in and just do this in this room over here.

So um yeah, maybe Jack or something.

I'll probably sit back there too.

Hi.

Good morning.

But yeah, whenever you want to jump in, and then I'll send you up, but they taught me how to do this.

Okay.

Yeah.

Hey, how are you?

Nice.

My little was you really are so good at this stuff.

Good morning.

Oh my god.

How are you guys?

I'm so sorry for the late.

No, it's I was on my computer that late at night.

Oh yeah, yeah.

I don't know if you saw the one came up from Northwestern or nine thirty.

I was like literally in bed with like one eye, and I thought I sent it to you.

I would also like three argumentations.

Perfect.

Okay.

Oh good.

Okay.

Good.

Good.

Yeah, we have great lineup.

Um I we had asked like we can be the um presented uh working group and they thought it was for this, so they had like a whole team coming, so I'm like, we'll just put them in.

Oh yeah, that's what I you know, so that would like I was like, oh Lisa, but I'm like, whatever.

Yeah.

So um and actually the presentation was on Korea's law, which we're talking about.

Yeah.

Good.

Um good.

That'll be oh thank you.

Yeah, I'll leave that.

Yeah, so we got a uh and then Renata is at the yeah, um she's with Carmen.

Yeah, with Carmen.

Oh, that's great that they're doing it together.

Yeah, it's really great.

Yeah, so she's gonna talk about the overnight hours.

Her slides were not approved in time.

So she her and Kerm are just gonna use ours.

Like you know, so Carmen's just gonna once the size are approved, we'll put her in a working group.

Um, but I know that uh Commissioner and I was um interested in just like the updates and uh over an hour so it's hot.

So um interesting.

Well there's been changes, there's proposed changes to it.

Um I wouldn't say cut a shift.

Okay, yeah, yeah.

Interesting.

Yeah, so we'll are you get one.

Thank you so much.

No, no, but no one has joined yet.

I have just met you.

Yeah, I don't know.

I'm gonna make sure you want to read it.

Yeah, yeah, right.

Um it might not work because you're an organization.

Oh yeah, that's right.

So we'll just wait here.

And then um, is it the out in the office video?

Yeah, I think you're in the last.

Your camera's on.

Uh yeah, that's the owl.

The owl is all the academic.

Yeah, it would go.

This is Dr.

Adams from Northwestern.

Hi, come on, Apple introduce you.

Uh lovely to meet you.

Hi, I'm up there.

Love me to meet you.

Hi, I'm Amy.

Nice to meet you.

Thanks for coming.

No, thank you for all the work you're doing.

So uh no, it's pretty uh yes, no, definitely.

Yeah, for sure.

To give you a rundown to the technology, so I have the presentation already.

Um I have a clicker that you're more than welcome to use to click on, or I can click for you and you can just say great.

Um I think you're fourth in the agenda, so we'll just pass this to you when it's written.

Fantastic.

Thank you.

Sounds good.

Oh, hey, it says message.

That's how you think we're gonna come up like that.

Oh, I think so.

Like I I'm not gonna sit here.

I'll I'll sit back.

Oh I think so like I I'm not gonna sit here I'll I'll sit back to Mars and then they can come on to here and then that person they can present here or they can on the other side.

Oh yeah and it's quicker so I'm gonna make sure that it can take it the only thing that's the board is like um update you know and then now the slides uh yeah um yeah that's just like yeah basically I can have to do or kind of like that kind of parliamentarian stuff uh and then we have to do a couple more parents like junk and sniff we survived um is it busy and then we can forward I know yeah well no thank you so much for just and like so far no well we hired someone to that oh this has been yeah oh there's a if she were just got the right power so I thought yeah yeah yeah but I'll just say it's crazy the four though that's where I was the chance it's working on multiple things I was like it wasn't um yeah necessary this is like a theory no so you have an experience honestly like I don't know actually like if it's here we should directly so the theory that one primary dirty um I mean uh get the I was similar with the network in terms of how we can have trying or don't think how we can use better data on the targeting effect no no it's the right version

I was doing this with the network in terms of how we kill me or we got trying to think how we can use that data on the marketing.

No, it's not a lot of people.

Like last time, he's up there.

Yes, or yeah.

So we start from the line for you.

Um they may have a program where they have a specific computer.

Yeah, I'll get back.

Okay, so um, I'll show you all this.

Sure, yeah.

Yes.

Yeah, you know, I guess the best here is our now.

Oh god, like screaming down.

Okay, so this is I might have you third.

Okay.

So Carmen and Renata are gonna go first.

Um Doctor Um is the only host from your mission and she's in the guy.

She's gonna go second.

She's coming in.

Uh virtually.

And then you guys could um shortly.

Yeah, it's a good idea.

Yeah, they used to be horizon expensive for the other home.

Okay, one thing that everybody's going out here.

So they're like very much.

Okay.

That's a funny guy.

Awesome.

Nice.

Finally, how are you?

I don't even have to know it.

No, she didn't expect I don't remember if you see available.

Well, I think we can just uh speakers like that.

Yeah, so if there's no public speakers at the show, that's the noise.

Anybody take a week in good morning everyone?

The hour of 10 a.m.

I'd like to um uh call the Chicago Cook County um violence against women task force meeting to order.

Um just uh we'll begin with public testimony.

Um do you know if there's any registered public speakers?

Uh no, there are no registered public speakers.

Oh, did you uh sign up?

Oh, right behind you now.

Right behind you, and as you're signing off, we'll read the um the rules uh for public testimony.

Yeah, members of the public who wish to testify have until 24 hours before the scheduled start of the meeting to register in order to do so.

Speakers will have three minutes to address the task force and will be alerted when they have one minute time remaining, when 30 seconds remain, and when time has expired.

Persons authorized to provide public testimony shall not use vulgar, abusive, discriminatory, profane or otherwise inappropriate language when addressing the task force.

Failure to act appropriately or failure to adhere to the time requirements may result in expulsion from the meeting and or disqualify the person from providing future testimony.

Written only comments providing prior to the start of the task force meeting will be made part of the meeting record and available to the members of the task force.

And then our first public speaker is Patricia, is that okay?

And you may be guess okay.

Um thank you very much for listening to me.

I had an issue where two Hispanic men literally pushed me with their open hands.

Now I went to court and they told me that I needed to get their names and addresses for for them to get summoned.

Now, at the same time, they put a restraining order, and I don't want to have any problems with them saying that I am stocking them.

I know that the law uh enforcement has their addresses.

Why do they make it so difficult for the persons that are being abused to hunt those persons up to one point I'm putting hunting because that's how I feel uh and get uh harassed again by those same persons saying that they are being prosecuted by the person that was assaulted?

And they were the guilty ones.

Unfortunately, they did um falsified information, not only that that they know politician, they have families in the law enforcement.

So what is the law enforcement covering them, protecting these persons?

If they did it to me, and I'm an elderly, I'm 67 years old.

To how many other women aren't they doing it?

They thought I was younger.

No.

Thank you.

Can we do something about that?

Thank you.

Um, we'll begin with a quick welcome from uh elder woman.

Um at this good morning, everybody.

Thank you all for being here.

I want to thank uh who county commissioner Almanai.

I know I see our another co county commissioner here as well.

Thank you all for being here for our third executive meeting here of the violence against women task force.

I see we also have the Chicago Police Department who will be here giving a presentation and thank you again, and also thank you and uh to Katie Katie for all the work that you do.

Thank you all.

Thank you, gentlemen.

Um, we just want to again um acknowledge all of the members um and uh thank them for their willingness uh to serve on the task force.

Um, for those that maybe new, this is the third executive meeting, and there are breakout um groups that also discuss specific topics, but um, we're gonna go right into the presentations, and I'll ask um Katie uh she could introduce her uh following presenter.

Sure, good morning, everyone.

Um our first presenters are uh Carmen Navarra Jacone and Renata Steele.

Uh Carmen is with Chicago Sammy Saving Renata is with the Office of the Chief Judge.

Um, thank you both so much for uh being here today.

Okay, okay.

Good morning, and good morning, Commissioner Case.

Good morning.

Thank you for joining us.

Um we're gonna jump right into this, and this is what we mean about uh working together.

Um, so thank you for joining us tonight.

Um City of Chicago Cook County Violence Against Women Task Force.

Uh as uh Commissioner and I mentioned this is a our third executive meeting.

Um, try to advance this.

The reason we said in introduction to protective orders in Cook County is because every county has uh different processes depending on what their judicial uh system is uh speaking strictly about Cook County, not the entire state.

Um, what are protective orders?

Uh documents issued by a judge that said the legal parameters intended to protect victims from future acts of domestic violence, stalking, sexual assault, workplace violence, threats involving a firearm, and or contact from their abuser.

One important thing to note, I promise I'm not going to read word for word every slide that comes in front of you, just so you know.

But the most important thing to know is that you do not need a police report to file a protective order.

Um, a lot of victims do not know that.

It's important for communities and individuals to know that you do not need a police report to file this protective order.

These are um the most frequently uh the types of orders of protection or protective orders, domestic violence order protection, a stocking no contact order, civil no contact order, firearms restraining order, commonly known as an FRO, workplace protection restraining orders.

For today, we're going to be speaking mostly about the domestic violence order protection.

Who can file one of these orders?

And Renata, feel free to jump in.

You don't have to wait till the um spouses and former spouses, children or stepchildren, parents, blood-related and in-law family members, roommates and ex-roommates, people who share a blood relationship through a child.

That's a difficult one to for people to um understand sometimes.

But if the the father of my children and I are not married, um, and his sister and I are having an issue, children, because we share um a relationship through her niece, her nephew, that qualifies.

So that's what that means.

We like to take the time to explain that.

People who have or have had a dating engagement or sexual relationship.

Types of orders of protection.

Um, an emergency order of protection is done ex parte.

We're talking in civil court.

If the victim comes into court, fills out the paperwork, and you heard Amy at the last executive meeting describe the packet of the paperwork that needs to be hearing.

That hearing is done of the abuser or the respondent in that case is not usually in court on the emergency order.

It is just the victim telling their side.

If the judge issues the order, that's the emergency order.

There's a follow-up court date, 14 to 21 days after, but that's the emergency.

There are interim orders of protection.

Those can be issued following an emergency for any number of reasons.

