Domestic violence deaths in arizona tragically consistent - China SMD LED Light Bulbs

"... your partner controls everything. "... your partner calls you names or yells at you. "..

your partner shoves, pinches, hits, punches, kicks orotherwise hurts you. "... your partner destroys your belongings. "... your partner threatens to hurt you, the children, or pets." Amanda's 21/2-year relationship with her husband, Anthony, had beentumultuous: screaming fights, holes punched through walls, calls topolice.

He had threatened to kill himself, and her, and her mother as well.But Amanda was certain he'd never actually go that far. Especiallynot with the children in the house. And not just before Christmas. Amanda gave the pamphlet back to her mother and told her not toworry. Two days later, Amanda was dead.

"She is definitely dead," her husband, Anthony Rinaldi, then 26,reportedly told authorities when he turned himself in. "I put twoto the chest and one to the head." Actually, the former Army sniper had put two bullets in his wife'schest and three in her head, her mother would later learn fromprosecutors. The sound of the gunshots reverberated -- boom, boom,boom, boom, boom -- up the stairs. There, Amanda's 7-year-old soncalled 911 over the hollers of his baby brother. * * * Amanda's death on Dec.

13 was one of at least 101domestic-violence-related deaths in the state in 2011. Of those, 59involved guns. This year, two recent incidents of domestic killings that claimedfive victims each, each involving children, have dominated thenews. But those incidents were only a fraction of the total. Not evenhalfway into 2012, at least 48 people have died; at least 31 ofthose were shot to death.

The numbers for Arizona are consistent:roughly 100 a year, year after year. The numbers are compiled by the Arizona Coalition Against DomesticViolence and include a broad range of types of incidents. Typically, any violence between people who share a residence isconsidered domestic violence, so the number in the annual tally caninclude spouses, girlfriends and boyfriends, other relatives andeven bystanders. Domestic-violence deaths are counted when a partner or other personin the home kills or is killed. An abuser committing amurder-suicide would be considered two deaths; a death is alsocounted if an abuser is shot during a confrontation with lawenforcement.

But when someone talks about domestic violence -- and when expertsstudy it -- the focus is on a classic pattern in which a person,usually a man, eventually kills his partner. A landmark 2003 study by a team of international researchers, ledby Jacquelyn Campbell at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore andpublished in the National Institute of Justice Journal, comparedtwo groups of battered women. One group consisted of 220 who hadbeen killed by their partners; the other group consisted of 343 whohad been abused but not killed. What the researchers pinpointed was that where a history ofdomestic violence exists, certain other factors vastly increase thelikelihood that a victim will be killed.

Battered women who have been threatened or assaulted with a gun --even once -- are 20 times as likely as other battered women to bemurdered. Those who have been choked are 10 times as likely to bekilled -- a statistic that also was a force behind the July 2010change in Arizona law that made attempted choking or strangulationa Class 4 felony. Previously, strangulation typically would hadbeen charged as misdemeanor assault. Other factors that can increase a victim's risk are substanceabuse, unemployment, depression, abuse during pregnancy, any kindof estrangement, and the presence of a stepchild. For people in thefield, the study -- and the danger-assessment tool it was based on-- is the definitive guide for assessing risk in domestic-violencesituations.

The checklist of those signs is so remarkably consistent thatintake workers at domestic-violence shelters use the criteria toestablish what danger a woman faces, and Phoenix police officersask similar questions when they go out on roughly 14,000domestic-violence calls every year. "It would be rare for something like this to happen with noprevious record of domestic violence," says Carl Mangold, alicensed social worker who counseled more than 3,500 men convictedof abuse in Arizona between 1996 and 2006. He now trains others towork with offenders through the Arizona Coalition Against DomesticViolence. There is a pattern in incidents that end fatally, he says. A manbecomes violent and blames the victim.

She tries to resist, and hisabuse escalates. She attempts to end the relationship, and hepunishes her for her defiance. The state's most recent domestic-violence incident may have defiedthe patterns. Last week, police said evidence indicates that JamesButwin, a 47-year-old Tempe businessman and father, killed hiswife, Yafit, 40, and their three children -- 16-year-old Malissa,14-year-old Daniel and Matthew, 7 -- before taking his own life.

While police said they found bullet casings in the home and guns inthe vehicle, and the parents were facing divorce and financialproblems, friends say they saw no history of violence. But in other cases, the warning signs were there. They were there before May 2 -- the day, police say, J.T. Readyshot and killed four people.

The twice court-martialed Marine, border vigilante and admittedWhite supremacist with a history of soured relationships killed his47-year-old girlfriend, Lisa Mederos; her daughter, Amber, 23;Amber's fiance, Jim Hiott, 24; and Amber's daughter, Lilly, who was15 months old. He then killed himself. Ready kept weapons at home. And in February, Lisa Mederos hadcalled police to complain that Ready had choked her six monthsearlier. The report went nowhere, police said, because they had noprobable cause for an arrest.

