In 2012, twenty-one-year-old Romelle Johnson was transported by ambulance to a local Brooklyn, New York hospital.*  While en route, an EMT worked to staunch the blood leaking from Romelle’s stab wounds as Johnson struggled to communicate with the police officer who accompanied him.  Despite his fight for breath and words, Johnson ultimately disclosed that, after an argument earlier that night, his live-in partner, forty-three-year-old James McEvoy, stabbed him time and time again.  McEvoy was found with a blood-soaked kitchen knife and scratches on his hands, neck and torso, and was arrested. McEvoy was charged with felony assault, among other crimes.  Several days later, when called to testify before the Grand Jury, Johnson refused.  When a Victim Services Advocate at the District Attorney’s office asked why he would not testify against his assailant, Johnson finally admitted that, without McEvoy, he had nowhere to go, no family to call on, no friend’s couch to sleep on.  Because of his financial and pragmatic dependence on McEvoy, Johnson felt he had no choice but to gamble with his life.

Romelle Johnson’s story is not a unique one.  During my tenure as a domestic violence prosecutor in Brooklyn, New York, I encountered hundreds, if not thousands, of intimate partner violence survivors. 

IN APRIL 2011, JONATHAN SIMCOX AND HIS partner Steven Ondo engaged in a lovers’ quarrel upon leaving a Cleveland, Ohio nightclub. The couple’s neighbor, an off-duty Cleveland police officer, confronted the couple, shouting, “Shut up, you`re disturbing the peace.” Simcox attempted to push past the officer.

The officer slammed him to the ground before unleashing blow after blow to Simcox’s body.

Within minutes, more Cleveland police officers arrived. The couple was arrested, only to be released without any charges. No more than a week later, the couple was awakened at their home by loud banging at the front door. Dressed in underwear, the couple answered, only to see Cleveland police officers. The police, again, arrested them. This time for assault on a peace officer.

Simcox asked the reason for their arrests and was answered by repeated punches to his face. Simcox’s brother asked police if he could get the couple pants and shoes. An officer responded, “You can get them shoes, but faggots don’t deserve to wear pants in jail.”