Either there was not service, the respondent wants a continuance to go ahead and get uh hire a lawyer for themselves for many reasons.

They can issue an interim that can be good for another 30 days or so till the next court date.

And then a plenary order.

Um plenary orders are after a hearing, those can be good for the duration of a case in criminal court, but in civil specifically, it can be good for up to two years or up to two years after the release if the person was incarcerated.

These are the steps to obtaining an order of protection.

So once the case is filed with the clerk of the circuit court, um, which is Mariana Scaropolis' office, the petition is heard by a judge.

The judge will determine if an emergency order will be granted or for future hearing must be scheduled with both parties.

Uh, what that means is after hearing or reading the petition and the allegations outlined in that petition, the judge is the one who determines whether an emergency exists.

If the judge determines an emergency exists, the judge will then issue that order.

If the judge determines that there is no emergency, the judge can deny the order, but enter and continue the petition for a hearing.

So that is only the judge determines that there is no state's attorney, there's not the advocates.

Uh, that's the judge's responsibility to determine whether an emergency exists.

The petitioner will receive a copy of all orders signed by a judge.

So whether an order is entered or denied, whether a petition is continued, um, that victim walks out with a copy of um all the paperwork.

The orders are then sent to the Cook County Sheriff's Office to serve the respondent, uh, the abuser with a summons for a future court date.

So even if the order is denied, if the petition is entered and continued, all of that paperwork still gets transmitted from the clerk's office to the sheriff for service on the respondent.

The next hearing will determine the disposition of the order.

In most cases, it will determine how long the order will be in effect.

So what that means is going back to what I said previously is that hearing, if it's an emergency order, the respondent served and both parties are in court, and now there's a hearing in front of a judge.

Um, after that hearing, um, that judge will decide whether that order will be a plenary order, whether whether it'll be vacated, whether the order is going to be terminated, um, but it's after that hearing, the judge makes the determination.

Sorry, did you want to?

Oh no, not at all.

Um, so what can a judge order?

Um, an order is basically instructions, um, orders to the respondent or to the abuser that are mandated by law.

There are uh lots of legal remedies that are court ordered, including the following.

Exclusive possession of the residence, which means if I'm the one, if I'm the victim and I filed the order of protection and I live at 123 Main Street, and I ask that the abuser not be allowed at 123 Main Street, and the judge has granted that order, um, then the respondent, the abuser is not allowed at 123 Main Street.

Um, if he shows up at 123 Main Street or she shows up at 123 Main Street, that is a violation of the order and they can be arrested.

Plus city of return of minor children.

Um, if the judge orders that the children need to be returned to the petitioner if the abuser has taken the children, um, that's one of the remedies that the court can order.

Uh, additional prohibited addresses can be ordered.

For example, order the abuser, the respondent to stay away from schools, work addresses, um, uh daycare centers, anything like that.

Uh visitation parameters.

Usually, if there's already a case in uh domestic relations where there's a visitation schedule, um, those hearings um will the follow up follow-up hearing will be with the judge in that um domestic relations case to change or add any additional visitation uh parameters and firearms prohibition or civil warrants related to Kareen Olet's law, which you'll hear more about in a later presentation.

So there's SCOPI, Rolling Meadows, Maywood, Bridgeview, and Marphone.

There's also a 555 West Harrison and at the Daily Center as well.

They've set up a system, which I'm sure Renata or the Chief Judge, Kate Nolan can talk about.

If they show up at the Daily Center, there is a way to have your case heard remotely.

Also online, you can fill out an easy form.

And there's also an overnight program.

And I want Renata to talk about the overnight OP process because that's an important tool that the Office of the Chief Judge has implemented working with all the stakeholders to make it available for victims.

Thank you, Carmen.

That's great.

So with respect to just following up on the different ways in which somebody can access the court system when requesting an order of protection.

And I am going to can everyone hear me?

Yes.

I'm going to limit this to orders of protection under the Illinois Domestic Violence Act, which are filed under the Illinois Domestic Violence Act and our civil proceedings.

So on the court's website, and the court's website is Cook County Court IL.gov.

I'll repeat that cook county court IL.gov.

There is a lot of information about how to obtain an order of protection, what it means to have a family and household relationship, the different ways in which you can access the court, addresses for all the suburban districts, so and connections to support services, the Illinois Domestic Violence Hotline, and other resources that survivors of domestic violence may need.

And which means that we're pulling judges off the bench every week.

We're using staff that we already have, and we are allowing remote access to petitions for orders of protection under the IDVA, seven days a week, overnight on the weekends, and during the day on Saturday and Sunday.

So the hours are Monday through Friday, 9 p.m.

to 3 a.m.

and Saturday and Sunday, 1 p.m.

to 6 p.m.

Currently, that is not available on court holidays.

Information about how to access the after hours program is included in every domestic incident notice that CPD gives someone when they're reporting an incident of domestic violence.

It is available on flyers throughout the community and also on the court's website.

But through that program, we partner with Illinois Legal Aid Online, which is a wonderful resource that is not just limited to information about orders of protection, but for attorneys and for self-represented litigants that have questions about any legal processes throughout the state of Illinois.

So we partner with them.

They've created an easy form, which is essentially a guided questionnaire, and they've created this specifically for our pilot, a guided questionnaire that helps individuals answer the questions or get the information together that needs to then be populated into the petition for order of protection, which is a little bit different than if you're walking into a courthouse.

If you're walking into a courthouse, you're you typically given blank court forms and you have to complete those.

What's nice about the easy form process through ILEO, which is available overnight, we're working on making it available during the day as well.

Um, is that it asks in very simple terms questions that virtually anyone can answer, and then it auto-populates all that information, types it into the petition, creates an emergency, a draft of the emergency order, um, and then through Illeo's website can be emailed directly to the clerk.

So we partner with the clerk's office as well.

So there is a duty clerk, two duty clerks that are assigned overnight to help process paperwork as it comes in through a LEO.

And once the clerk has processed that, it is emailed to a court coordinator.

Um, I also have to give a shout out to Lashonda O'Quinn, who is here.

She is sitting in this room and she is the supervisor for the OCJ for the after hours pilot.

And when I tell you about the numbers that we've seen and the orders that we've issued, um, all of that credit goes to Lashonda because she oversees the program, she supervises the coordinator, so there's also a duty coordinator.

Um, and she it would not be what it is without her.

Um, so huge, a huge thanks to Lashonda.

Um so once somebody completes the easy form, it gets populates into the petition for the order of protection, it gets emailed to the court coordinator and the duty judge.

So this is all remote, everyone is remote.

Everyone is remote.

The judge can review the petition.

And when the judge is ready, and this all usually happens within about an hour, when the judge is ready, they open up a Zoom.

The petitioner has information on how to access the Zoom.

The judge holds this emergency remote order of protection hearing via Zoom.

Zoom records it in case there needs to be a transcript in the future.

The judge can make their ruling, sign an order remotely, send that back to the clerk.

The clerk processes it, meaning enters it, puts it into odyssey, immediately sends it to leads for entry into the law enforcement database, and then it goes out seven days a week to civil process with the sheriff's office for service.

So it goes out the next day.

Oh, the most important thing is that we couldn't do this without our advocacy community.

And so when we started this pilot, uh, Connections for Abused Women and Their Children was the first organization and the only organization that partnered with us.

Also couldn't have done it without them.

So they have staff that's available overnight when if anybody needs assistance, either in filing for an order of protection or needs other wraparound services, because the reality is that an order of protection is not always what someone needs when they're in crisis and they might need housing, transportation, shelter, um counseling.

There's a million things that a survivor may need.

Um I apologize.

But so the connections for abused women and their children partner with us, but also the Illinois Domestic Violence Hotline has victim information resource advocates that are available 24 hours a day.

And they essentially answer calls from survivors that need assistance or questions about this process.

They help screen and identify whether or not somebody is able to access the court system remotely.

Do they have Zoom access?

Do they need help setting up Zoom?

Um, do you are they in a safe place to have this hearing?

Do they need other wraparound services at that time?

And so once that call is made, and this is all voluntary, so always thinking about agency for survivors, they make the call, they make the decision about whether or not they want to do this on their own, if they want to reach out to an advocate.

So everywhere throughout the Easy Forum process and everywhere throughout anywhere where this information is advertised, like in terms of how to get an order of protection, there is always the Illinois Domestic Violence Hotline for people to reach out to to help navigate to connect to other services, including legal aid resources and things like that.

So if I am a survivor who is completing the easy form, I'm constantly blasted on every page.

Do you need any help with this?

Call the Illinois Domestic Violence Hotline.

The Bureau are available 24-7, and they can either make a warm handoff to connections for abused women and their children.

So the advocacy group, or if connections for abused women and their children are at capacity for the evening, the bureaus are also trained to do the same work that the connections for abused women and their children advocates do, which is walk somebody through this petition, help them complete it, and provide any additional follow-up services or connection to a legal advocate for future proceedings.

So that is the after hours program.

The other thing that I wanted to mention briefly was that we also instituted a few years ago a partnership with the domestic relations division.

So I think many of you know there's a big difference between the domestic relations division and the domestic violence division.

Domestic relations handles cases that involve parentage, child support, divorce, and there might be an order of protection that is filed in conjunction with those cases.

Independent protective order cases where there is no other pending case are handled at 555 West Harrison or one of the suburban districts as independent cases.

However, we have a partnership now where if somebody were to walk in to 555 West Harrison and learn through the clerk's research that they have a domestic relations case pending, we are able to coordinate with the domestic relations division with their staff to have the judge in the domestic relations division hear that emergency order of protection petition.

It gets filed under the D case number.

And we have Zoom booths at 555 West Harrison, and we have staff that helps facilitate that on both sides.

And the staff 555 West Harrison give information to the petitioner about what happens next.

They get all the same information that we give everyone, which includes again information about resources that are available, but then they sit at 555 without having to leave, without having to travel to the daily center, and they have their Zoom hearing with the domestic relations judge.

We have a reverse partnership.

So if somebody is confused, and again, just acknowledging that our court system is complicated and challenging for most people to understand and navigate, if someone's confused and does not have a domestic relations case that's pending, and they come to the daily center and they are petitioning for an independent order of protection, then we can have them zoom in from the daily center to see one of our judges.

