In the past, it has been hard to report basic facts about the scope of domestic violence in Marion County, because data is spread across many agencies and parts of the criminal justice system. This analysis combines several of those data sources by matching people across datasets based on shared characteristics, like name, age, and race.

Because of the way this analysis was conducted, the data reported here are just estimates. It is possible that some records were found to be matches when they were actually different people. Or the opposite could be true, when people are matched, but they are actually separate people.

It is important to remember this data only represents information related to the criminal justice system. It does not include information about domestic violence cases that are unreported.

For a more detailed methodology see the full report.

The Domestic Violence Network is committed to engaging the community to end domestic violence through advocacy, education and collaboration.

It would like to improve upon its ability to report on the state of domestic violence in Marion County by matching data from various local agencies and organizations that work with domestic violence victims and perpetrators.

Its goal is to learn more about the extent of domestic violence, who is affected, and the behavior patterns of both. It also seeks to understand this in relation to the socio-economic context of the communities in which this occurs.

SAVI helps people and organizations make data informed decisions through actionable information, knowledge platforms, and capacity-building. SAVI is a program of The Polis Center at IUPUI.

This project was supported by Grant No. 2015-WE-AX-0026 awarded by the Office on Violence Against Women, U.S. Department of Justice.

This report uses data collected about domestic violence victims, incidents, and suspects. Each data source is described below. Data was collected through 2016 for all sources and began in 2009 for most sources. See Data Notes at the end of the report for more details about the data collected from each of these sources.

Through September 2014, advocates at The Julian Center reviewed and compiled Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department (IMPD) incident reports to identify incidents that may have been domestic violence-related. Starting in October 2014, funding for The Julian Center outreach effort was diminished, so fewer victims were contacted by The Julian Outreach team after that time.

The data collected from IMPD includes incident reports. These are the details about crimes, suspects, arrestees, and victims as they are reported and do not reflect whether the report materialized into a criminal charge. Race, age, gender are provided for victims and perpetrators.

This a civilian unit with IMPD that responds to crimes to provide on-scene crisis intervention and help after the crisis (such as referrals to support and services and help with the criminal justice system). This unit responds many incident types, but records indicate if an incident is related to domestic violence.

This report uses data about the civil protective orders that are tracked by the Supreme Court. These data do not reveal a reason for the protective order. This report assumes the majority of these are related to domestic violence.

These data include information on cases, defendants, victims, charges, case outcomes, and sentences. Demographic information such as age, race, and gender are provided for defendants and victims.

The Baker One Initiative is an effort to reduce domestic violence, especially those cases with high risk for homicide or serious assault. IMPD Officers who respond to a domestic violence call complete a domestic violence officer information sheet (called a “Purple Sheet”) that records details of DV cases such as signs and symptoms of potentially lethal actions such as strangulation and previous behaviors of the suspect. Also as part of this initiative, the IMPD identifies the 25 most concerning domestic violence offenders in each of the six police districts to ensure all responders and partnering agencies are aware of the high-risk offenders. Offenders or suspects are classified as “Baker One” when they exhibit escalating or habitual offenses by committing crimes such as invasion of privacy, harassment, or vandalism.

The Connect2Help (C2H) Resource Database is a listing of agencies, programs, and services that are available to residents throughout Indiana. A specialist collects and records demographic information during information, referral, and crisis calls. The specialist uses the information collected about the caller to refer individuals to resources or services. During the course of the call, the specialist may determine that the caller is in a domestic violence situation, and they will flag that call with a domestic violence marker. The marker is noted in the database in reference to the call, the caller, and their associated needs. Some referred services are specific to domestic violence needs.

The domestic violence rates were compared to populations using data from the American Community Survey (ACS). The ACS is a US Census Bureau program designed to supplement the decennial census. ACS replaced long-form (SF3) census data beginning with the 2010 Census. The advantage of ACS data is that it is released annually and is therefore more up-to-date than decennial census data. Disadvantages include the fact that since the estimates are based on smaller sample sizes that decennial census data, margins-of-error must be considered when using the data.

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