And the purpose of all of that is continuity of care and understanding that well one, we don't want conflicting orders being issued by different judges that are um addressing issues that families might be experiencing and also continuity of care in the sense that we would like the judge who is going to hear the case in the future to be able to make those decisions.

And the same thing goes for the domestic relations cases.

Those judges have likely a lot more experience with the families and understand what orders are in place.

And so they are better in a better position to hear those requests.

So that is oh numbers so in terms of the after hours pilot um it has been a huge success I think um our partnerships have been wonderful um and since September of 2022 there have been a total of 4,345s filed.

So this data is accurate as of Sunday of this week 4,345 petitions filed just during those limited hours overnight and on the weekends.

This does not include the thousands of petitions that are filed throughout the county every day.

Of those four roughly 4300 petitions filed 34 357 EOPs were granted by the judges who hear this overnight.

And then approximately 2800 of those cases benefited from the assistance and connection to advocacy services mostly through connections for these women and their children and then an overflow with the network.

And then another factor that we track is whether a case has an associated police report about 1588 of those 4000 petitions had a police report associated with them.

And we do hear petitions that are being filed pursuant to a domestic relations case after hours and of those 4,345 petitions 627 of them were filed pursuant to a domestic relations case and those just return we don't have the same process that we have during the day overnight but those return to the domestic relations judge at the next court date and they're filed under the D case number.

So I don't know if there are any questions or if I missed anything.

Yes Commissioner Sams.

Thank you so much.

I wanted to know if the percentages that you reported out for the overnight are those higher than average for the ones that are filed during the day no not even close um we can see as many as 120 new requests for an order each day.

So our numbers are in the you know over 1000 for the year filed during the day or around the 1000 mark filed during the day.

And that's just a 555 West Harrison.

So that doesn't include the suburban districts or the daily center.

Yeah also to add to that um sometimes uh those emergency orders that are filed today for example they're up again three weeks from now right 14 to 21 days.

So 14 to 21 days from now at that court hearing that initial emergency order is is expired but a new order has to be issued.

So it may be the same case or the same um issue or it's uh if it wasn't served it may be an alias summons they have to go out for service again.

So each order is a new order which is why there's so many new orders every day.

And could you say one more time what the times are for the yeah of course and again this is all available on the court's website as well but I will tell you all here so Monday through Friday 9 p.m to 3 a.m and Saturday and Sunday 1 p.m to 6 p.m and that excludes court holidays at the moment is there a reason that it's um only one to six on Saturday staffing reasons so that was that was one of the issues is that we don't this because this started as a pilot and we're still figuring out you know how best to operate this and what additional staff we need um we would need more judges and like I mentioned um we're so incredibly busy throughout the county that we just don't have the capacity for staff and judiciary right now to extend it beyond that.

But we are reviewing and looking at you know current data and thinking about what we would need and making proposals and hoping that we can expand it further or you know make any adjustments that are necessary based on what we feel the community is telling us they need.

Of course.

And something I would add is that you also need clerks.

You also need so it's just not, you know, operation of judges.

It's everybody else that kind of helps it running.

So, you know, um, just like it was mentioned, there are recommendations.

There's a working group that's work looking at this to propose official recommendations to the new chief judge beach um in order if there is any adjustments for those to be considered.

And commissioner, the goal was just to reduce the gaps in time when someone can't access the court and just to you know make sure that there is at least a chunk of time each day that someone can.

On the other hands, I had a question regarding the um the drop-off uh folks following up with some of those.

Um, so we've discussed this on the board uh many times.

Um do you have you been able to identify why that happens and is there any additional support systems that the survivor may need or the petitioner?

So are you referring, Commissioner, to the drop-off that Carmen mentioned?

So the ones that are followed through.

Also where the petitioners don't come to court.

Yes.

Yeah.

Well, so and then and this is just anecdotally, but since we have so since the pandemic and since we've allowed remote access, we've actually seen a significant decrease in the drop-off because where people may have had transportation issues, financial impediments, or you know, couldn't leave work.

They're actually now zooming in.

So we're seeing less of a drop-off, which means we have a higher volume, which of cases to manage, but we don't want people to drop off.

But I think there are so many reasons why someone may, and if we have access to them, so at every this is why we try to capture people, we try to meet them where they are, we try to capture them when we can.

So at the first visit to the courthouse, we give them a packet of information that includes a ton of resources, a ton of information in anticipation of the fact that they might get home.

We don't want to bombard them with too much.

We know we can't tell them too much in that moment.

They're in crisis, but maybe they're home and they're thinking about am I coming back?

Do I want to do this?

Um and they have some of those resources available, and most importantly, they have access to the hotline to court advocates.

Um, but we see drop-off for a variety of reasons.

I think many of us are familiar with the statistic that it takes a survivor of domestic violence at approximately eight efforts, eight attempts to actually leave their abusive partner.

Um that means, and you know, each attempt can look different.

It could look like you make it to the you know the front steps of the courthouse and turn around.

Um, it could make it to your third court data on a protective order, and then you decide you want to give it another try because you have children together or because you can't financially support yourself.

And so for many different reasons, people will choose to drop off.

Um when we have access to petitioners, when someone is coming in and saying, I want to drop this order.

Um, our judges do typically a very good job of asking them, making sure that they're making this decision willfully, that no one is coerced them.

And we always try to make them feel welcome.

So, in recognition of the fact that we likely will see them again.

Um, we leave them that agency, let them decide what's best for them in that moment, and then let them know that we're here if anything changes in the future.

Um, but there are, yes, there are so many different reasons why somebody might drop off, and we do the best that we can to let them know that there are support services and counseling services available.

I think a big part of it for survivors to reduce that, Commissioner, is education.

Um, you know, education about the dynamics of domestic violence.

It is one of the most counterintuitive things that we encounter in our line of work.

Um, and many survivors just haven't had the benefit of even understanding the level of risk that they might be exposed to or why certain things are happening in their relationship.

So education, counseling, these are all the things that help support somebody and make them actually in a better ready to participate in any type of legal process.

It's easier.

And I think that that's important for the task force to take into consideration specifically because you do have the information regarding you know additional resources and what that means for the reduction of the drop-off.

I think that's important.

Um any other questions?

If not, we will turn it back to Katie for our next presenter.

Thank you.

No, thank you.

Okay, thank you so much.

And um hope that Renata to share those numbers um and uh send them out with the meeting outs.

Um our next presenter is gonna uh join us virtually.

Her name is Dr.

April Zioli, she's a national expert on firearm restraining orders um and also civil orders.

Um she's worked in almost every state in uh the country, and this is uh first time she's been focused on Illinois.

So we're really excited uh to have her join us.

Um and Dr.

Zioli, hopefully uh you can uh this will work out.

I'm confident it will work out.

Oh, hold on, I have to um sorry.

Uh first I wanna thank the executive committee for having me here today.

Um, I'm gonna talk about firearm restraining orders and orders of protection and if yeah, and Karina's law for intimate partner violence.

Next slide, please.

So firearm restraining orders and Karina's law are both life-saving tools.

What they do is remove firearms from someone who is too risky at the moment to have them.

And firearm restraining orders are broader and more flexible than orders of protection in Karina's law.

Firearm restraining orders can be used in cases of threats of self-harm or suicide, threats of harm to others, including intimate partner violence, threats of mass shootings or mass harm, and threats of violence, violent extremism and any sub-threat thereof.

Um, and they require behaviors as evidence that somebody might engage in even riskier behaviors.

So they can't have a firearm right now, or there might be danger.

Karina's law, on the other hand, only applies to orders of protection.

So it removes the firearms or designates who will remove the firearms when someone is prohibited from possession by an order of protection.

Both of these are civil procedures, and both of these may co-occur with criminal actions.

Next slide, please.

Sometimes, you know, an intimate partner violence case might require an a firearm restraining order or FRO.

It might be an appropriate intervention in a multitude of cases.

For example, if a if a survivor doesn't want to file an order of protection, doesn't want the multitude of remedies that that would come with, but does want the firearm removed, then the firearm restraining order is probably the way to go.

And unlike the orders of protection, law enforcement officers can petition for this firearm restraining order on somebody else's behalf for for that victim survivor.

It might also be petitioned for if law enforcement come to the scene.

It is an incredibly dangerous scene, and they decide that they cannot leave the firearm there.

The firearm has to be removed.

Then they might want to use that firearm restraining order because it might take a while for that victim survivor to decide they want an order of protection, and maybe they won't decide that ever.

Um, you know, so law enforcement can take that action of getting a firearm restraining order and removing the firearms to make the situation a bit safer.

This is harm reduction.

There might also be kind of as I said already, an urgent need to remove firearms.

So an order of protection may be something you know the victim survivor is looking into, but the firearm restraining or restraining order process can move much more quickly than that order of protection or OOP process can.

So it's advantageous to use that.

Everybody's going to have you know ideas of which one is best for them.

Uh this decision about whether to apply for an order of protection or a firearm restraining order or both or neither, needs to be based on the circumstances of each situation.

And ideally discussed with the victim survivor, if it is a law enforcement officer deciding whether to petition for the fro or FRO.

Um, you know, so the survivor knows what's going to happen.

Um, and indeed in the statute, it has notification of targets of violence, you know, embedded in there.

So care should also be given to preserving the survivor's agency and autonomy when considering this.

And the step that seems safest, the step that is least likely to um result in retaliation or increase the danger, is ultimately the step that should be taken.

Next slide, please.

A petitioner for an order of protection or an IPV survivor should not have to petition for an FRO in cases in which they already have a firearm restricted restriction granted for an OOP.

I live in Michigan, we have domestic violence restraining orders, we call them PPOs, personal protection orders.

We have our version of the FRO.

And we hear law enforcement officers say, well, if they want the firearm removed, they should get the FRO.

And they already have the order of protection with the firearm restriction.

We don't have something like Karina's law in Michigan.

You have it.

So that is what the firearms are intended to be removed under for orders of protection.

It's right there.

It should be used.

We heard a little bit earlier about survivors are in crisis when they're filing for orders of protection.

And they are.

This is often the moment when they're leaving the abuser, the abusive partner, or maybe they've already left and the violence has continued and there's been some very traumatic violent event.

At any rate, this is a dangerous time when people are in crisis.

And it is difficult for them to go through the order of protection process, you know, first and foremost, we heard about that easy uh petition, which I think is a great idea and will be recommending to Michigan.

Um, you know, but it's made easy for a reason.

It's made easy, you know, because this is a crisis time, and it's going to be difficult for people to do this without any advice, without you know, somebody telling them what goes where.

Now we do have advocates, you know, for domestic violence cases, and that's great.

Um, but then asking that person to also go through the firearm restraining order process to get the restriction on the OOP implemented is really a lot for that survivor to handle.

It's asking them to go through two separate court processes against the abusive partner or ex-partner that have three different standards, though, standards of evidence, so that the firearm restriction on the first order can be implemented.

Next slide, please.

And I want to stick with that three different standards of evidence piece for just a moment.

The order of protection has standard of evidence that is the preponderance of evidence.

That's that first scale that you see.

Um, it's slightly tipped in one direction.

Preponderance of evidence is more likely true than not true.

Um, I've heard it described as 50% plus a feather.

You know, it is a relatively low evidentiary standard, and it's civil court, so that you know makes sense.

We'd never see that in criminal court.

Um is potentially the easiest standard of evidence, you know, for this domestic violence or intimate partner violence survivor to reach with her case.

For an ex parte firearm restraining order, it's a higher level of evidence.

It's probable cause, and that's that middle scale of justice you see that's tipped even more.

Probable cause is a reasonable belief.

So in this case, it's a reasonable belief that were the respondent to have a firearm, that there would be a grave risk of harm to self or others.

That's you know, that's a bit higher.

So what they brought to the order of protection hearing may not meet that level for the ex parte FRO.

And then the plenary FRO has clear and convincing as the standard, and that's the third scale where it's very heavily tipped to one side.

Clear and convincing is a high probability that it's true.

Um, it's substantially more likely to be true than not true.

And so this is, you know, even if you got the ex parte FRO, you may not meet the level of evidence required for the plenary FRO.

And when you're doing all of these and trying to meet all these evidentiary standards, you're doing this under the rules of evidence, which I'm going to guarantee, not having surveyed the population of Illinois, that most people don't know evidentiary rules or standards and how to meet them.

So we're asking them to know what constitutes hearsay, know what factors the court is going to look at in deciding the FRO, know how to present evidence.

And they very likely don't have a lawyer with them.

This is a civil proceeding.

They don't need a lawyer.

And often they're not going to be able to afford a lawyer because they're in the process of leaving.

So we're asking them to figure all this out on their own while they're in a period of crisis, which some will do, a lot won't.

Next slide, please.

Well, just referring back to that other slide.

You know, we may be in a case where they get the order of protection.

They're told to get the FRO to have it implemented, and they can't get the FRO.

They just can't meet that standard of evidence.

Next slide.

So I have done a study still working on analyses of extremist protection order or firearm restraining order petitions in six states: California, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Maryland, and Washington.

And we literally read 6,634 of these cases.

So we know what these are being submitted for, what evidence people are bringing, whether they're being granted and denied, at least in these six states.

And the precipitating event is that in is that event that makes someone decide I'm going to petition for this firearm restraining order.

It's it's the straw that broke the camel's back.

And you can see IPV is that top row.

So an average of 21% of these petitions were for intimate partner violence, or one in every five.

Next slide, please.

And this is what these cases looked like.

13% of these 1,402 cases involved the use of a firearm.

A firearm was shot.

61% involved a firearms threat.

So someone's the respondent to the uh firearm restraining order said, I'm gonna shoot you, or they literally pointed a gun at the person.

Something like that.

42% included non-firearm violence, so hit, kicked, strangled, you know, the basic non-firearm violence.

And 19% had non-firearm threats in there.

So someone might have just said, I'm gonna kill you, but not specified.

It was gonna be a firearm that they used.

90% of the respondents had possession of a firearm.

So that 61% that made a firearm threat could make good on that threat.

And the the victim knew it.

30%, 36% of respondents were arrested at the scene of IPV that law enforcement came to.

Why wasn't it more?

Any law enforcement officer will tell you.

A lot of times they leave the scene, you know, the abusive partner.

So maybe they arrest them later, maybe there's an investigation and then they arrest, maybe they don't arrest.

Um, but we could only know of the ones that were arrested at this scene because that's what that's what was in the case file.

Next slide, please.

So intimate partner violence involves uh extremist protection orders, firearm restraining orders, risk protection orders that they call them in Florida, um quite a bit, or at least again, one in five of these orders or petitions involve intimate partner violence.

They can be incredibly useful.

I have done another study, which we're also writing up, of law enforcement in Florida in Maryland asking them about their FROs.

You know, how do they use them?

When do they want to use them, different circumstances?

And this one law enforcement officer talked about risk protection orders, their RPOs and intimate partner violence.

And he said, there was one situation where I RPO'd a gentleman after he shot at the vehicle carrying his wife and children.

And he had a violent history, but he was allowed to carry guns legally because he was not a convicted felon.

I initiated the RPO and went through the RPO process, and from there he was served the RPO.

He had his firearms taken away, which kept his wife and his kids safe, you know, at least from him legally obtaining firearms.

And then, you know, it gave his wife a chance to kind of re-evaluate the relationship and then make better and safer choices for her and her kids or their kids.

And then the firearm, well, I believe his RPO got extended an additional year after that.

So this law enforcement officer, you know, had really great grounds to petition for the RPO and it was granted.

And he used it to create this space where at least there wasn't a danger of firearm violence, and people could do what they needed to do.

Um, hopefully the abused partner and the kids were able to gain greater safety even than simply having the firearm removed.

Um, but we heard this from law enforcement in both Maryland and Florida that it's a good tool to use when you know leaving that firearm in play puts people in danger.

Next slide, please.

Thank you very much for listening to a Michigander in this um presentation.

And I am happy uh to talk further about this problem solve with you.

One of my jobs in the state of Michigan is to help with the implementation implementation of our extremist protection order law, training law enforcement and training judges, training anybody who wants it, um, helping write protocols and everything like that.

So if you like, you can contact me and we'll see what we can do.

Thank you.

Thank you, Sasha.

Well, um, begin with questions.

I don't know if there's any from task rumors.

Kenny, did you have anything else to add?

We really appreciate your time and and all these slides will be sent to everybody.

We have questions.

Oh, I'm so sorry.

I just really quick uh a comment.

I wanted to say thank you for that presentation.

It's great.

Um, I think it's really important to look at what other jurisdictions are doing nationwide and learn from each other.

So I appreciate this perspective.

Um, you know, for those interested in digging further, King County and Washington is really an amazing state when it comes to addressing firearms relief.

Um, I just wanted to underscore what you mentioned, which I think is really important about this being an assessment that's made on a case-by-case basis, because the reality is that if someone is getting a firearms restraining order, the only relief that's available under an Illinois firearms restraining order is to take a weapon away or to prohibit somebody from having one.

Um, that may not always be the safest option for a lot of victims because there is there is no additional remedy that prohibits abuse.

There's no remedy that limits contact.

Um, and unfortunately, what we see in our experience um is that oftentimes if a respondent is frustrated by something by the way the system's responding, if his weapons are taken away, the person that that is likely to bear the brunt of that frustration is going to be those that are closest to him.

Um and our firearms restraining order act has a very, very limited provision that requires someone who is seeking a firearms restraining order to notify an intimate partner who may be a risk.

Um because of that, uh I just want us all to be aware and just careful about this, because um if a petitioner isn't aware that this is happening, there could be some form of retaliation.

Um and the other the other thing that I wanted to mention um was, and again, very very helpful to lay everything out in terms of um the evidentiary requirements.

Uh so while the preponderance of evidence is what's required with respect to all the remedies and the order of protection.

If someone is seeking a warrant pursuant to Korean's law under the IDBA, that is a there's a probable cause requirement there as well.

So just to clarify.

But that's it.

Thank you so much.

Thank you, Renan.

Appreciate that.

Okay.

I am fine.

Okay, okay.

Okay.

So Dr.

Zale, I don't know if you can hear us, but thank you so much.

Um okay.

I think we're good.

Okay, I think we're good now.

Okay.

Um Dr.

Gill, if you can hear, thank you so much.

Um and uh and we'll be sending around the slides from today.

Um, and we'll be looking forward to future discussions with you.

So thank you so much for joining us.

Um next, we have uh deputy director Mike Meltien from the Chicago Police Department.

Um and I hope we're connecting Lieutenant Clark as well.

Um and so thank you for being here.

Yeah, good morning.

Uh everybody hear me okay.

Yes.

All right, good morning.

Uh, my name is Mike Milstein.

I use he and his pronouns.

I'm a deputy director with the Chicago Police Department's Office of Equity Engagement and Victim Services.

Um, I'm joined today by Lieutenant uh Jason Clark with our internal governmental affairs division um and Mariana Martinez, who's our assistant director for um market investment violence program.

Um again, just appreciate uh being here today and being able to talk about what CPB does with this task force.

Um, what we'll talk about today is um just some things that we have in place policy-wise and training-wise around how our officers respond to incidents involving gender-based violence and domestic violence, um, what some of our policies are, um, what some of the trainings that we are doing.

Um, we'll also talk about our victim services program and what our VICA specialists are doing, and then we'll close out on just talking about um some changes we've made to our search warrants policies as well as how we've integrated Korean's law search warrants um into our processes.

So move on to the next slide.

Great.

So just to kind of start, I won't read this whole slide, but we just wanted to highlight that CPD um does have a gender-based violence policy.

Uh and to our knowledge, CPD is actually the only law enforcement agency that had a standalone gender-based violence policy.

This policy is intended to really just kind of talk about gender-based violence as to what it is, an umbrella to many different types of incidents involving gender, um, and really just reaffirm a department policy that our goal as CPD is to reduce gender-based violence in our communities by providing trauma informed and victim-centered services to all victims and survivors of crimes with uh a gender-based violence incident component and an unbiased effective manner to improve the department's response to these incidents.

Um, and just kind of highlighting again talking about what gender-based violence is from a more of a law enforcement standpoint.

Before I also dive more in depth, I also just want to mention you'll see we use the term victim a lot um in our slides.

Obviously, in our practice, we tend to use victim and survivor um interchangeably.

Um, but just for today's purposes, I want to just use the term victim just from a more um legal perspective.

Uh just want to highlight some department policy that we have in place.

Um, again, we talked about um the gender-based violence incident policy.

We also have a handful of domestic incidence policies.

These are going to dive more in depth on how officers are going to respond to uh domestic incidents, uh, and then we have policies focused on sex assault and sex abuse, anti-stalking, orders of protections, and crime victim and witness assistance.

One thing that I want to slide is that we are currently in the process of reviewing all of these policies and we are inviting community to give us feedback.

We are doing monthly meetings with a handful of gender-based violence stakeholders and welcome anyone to give feedback on these policies.

We want to make sure that these are all up to date and as um forward-thinking as anyone is interested in giving feedback on any of our policies, um, please find me or Mariana after the meeting today.

We can definitely get you connected there.

Uh also department training.

So we do a handful of different training for officers across the departments on gender-based violence for training every recruit on gender-based violence.

We train them on domestic violence, sex as a cell, stocking, all of the policies you saw previously.

All of that they are receiving in recruit training when they first come and join the department.

We also conduct additional promotional training.

So when we have officers who are promoted to sergeants or sergeants promoted to tenants, they're also going to be getting an additional course in domestic violence as part of their promotional training, just to emphasize again, refresh them on what our policies are, but also talk specifically about what are their roles when they respond or handle incidents involving gender-based violence.

In 2022, we did an eight-hour course on gender-based violence.

And then this year, we actually just launched actually this week a three-hour refresher course again on gender-based violence.

That's those two courses are being delivered to the entire department, both sworn and civilian members, just to make sure that they understand again, gender-based violence, domestic violence, sex assault, all those policies and how we should be responding as a police department in trauma-informed ways and in ways that are survivor-centered, and to really take every incident seriously, make sure that we understand that domestic violence is not just an incident, it's actually a pattern.

And so we want to make sure that we instill that message within all of our officers.

And then we are also CPD committed to providing training on gender-based violence at a minimum every three years.

So moving forward, we will be doing training on GDV at a minimum every three years.

In some cases, we're doing it more frequently.

We also integrate principles or concepts of gender-based violence into other in-service trainings, but at a minimum, there'll be a standalone course on GBD every three years.

I'll shift now a little bit to talk about CPD's victim services program.

So just some of a brief history.

That person was there for about a decade, and then in the early 2000s, the department expanded that to uh increase to having four additional domestic violence advocates.

They started to provide some support to members of the public who were victims and survivors of domestic violence.

In 2021, the city was awarded a federal grant, which allowed CPD to expand victim services to non-fatal gun crimes.

That grant did expire in 2023, but the city then basically made those positions, that program part of the corporate budget.

So it continued through city funding.

And then in 2025, we ended up actually merging the titles or changing the title of the victim advocate to just be a victim specialist.

This was intended to try to eliminate any confusion around what a victim advocate is from a community-based perspective versus within CPD.

And then as of 2025, the CPD is funded, has the budget to provide victim services or victim specialists on a citywide basis.

So every CPD district, which is 22 districts, has uh staffing allowing them to have at least one domestic violence specialist and a non-fatal victim specialist.

Those non-fatal folks are doing services for individuals who are victims of any aggravated battery or any aggravated assault.

As part of this expansion, um, historically CPD's victim services and domestic violence program was always existed under CPD's community policing or CAF structure.

In 2025, we actually restructured that and separated victim services and domestic violence into its own standalone unit.

So there is now an actual standalone unit within CPD that is called the domestic violence program.

This is where all of our domestic violence specialists are housed.

Those folks are the ones who are going to be doing outreach to victims and survivors of domestic violence.

We also have staff who are auditing case reports for domestic related incidents.

They're helping to advise department on policies related to domestic and gender-based violence and also working to help develop training on PVD for CPD members.

We also coordinate events and engagements aimed at increasing awareness about domestic violence, ways to safely report and other available services for chickens and survivors.

Just to highlight what our process is that we instill with all of our victim specialists.

We recognize that the work that really goes into helping the survivor of domestic violence go through their journey really lies best with community-based agencies.

What we want to do is make sure that we can use our abilities to see access case reports to connect victims and survivors to those vital resources outside to the community.

So when an incident occurs, our victor specialists have access to those case reports relatively quickly, pretty much immediately.

Um and then they are tasked with doing outreach to those victims and survivors to connect with them and really to make sure that they know about what their rights are and inform them about the many different services and options available for them outside of CPD.

We always try to first and foremost encourage a victim or survivor to get connected with a community-based agency based on what their specific needs are.

Um we can help connect them, give them the information about what an agency does, how to get in contact with them, or in some cases, victims are willing to sign release of information uh forms with CPD, where we can then share their information with that agency, and then that agency can do the one uh that does a frack of outreach to those um individuals.

In some cases, uh victims at this point do not want to be connected with an agency.

Um we understand that we will then offer them or walk them through what we can provide them with or what we can do to help support them.

Um, we do have some things that we can try to start them with, um, but for ultimately our goal is to always get them connected with an agency outside of CPD.

Um so if someone does say to us, you know, I'm not ready to be connected with the agency, but I'm curious about what Arbitra specialists can do for them.

We'll walk them through what we can do, see how we can help them, if there is any place that we can't help them at.

Um, and then of course, there are many cases where we talk to someone and they say, you know what, we good for now, I don't need anything.

We say, okay, understand.

Um, you know, we'll leave it there.

However, we will always follow up with that person if additional case reports are generated where that person is also listed as a victim.

So we never lease them alone alone.

If another case report comes down the line or a week later, we'll reach back out to them and say just checking and seeking anything at this point.

Uh, some of the services that our team can provide.

Um, first and foremost, we always make sure that victims and survivors are aware of what their rights are, what their options are, um, and again, making sure that they know how to get connected with um community-based agencies.

All of our staff are trained in how to provide immediate crisis support or safety planning.

Um, we can help them start the process to um an advocate justice system or obtain order to protections.

Um, we will also serve as a liaison between victims and survivors and detectives assigned to their cases.

One thing I want to note here though is that we will never encourage or force a victim to talk to a detective.

If they choose to do so, we will help them coordinate that.

Um, but we also respect it if they should say that they do not want to talk to a detective.

Um, we are respect that as well.

And all of our staff are prohibited by policy from sharing any information about a victim or a case with a detective.

All that information has to stay between that victim and themselves unless we have written consent from that victim to share information with a detective.

Uh, we also will help them file crime confessation, um, as well as the any other services requested that we can provide will help to navigate.

Um, all of our specialists are trained in the 40-hour domestic violence training as well.

Uh, I want to highlight as well, CPD has uh it's part of a domestic violence multidisciplinary team.

This is a partnership between CPD, the Cook County State's Attorney's Office, uh, lifespan, family rescue, and connections for abused women and children.

This is designed to be a coordinated response between that really is intended to move away from just the police only response and integrates law enforcement, prosecution, and services by community-based providers into the response for domestic incidents.

This is a pilot program that exists right now in four districts where next slide.

Um an officer responds to a domestic incident.

Um, in addition to doing a domestic or a typical case report, officers will then ask or invite a domestic violence victim to complete a domestic violence assessment form.

Uh, those forms are intended to ask a series of questions, such as, you know, if there's been history of strangulation, threats of weapons, coercive control behaviors, stalking or isolation, or other escalating violence risk factors.

Uh, victims themselves can choose to fill these forms, they can choose not to.

Um, if they do fill out the forms, um, as part of that form, the victim can authorize CPD to share this assessment form with a domestic violence service provider who will then do the follow-up.

So if someone does fill out the form and says, yes, I authorize CPD to share this form.

Uh CPD will then share this form with either family rescue or connections for abuse women and children, as well as the safe security's office.

And then those service agencies are then able to access these forms and do direct outreach to these victims and survivors to try to connect them with services.

Um, like I mentioned, this is currently active in four districts.

Um, I think you know, from our perspective, this is a really great program that we value a lot.

I know Amy Fox was talking about it a little bit last week when she or last month when she was here.

Um, this is definitely a program that we would encourage looking at ways to expand obviously that requires additional funding, but um definitely one that we think is a great tool that really just again integrates um more survivor-centered services and connections with agencies into uh the police response that really makes it not just a police only response.

I'm going to shift now a little bit into Karina's Law warrants and just talking about some changes that we've made as a result of Karina's law.

So again, as we heard before, you know, when they uh court grants or issues an order for a search warrant as a result of Karina's law, that court or the clerk's office will then send the order over to our CPIC center.

CPIC stands for the Grant Prevention Information Center.

It's basically a 24-hour fusion center within CPD that has access to the entire department as well as other city agencies, local agencies, county, as well as state.

CPIC will get those orders whenever they are issued, and then they will send those orders over to our Bureau of Counterterrorism, who then assigns it to our FIT team, Fit Stance for Firearm Investigation Team.

Our FIT team is going to be the ones who are specially trained in conducting search warrants, executing search warrants, responding to more potentially violent incidents if they occur.

This is where all of the search warrants are going to come from is our FIT team.

So when a search warrant is issued by, you know, under Karina's law, it will eventually go over to our fit team who's going to be assigned to doing the investigative work and actually conducting and executing that search warrant when it comes time to.

I know it's a little hard to see.

Hopefully, folks have seen these forms before, but these are just to highlight the forms that have been created, both on the court side that someone is going to fill out when they go to court to request a search warrant to be completed.

It's obviously a heavy lift, a lot to put together.

But these are just some of the forms that CPD will receive.

There's also an additional tweet information sheet that just provides CPD with a little bit more information about the search warrant that helps us just prepare or plan a little bit better before we actually execute that warrant.

But we can definitely try to link.

I know it's large to see all the forms on the screen here.

This policy, as well as all search warrants, are covered by CPD's consent decree.

And I mentioned that because I want to emphasize that there are a lot of different legal requirements that are placed on CPD before we can even execute a search warrant.

And sometimes these legal requirements are things that we have to navigate when also looking at state law and executing actual search warrant.

The consent decree is a federally governed legal agreement between CPD, the city and the state attorney general's office.

It's monitored by the independent monitoring team and the attorney general's office and enforced by a federal judge.

And so any time that CPD could ever be in violation of one of our consent degree requirements, at any point, the attorney general's office or the judge could actually hold CPD in contempt of court for not following that.

And so I emphasize that because there are some restrictions or some requirements that CPD has to do per our federal agreement before we can even issue or execute a search warrant.

Some other items that are required include the requirement of the presence of a department supervisor and a female officer on site before we do any search warrant, as well as new limits on uh no what no knock warrants.

These are only limited to now situations where we have reason to believe that there are potentially more violent factors that could exist.

One thing that this agreement does include, though, is that it does require that CPD conducts an independent investigation to verify and corroborate or gather any additional information uh about a potential warrant before we execute it.

So that could be looking at any history of violence by the subject of the warrant, um the possible locations of firearms, presence of any vulnerable individuals such as children or people with disabilities, presence of pets, any potential security features within that home or the location that we're focusing on, um, and when the subject of that warrant is most likely to be at that location.

Sometimes this information is a little bit easier to gather, sometimes it's a little bit harder to gather.

Um I mentioned that again because I know the Karina's law requires that CPD executes the search warrant within I think 96 hours.

Sometimes this information is harder to gather.

And so it does take us time to gather this information, and we may have to request extensions of when we can issue a search warrant based on requirements that we have to gather this information per our federal agreements.

So just to kind of close out on some of the numbers that we have on uh Karina's law search warrants that we've been given since May 2025.

So since May, we've uh CPD has been um given 60 uh total number of search warrants um as a result of Karina's law.

Uh 41 of those we've had to go back and ask for extensions on.

Um, two have been executed and one has been returned.

What I want to emphasize on the executed number is that um two means that we've actually had to go out and issue or execute that search warrant.

However, a vast majority of search warrants that we've been giving have actually been able to be negated because that subject um willingly turns over the weapons before the actual search warrant needs to be executed.

Um of those 60 search warrants, we've actually been able to collect uh 30 firearms as a result.

Again, a majority of those um have not actually needed to be executed because that subject of the warrant um once they realize that there's a search warrant coming their way, they ended up just willingly panning over their firearms to CPD, um, which was then able to negate the need to actually execute the warrant.

That was a lot.

Um I will pause no great.

Um I'll pause there and yeah, turn it.

Okay, before we start with questions, what does return mean in the search warrants?

Return on a search warrant.

Um, you see, we only had one.

And actually, in that circumstance, there was some confusion on the 96 hours with weekends and holidays.

And we're our team uh originally told uh that the holiday, okay, we don't count that, or uh and turned out that wasn't the case.

So we were unable to execute that search warrant because it had expired, so it had to be returned.

Uh traditionally you're gonna see a lot of our warrants will be pronegations.

And most of the time it's because it is difficult it is for a lot of these petitioners to fill out the order protection packets because we know how long they are.

Um the info she needs that we have can be a little confusing.

Um, and that's what it'd be nice to get a lot more help in the beginning in the front end.

Uh because for them they have to articulate what basically amounts to probable cause for us to be able to execute that warrant is very difficult.

Um, because we have to do that independent investigation, that independent verification, it does take time.

Um, but we've had a number of them where that probable cause just didn't exist.

And where we've been lucky, where um I'll say they they they got the warrant because they thought that he might have a weapon, but never saw it, or they saw a weapon two years ago.

Well, that's not enough for us to actually execute a search warrant.

Um, and we don't have the petitioners aren't compelled to work with law enforcement.

So sometimes it gets a little difficult.

We don't have cooperation and trying to do these independent investigations and verification just so we can execute that warrant.

Now, with that said, our work doesn't end just because we have to negate a warrant.

We don't have enough for the search warrant.

We still follow up if we find out maybe that uh person has a FOID card.

Uh, we can show evidence that they purchase the weapon because we do backgrounds.

Then we can contact that person, let them know because they're still in violation of a domestic violence act, and we get them to turn their weapons over.

That's why we have 30 weapon recoveries with only two executed warrants.

So the work is still being done.

Um, we're just trying to navigate through some difficult language in the bill, um, especially as I can flip some bark policies.

Thank you.

Any questions?

You mentioned the domestic violence assessment at the highlighting four districts.

Can you tell us what districts those are?

Yeah, it's currently active in the third, fourth, fifth district, which is covered by family rescue, and then the 14th district, which is covered by um connections for use women and children.

Thank you.

Commissioner Garner.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you for being here today.

How many employees are in your domestic violence program petition?

I believe right now we have 25 or 26.

Okay.

Well, given the number of orders that we heard about the last person can testify, is that enough people to handle the number of victims and work that that program has to do?

Sure.

Yeah.

So I should clarify we are budgeted to be at 55 total.

Um, so we're in the process of hiring more staff.

Um, as I'm sure everyone knows, city hiring of some service county is always what?

Yeah, right.

It's always hard.

So we don't believe you have to do that.

Yeah, so we're we are in the process of trying to fill as many as possible.

We are budgeted for 55 total house specialists.

I will say that is can also include our non-fatal staff.

So I think on the DV side, we'll probably end up anywhere between 30 to 35 total domestic violence specific.

Okay, so did that budget increase last year, which is why you have hirings due now, or is it just because the attrition over time, you're just always going to be down another?

Yeah, the budget was there in place for 2025.

Um again, high city hiring was just difficult where we were able to make enough offers but not actually get enough people in the actual spots.

Um, do you think that you'll have that hiring close?

I'm not saying that we're going to be where we want it to be, but like when we work things, we've made offers to the remaining vacancies already this year.

Um, so we're just waiting for the city to open up hiring where we can actually get start dates.

So I'm hoping I'm gonna say cautiously April.

Okay.

But don't hold me to that.

So maybe our task force can reach back out to you maybe in the end of June by the end of U2 to figure out kind of where you guys are at, yeah.

So we can kind of collaborate, and maybe all even for us can coordinate on that.

Yeah, absolutely.

Um and then so the crime victim compensation.

What are the eligibility criteria to that?

Yeah, there's a lot.

It really based it's based on um the UCR code for the case report.

So any victim of domestic violence, um, aggravated battery, batteries, assaults, aggravated assaults, arsons.

Um, there's a whole list of UCR codes.

I'm happy to share it.

I don't remember off the top of my head, but um, I can definitely provide the task force with the full list, but pretty much majority of um victimizations are covered under uh victims and compensation.

Okay, and then is there enough money in that fund to do so that if you are eligible for that compensation that you can receive it?

That I don't know.

It's um handled by the state attorney general's office, so it's the state program.

Oh, okay.

And then um, if you know then what type of compensation is available to victims through that fund.

I believe it's a maximum of 40,000 um that um would be used to reimburse someone for like lost wages um or like medical expenses.

So there is criteria for what they can use that funding for.

Um that person will have to provide receipts and documentation of those expenses.

Um I believe it's a maximum of 40,000.

I'll double check that, but it's um around there at least.

Okay, and then also in the program you had talked about, once you identify a victim, then the next flow chart um era was to try to provide services.

And you know, we've been working as a county in DD situations for many years.

And one of the number one things uh problems with is housing.

Okay, you immediately need to leave a situation and they're and there's immediate threat.

They need to go somewhere at least for a few days to a couple weeks to figure out where they're gonna go next.

Is that something that the city coordinates on?

I know that can get into the whole affordable housing and housing situation, which we don't have to talk about here.

Yeah, what does the city do to connect victims with housing?

Yeah, again, I think we're in the same kind of position as many other agencies.

Housing is obviously the biggest challenge.

Um, you know, we will use what we can to connect with um, you know, city-run shelters or um shelters that are that work with the city um if available.

We're also work with any DV agencies that um operate shelters as well.

Um very limited circumstances, we've been able to help someone um get like an Airbnb or hotel stay for a very limited time.

Um, it's the same kind of challenge that we have too, though, as housing is always the biggest challenge.

We'll do a weekend to connect with who we work with, um, but we are always still challenged on that space.

Okay, can I add something on that?

Um, what we would like to see too is some kind of priority housing program, especially for those that are seeking a Korean's law remedy, because we have to keep in mind that on a typical order protection, cook County Sheriff's Police, once they get it, they make attempts to serve that order right away.

When there's a career's warrant that's issued, we could be 96 hours later, even longer if there's an extension before the order is served.

Because county won't serve that order protection until we're done with our investigation, because unfortunately the remedy is attached to the petition.

So they don't want to send county there to serve the order and they see a remedy box checked for uh search warrant.

And now we're kind of tipping our hair.

So but we have to keep in mind tensions are really high in the beginning.

And we really want to make sure that the petitioners or survivors are safe until reach that order can be served.

And we can at least handle the Korean side of it.

So um, if there is an ask, if it's something we can prioritize along with any correno requests.

Okay, well, I think that you know, at least on our side, the commissioners know that we have regular budget hearings and then annual budget hearings, and we work with our budget office pretty closely every year.

Commissioners can um request amendments to that budget for specific things that we've been working on throughout the year.

And so maybe it would be a good idea for the county and the city to work together on a joint fund or housing that's temporary or case by case basis when the city and the county um in their TD programs find that there's a need.

Um, I imagine that if we start a small, that could be scaled up over time.

Also, I know the budgets are a tough and tight situation um annually, but I do know that there is money.

We have a 10 billion dollar budget, and you guys have a over 16 billion dollar budget.

There is money there.

And so I think it is scalable, but we need to start somewhere.

We need to create a line item for it because housing is something that will keep people secure and safe at least temporarily.

Okay, the last question I have is about the search warrants.

You had to identify there's 60 search warrants, 41 were extended.

Did you did you already explain what extended means and then missed it?

But if not, please explain again.

Yes, an extension.

Um, when we do the the preliminary, we do the independent verification and the investigation, because we have to meet that problem cost threshold.

Uh and plus, we have to be safe about it for everybody involved, you know, know where we're going that and whatnot.

Uh the trouble we have is on typical search warrant, if it's in a criminal division, and say it's a John Doe or Django search warrant, we have that person with us.

We can ask the right questions.

We know what we need, you know, a state's attorney's involved, the judge meets everybody, you know, everything's kind of put together.

We've already done our background.

We're now giving these civil warrants where we're kind of forced to re-engineer this.

And when we don't have the petitioner, that survivor with us, uh, and say they don't cooperate, or maybe we can't get a hold of them because they moved out, maybe we have a phone number.

Um, when we have those issues and we're still trying to verify that information.

Um, and again, these info sheets that we added to the order, and CPD developed its own independent information sheet because the one that the state attached when the bill passed just wasn't adequate.

Um, it didn't provide enough information.

So we actually built it out quite a bit.

And fortunately, with the courts and the clerks being fantastic, everybody worked with us on it.

Um, it's only as good as how well it's actually filled out by the petitioner.

And I think it's unfair to uh ask some of these people to know how to respond to some of those questions, uh at least in a correct way in a legal way.

Um so sometimes it takes a while for us to build that back up.

So if we need that extension, just because we still don't know if we have enough to serve the warrant, we then request the extension.

Okay, then there's 41 extended, and then another three that were kind of like miscellaneous.

Then what happened to the other 16 search warrants that weren't listed?

Um they were they were negative negated.

So I mean, aside from the extensions, still there's a number of them that in most of them are negated for whatever reason.

Uh we didn't have enough to actually serve the warrant.

Um, you know, there wasn't enough information there, or we just didn't have probable cause.

And say hold on, let me put up in the net.

So once a search warrant is issued by the judge or signed off by the judge, or you signed off by a judge, it becomes the warrant.

So then what does that mean it's negated?

Well, it's negative once we get that and we're giving if we find maybe I'm missing something something here because I'm not in the background.

Don't you do the investigation first?

No, see, problem is we're not involved in this until after the warrant is signed.

Because you know, if somebody was by a judge, yes, but it's not you guys don't have any ordination.

So then, okay, so it's signed by the judge, it's given to you for the sheriff's office to execute, but then there's something in that warrant that negates your ability to execute it.

Yes, say say there was something in the in the petition in that impost sheet.

Say the information was incorrect.

Um, I mean, uh, you know, or say we weren't able to verify that information uh to meet that problem cost threshold, then we won't be able to serve that warrant.

Um, but again, even if we negate it, um, we and odds are we're gonna file an extension and try to verify it even more.

If we wind up ultimately negating the warrant and not serving it, again, our job still doesn't end.

We still do everything we can if we find any kind of evidence that there may be a weapon through other means, then our fit teams who are fantastic.

That's why they're still able to recover some of those weapons because we still have the order protection, the Illinois, you know, Department of Violence uh uh act that they can't have those weapons.

So we still have some authority to request those weapons.

So they're able to go back and seek that weapon voluntarily as a turn-in at that point.

So independent of the execution of the search warrant.

Okay.

Let me just ask a little bit more about the negating part.

So say I come to court when I say I need something to happen, the court executes a search warrant and says, and then provide that search warrant to you guys for the sheriff's office.

Then you have to independently validate what I said, even though I'm not there because I've already said that to a judge.

I'm the victim.

Why does it have to be validated a second time?

Well, we still we still have not just consent decree, but our department policy when it comes to executing search warrants.

Because again, we're still looking at uh, and again, this is a new law, right?

But we still have for residential search warrants, they still have a high benchmark.

Um, and so we're balancing we have civil search warrants with our policies that were really, you know, applied towards you know, criminal warrants.

It's our first time dealing with civil warrants, you know.

But we've had, and again, I don't want to say it's not just verifying what they said, because if we can meet that person, they say, No, yeah, I saw the gun there yesterday, he's always had a gun, it's there, we're gonna act on that.

A lot of the negations come from, and we've seen them where I think he has a weapon.

I'm not sure.

You know, if he had one, it would be here.

But isn't that the point?

Like, I'm sorry, complicate this, but isn't that the point of the search warrant that I say something to a judge, and then that goes into the record and that become a bite money and testimony is evidence in the court of any court of law, and then you rely on that evidence, then to go out and search for the gun.

And the person says, I don't have a gun, that person's doesn't isn't credible, whatever.

But the the process is that I provide the evidence, the judge validates that and breaks an order, and then you follow that order.

But if you have to like double validate it, doesn't that end up kind of putting up a wrench into the process where this whole process was meant to be expedited and for our law enforcements to go out and expedite and go get a gun.

And so then if you do your investigation, you serve that warrant, you say, I want that gun, and you've done your part and you can't get the gun and you can't find the gun.

Then that process is kind of it's been executed the way that it was intended.

But if you have to double verify, it seems to me that, especially in a civil sense, it creates it can create a wrench in a plan that doesn't necessarily need that mention it.

Yes, but mind you, we still have to we're we're bound by the consent decree and our department policy that is dictated through the consent decree.

So we're still required to do those independent investigations and and verifications.

Is there a way to change that consent decree to in this case to allow you to rely on the testimony of the victim and remind the fact that the judge is there in order to determine the credibility of that right time in a court of law in that court order or something that you can say I need to follow because of this certain type of situation that is unique?

Yes, and and again, we do rely on the victim.

And but some of the issues that we get into, yes.

No, no, I it's very confusing.

I understand.

Uh, but again, when there's times where, and we've had these warrants come in where they say, Well, I'm not, or we'll call the person after the fact, and there's times, well, I'm not sure he has a gun, but I think he might, it would be here.

Okay.

Well, let's put a pin in that as well, because sometimes people, especially women who are victims, are taught to, you know, um really maybe not trust themselves.

Maybe they've just been pulled down over many, many years and kind of figuratively and realistically beaten to submission.

And so then they're not, especially with a law enforcement person, they're gonna equivocate.

So if they've already my point, I and I don't mean to believe this point, but if they've gone in front of a judge, they've done their part, double validating them, calling them again, and then having them say, Well, maybe I could have been wrong, it's very natural to a lot of women who don't feel like they have agency.

And so then you're relying on that rather than the beginning of the testimony, which was closer to when that event happened.

Like legally, we say, you know, if there's testimony right when an event happened, that is more credible and reliable testimony, and then four years later when you're at trial and you may not remember what you ate last week, much less what happened four years ago.

So to the extent that this whole law and this whole process is established in order to protect the victims, then validate it seems to me to be expanding it in a process that doesn't really get to the mission of what was trying to be accomplished by that state law.

Well, you know, and that's why we ask if we can get some help up front, whether it's through advocates or otherwise, where they can walk them through this, because the problem is when they try to fill out these info sheets, you know, a lot of these petitioners don't really understand what they're filling out either.

You know, like we had one where they describe, well, he has a gun and it's in a red card.

Okay, no plate information, nothing, you know.

So we need to verify that information.

Well, what red card?

I mean, you know, so it we still have to kind of get to the bottom of it.

So there's a lot of things that we want we have to verify, right?

You know, but so if that help was up front where somebody was there in the courts with them to kind of walk them through the language, how to answer this, how to respond to it, then I think that would help us up front, especially with a lot of it.

And you know, we're not as been fantastic.

If you want to speak to any of this, please.

Um, but that's where some of the difficulties we get into.

Because again, it's kind of like when I say that re-engineering that warrant, it is a little difficult for us.

Um, because as much as we put those questions on an info sheet to get as much information as possible, it's only as good as the response that was written down.

And I think it's uh it's really unfortunate that we expect these traumatized survivors to have to fill this out properly uh to give us adequate information to kind of understand what they're filling out.

It's different if I'm sitting down with the survivor and I ask the questions, all right?

Because I know how to ask, I know what to ask, and then even if they give me a response, I can ask further.

I can still kind of dig into it to get the information I need to act on.

We don't have anybody in place when they're doing this, and there is not enough betting up front uh with with the courts to actually verify a lot of these questions because we know how busy the courts are in everyone.

So it does get difficult.

I think there's two separate issues, and the first is expanding on the information that you've been previously provided with, like if it's in a red car and a red car is at 1423, you know, saying, okay, would you have a license plate number in the dark that that's expanding more knowledge to get you guys more quickly into a situation in recovery?

And then validate going back and validating, was it really a red car?

Are you sure there was a gun there?

And then kind of renegotiating what was originally provided, the information of it provided.

So I completely understanding and completely understand the um the additional information and wanting to expand the information to get you the best information to a situation where we're walking into what could be a situation with a person at a firearm who may not be mentally healthy at that time of putting the CPD at risk with an already risky situation with and looking at it from a victim perspective, asking a victim for validity information already provided seems to be like I said mentioned the process.

So we could just leave it there.

I don't have any additional information.

Yeah, I would love to jump in if I can.

Um, and Commissioner Dungan, I really appreciate your perspective.

And I think it's really, really important to keep everything that you're saying in mind.

Um, I find it helpful to zoom out a little bit because this is a new we're gonna have to take with one more speaker.

Oh, we do.

Yeah, okay.

We'd love to talk to you more about it though.

Okay, okay.

Yes, we apologize.

We are running really behind, and we have one more speaker.

So I know someone from the university.

I'm sorry, Northwestern University is here.

Katie, did you want to do a formal introduction?

Yeah.

Dr.

Adams.

Hi, thank you.

And and sorry to cut that up.

Um, we'll be talking about that in the working groups and we'll follow up with you.

Um, we have um Dr.

Adams here from North Western Dr.

Adams who's uh newer to the city of Chicago, she's a worldwide expert on uh gender-based violence.

We're really honored to have her here today.

Um, and she's just gonna give us um an introductory um presentation on um on some of the work she's done, and she will be uh frequent figure in Kirk County going forward.

She has a few projects in the works with the city of Chicago and uh with the safe serving office.

So thank you, Dr.

Adams, for being here.

Great.

Well, thank you so much for the invitation to be here.

So you can probably tell from my accent and from what um uh Katie just said.

Um, I moved to Chicago uh last year.

I'm a professor at Northwest, and I'm in the economics department, so I think I kind of also just wanted to say a little bit about um so this this talk is kind of actually going to be zooming out a little bit, but I think also providing a little bit of perspective on things like housing, what's the process uh by which victims are kept engaged um uh in the formal criminal justice process once that's once that's kind of been initiated, why that's so important and does actually have a meaningful impact um on outcomes.

Um why is an economist here?

So the one of the things I wanted to get across in this short presentation um is that economic and financial dynamics are really important for understanding how to support survivors and how ultimately to get them to safety, once their sort of head is above, you know, but once we can identify them.

Um so uh the point at which uh victims um are often, you know, that a police report is filed, we can't think about that as the start of the process for that individual.

Um abuse and financial suppression uh may have been ongoing for many years at that point.

So understanding that and thinking about how is it that we support that individual um into safety becomes kind of first order.

Um the other thing I kind of wanted to speak about in terms of why is it that um an economist might uh have something to say here relates to some of this discussion about how do we think about budgets?

How do we think about funding a bunch of these programs?

Uh, you know, there's always competing claims on city budgets.

Why is it that these initiatives are so important?

Um, so one of the things like that um I've come to appreciate through my work is that the usual ways that we think about, you know, putting a dollar number on the cost of gender-based violence um and domestic violence.

Once we start recognizing that, I think it sort of helps us make a better case for why these things actually need to be kind of protected in budgets and shouldn't be one of those things that just goes because they don't have a dollar sign often attached to them.

So as I say, a couple of things are going to think just underline some of the discussion that we've heard so far.

So specifically in terms of what my expertise is.

So a lot of what I do is try and think how is it that we use for want of a better term, kind of big data to sort of credibly put numbers and sort of bring evidence to the table to underline a bunch of what I just said.

So that's both about understanding the dynamics of abusive relationships, and also thinking about how is it that we actually evaluate programs to know what works for survivor safety, um, but also who does it work for?

So something many individuals in the room um would have even better experience at than me knows that this is a very, this is a population with very varied needs, um, very varied backgrounds.

And so it's not going to be a one-fit kind of one size fits all policy for every individual.

Um, so I'm going to give you a couple of kind of points from the work that I've done so far.

So I started working um in this area a number of years ago, uh, where in the UK, violence against women was um raised to the level of an epidemic, sort of um equivalent to a terrorist sort of threat, actually, um, because of rising caseloads and a couple of very high profile cases.

Um turns out the data in the UK wasn't good enough for me to be able to sort of credibly, I thought, kind of push forward a couple of projects.

Um I over the last few years have been working um actually in in Finland, uh, so uh where um we've had a very good uh relationship with Finnish police and with other aspects of uh the Finnish um kind of government in order to connect every police report in Finland and all of their hospital admissions um to health records, to employment, to vital statistics.

So, what does that mean?

What does that allow us to do?

That allows us to look at that police report that comes in for domestic violence for an individual, but then track all the way back to what happens when those people actually first got together.

Because it turns out in Finland, that's also recorded.

Maybe maybe that won't happen here.

Um, but so what that means is that we can really actually look at the whole dynamics of how these relationships occur and actually what helps to get people out of them.

Um the other thing it allows us to do is to recognize and to provide data on the fact that for many of these perpetrators, this is sort of not a one-time offense either with that victim, but this is a repeated pattern that happens across relationships, and we can do that because we've got all of all of these police reports.

Um now, as um, as Katie said, in terms of I'm only going to give you a couple of snippets here because I'm, you know, I don't we don't have uh the results yet.

Um, but what I'm hoping to also be uh feeding into the task force over the next um you know uh few years um are the results of evaluations of programs which are happening here in Chicago.

Um so um working, for example, with the state's attorney's office to think in lifespan in terms of the evaluation of their special program um to support particularly high-risk victims uh through the prosecution process.

Um we're also actually from Monday working uh on the new launch of the Survivor Fund uh that the network uh runs uh um in Chicago, which every month uh provides uh 1,000 dollars sort of no questions asked to gender-based violent survivors um in the city.

So providing often a really needed injection of cash uh when individuals need it uh in order to improve their safety.

Okay, so just quickly on this point that for those of you who have kind of access to purse strings, I guess, uh in the room, um, the cost of domestic violence is huge and way bigger than you think.

So, what does it mean?

What do I mean by that?

So, okay, I'm an economist, so I'm also going to be thinking a little bit first about employment and earnings, the cost of lost lives of the mental health trauma of um the emotional abuse, um that I think goes without saying is huge.

That's not something I can show you new today.

Um, but what I can show you is okay.

So again, I sorry, a couple of graphs.

Um, so what we have here is the time around when someone actually starts a relationship.

So forget when a police report is filed, what happens to people's employment rates?

This is just employment, um, in like before they start an abusive relationship and then afterwards.

So what we can see here is that in the years before starting an abusive relationship, actually, you know, um many um uh many survivors are actually on an upward trajectory.

Okay, many uh many are young women, they're gaining kind of uh their attachment with the labor market.

So, how is it that we think about showing what the impact, if you like, of being in an abusive relationship is?

Well, because of this crazy data that we have access to, we go out and we find the people who look basically identical uh to a survivor, um, but they end up starting a relationship with a guy who isn't abusive, okay, but otherwise he kind of looks the same, same education, same employment background, if he does have a criminal record, same criminal record.

And what we can see is that for people who don't start abusive relationships but have exactly the same other characteristics, they just keep on going in terms of their employment, in terms of their earnings, it's not really a big deal.

When it comes to thinking about abusive relationships, though, and this is the point I think we need to recognize when formulating policy responses and really why services here are super important.

Right from the start of when you start that relationship, things start going wrong.

And this is showing up even in how people are able to work and earn money, let alone mental health and other aspects of kind of physical safety.

So when you sort of take the difference between those two lines, um, this is this like in terms of what's the impact on employment from uh moving in with someone who's abusive to you.

This is off the scale when we think about the economic shocks that there are very standard support programs for, which are giving out money every day uh to other areas.

And this is um the other thing I wanted to say is that this is really about starting relationships, okay.

This is not just about um filing police reports and and everything else.

You still see that people's employment rates and their um everything else, um, in terms of many other aspects of their lives um deteriorate, um, even if we only see like a police report a number of years after they first start that relationship.

Okay, so why is this important for thinking about policy?

It's important because when we're thinking about why aren't individuals leaving, what's the kind of why aren't they uh, you know, you've got to recognize that for many women, this has been years of financial suppression in addition to other aspects of emotional and coercive control.

Okay, so it doesn't moving like moving and leaving is costly.

And these women have often been um, you know, their finances and economics have been suppressed for a number of years.

The other thing just quickly that I wanted to say is because uh with this in with with with the data we've had access to, um, we can look at what happens when guys who are abusive with one relationship start relationships with other women, okay, even if there's no police report filed in that in that relationship.

Okay.

And what we see is evidence of a consistent pattern, okay.

For these women, even then, there's no police report filed.

I haven't shown you mental health prescriptions here, but what we see is employment and earnings, they fall when you move in, and um other aspects that think about kind of health and well-being, they deteriorate too.

Okay, so two sort of um uh uh points again, and I can follow up with anyone here with like a bunch of the actual um uh with the numbers, the methodology, the uh the references, I just didn't think I think I thought overwhelming you in the in the morning in a in a general meeting wasn't uh wasn't necessarily the best thing for everyone.

Um kind of underline what the commissioner was suggesting um in the in the comments to the last um presentation.

Umancial support and access to shelters and housing, there is proven research that that does make a difference, that it enabled women in abusive relationships to leave faster.

Okay, and that's um what you know, and and and and and get to safety.

Um yeah, I'm not gonna go into all the stuff underlying that graph, but what we can see in Finland is, you know, so when shelters open near you, we see that women leave their abusers quicker and are able to stay away from them quicker.

presentation um financial support and access to shelters and housing there is proven research that that does make a difference that it enabled women in abusive relationships to leave faster okay and that's um what you know and and and and get to safety um the uh yeah i'm not going to go into all the stuff underlying that graph but what we can see in finland is you know so when shelters open near you we see that women leave their abusers quicker and are able to stay away from them quicker when their employment opportunities in general sort of financial situation they're able to uh you know they're able to access benefits more easily for example it turns out they leave their abusers more quickly um so uh that some of the suggestions around housing funds that were just floated there's a lot of evidence out there that that will have a difference the other thing that I wanted to say um is that um uh whilst uh you know uh formal uh contact with the criminal justice system is the tip of the iceberg when we think about uh you know the the number of victims and the kind of uh and and domestic violence and gender based violence um more broadly um once individuals actually do have contact with the criminal justice system um we really want a system which is set up in a way which want you know it helps them keep engaged um and cooperative now i know so i'm looking at all these numbers sort of in databases so i know that what that means practically is really complicated um but what it but what the evidence also shows is that uh police forces and areas which are able to keep more victims engaged from police report through uh that you know through through the prosecution process those survivors remain safer and they do better okay so um we have work again uh with with this with this finished data showing that areas where where we have these proxies for more inclusive policing styles where we see greater rates of uh victim cooperation even though there's nothing else that looks pretty different about these about the types of cases that these police uh that these police forces are dealing with the survivors there do better they recover quicker um after um after actually making a report um there's evidence in the US that actually uh using as well uh how is it that we think about uh the uh gender diversity of police forces is in ensuring that there are sufficient female officers um uh around to help with these cases um again credible evidence that that increases reporting rates for domestic violence but reduce and reduces homicide rates so a little caveat here sometimes greater reporting is good you know it's actually we know that these reports are everything is underreported so um yeah so uh when we're kind of looking at stats just to say be careful when with the reporting statistics um the other thing again just to underline uh some of the work which hopefully will be funded to do uh from July there's early evidence that programs which are running right or have run historically right here in Chicago through the state's attorney's office have had huge reductions on homicide rates um so the target abuser call program you know has a big emphasis on keeping victims engaged uh with the with uh uh with with the process um and connecting actively to services providing independent advocacy specifically for high risk um for for for high risk survivors again the evidence and the numbers say this works what we need is to ensure that these programs are sort of sustainable um and well funded um so that's uh yeah kind of uh some high level comments but hopefully uh you know uh providing a little bit of food for thought that uh many of the discussions that have happened here today we've got the list of sort of studies which say um this can work okay if we can if you can roll it out okay thank you thank you so much Dr.

Adams we truly appreciate this information um it's definitely um very um important to know the economics uh component of this as well so we appreciate it um so before we adjourn um we want to just take a special note that three of the working groups um have already had their initial meetings um so there are some follow-up uh that will be coming out of those um and some additional tasks before next month's meeting so information about the next working group meetings will be announced in the upcoming weeks um any uh other closing comments katie or what do you want to think about this okay um we apologize we didn't have uh uh enough time for questions for the last presenter for Dr.

Adams but we truly appreciate you all being here um and again we will um proceed with additional information coming to your inboxes um without any further discussion we will uh move to adjourn um can i have a mover or have I'm not sure commissioner dunan is still here now Katie can you make the motion being here or second it I'll mention thank you uh all in favor signify by saying aye I'll oppose knees I have it thank you we're adjourned everybody