The warning signs were there in the case of Christina Alvarez. The32-year-old was shot and killed in Phoenix on May 29, her threechildren in the next room. The warning signs were there in the case of Tekesha Barnes, shotoutside a school event for her eighth-grade daughter May 25. The warning signs were there in the case of Claudia Pascual, 31,shot in her Tucson home the day before Valentine's Day. And the warning signs were there for Amanda Blaies-Rinaldi.

* * * The majority of domestic-violence cases do not turn deadly. NeilWebsdale, a Northern Arizona University criminology andcriminal-justice professor for 20 years, has worked to document howit happens in those that do. In addition to teaching at NAU, Websdale leads the NationalDomestic Violence Fatality Review Initiative, which he started in1999 with a grant from the U.S. Department of Justice in the hopeof preventing more deaths.

Each year, 10 Arizona teams review 20 orso cases in great detail, looking for common traits among abusersand among victims, working to identify where the system works andwhere it fails. Almost always, a history of a certain kind of abusive behavior isthe first, most important indicator. Websdale has studied police reports, restraining orders, arrestsand convictions in the kind of abuse that researchers call"intimate partner terrorism," or "coercive control." Coercive control is almost exclusively the domain of men. It islong-term and tyrannical abuse that includes, often in addition tophysical violence, attacks on a woman's self-worth, degradingremarks and obsessive monitoring of her whereabouts and her contactwith other people.

Other factors fuel the lethality: He's obsessively possessive. If he can't have her, no one can. He drinks or uses drugs. He's depressed or unemployed. There's a stepchild in the household.

The risk increases notbecause of anything the child does, but because his or her presenceinvokes jealousy over a woman's prior relationship. He abuses his partner during pregnancy. There's an age difference of more than 10 years. She's an undocumented immigrant who may fear reaching out for helpbecause of her status. Websdale also finds that many men kill in a state of what he calls"humiliated fury," shame that has gone into overdrive for anynumber of reasons: She is moving out and he is losing control ofher, for instance, or he has lost his job and is drinking more.

"It's about manhood and failing to live up to prescriptions ofmodern-day masculinity," he says. An escalation of abuse is typical just before a battered woman iskilled, he notes. There will be more broken bones, more crackedteeth. More calls to 911.

"You can see it coming. You can log it. You can count it," he says. In addition to an escalation of abuse, there may be other changes.Maybe an abuser starts keeping a loaded gun on the nightstand, orbegins reading her text messages and dropping by her office to makesure she's at work.

More subtle but just as important is that the victim growsincreasingly fearful and tells friends or family that things aregetting worse. There may be no outward signs. But Websdale says, "In her own mind,if she senses things are getting worse, they are. We have to besensitive to what the victim tells us." And while leaving an abuser is a dangerous time for any victim, inthese cases, any emotional estrangement can also trigger a deadlyattack.

Such things as enrolling in college, making new friends orrefusing to argue anymore can trigger a deadly attack just aseasily as filing for a divorce can. "He's controlling but vulnerable," Websdale says. "He's very, verythreatened by her moving on." Barnes, the mother killed outside her daughter's eighth-gradegraduation ceremony held at a nearby high school in Avondale, hadfiled for an order of protection just four days before she waskilled. * * * Combine escalating abuse with the presence of a gun and the riskgoes even higher.

When a woman calls the Sojourner Center, a domestic-violenceshelter for women where the 224 beds are always full, one of thefirst questions she is asked is whether her abuser has access to agun. That question not only helps the shelter gauge necessary securitymeasures at the shelter, says Connie Phillips, the center'sdirector, but also helps the woman understand how much danger shemay be in. Victims often minimize the risk they face as a means ofcoping with abuse from day to day. A gun is a powerful weapon as much for its ability to intimidate asto kill. "You don't even have to point it at her," Phillips says.

It doesn'tmatter if it is a handgun he fires at the range on weekends or arifle he takes hunting. He only has to clean it in front of her,put it on the bedside nightstand as she sleeps, or carry it on hiship to make a point. Some hold guns to their partners' heads and pull the trigger in atormenting, Russian-roulette-style game. In 18 years at the center,Phillips has heard versions of that story hundreds of times.

"It's just another way of showing 'I have power. You don't,'" shesays. Phillips tells of a woman who was shot by her abuser but survived. He said he was sorry of course, apologizing again and again.

Hepromised it would never happen again. When he brought her home fromthe hospital, he took good care of her. And then one day she feltthe muzzle against her head again. Click.

The chamber had been empty. She breathed again, and this time shegot out. Not everyone does. * * * Amanda Blaies-Rinaldi and her boys spent the weekend before shedied at her mother's house. They went to a Christmas party forAmanda's sister, Lea, who's 35 and has Down syndrome.

That was the day Pamela tried to show Amanda the pamphlet ondomestic violence. Amanda had looked away. She told her mom everything would be fine. Anthony had moved outtwo months earlier into his own apartment. She was planning to filefor divorce.

"I'm going through with it this time, Mom. I really am," Pamelarecalls her daughter saying. But Amanda added, "It would be easierif there wasn't a part of me that still loved him." "I taught my daughter that she was gorgeous, talented," PamelaBlaies said. "I told her, 'You have everything going for you. Youdon't have to put up with anything from anyone,' and she neverdid." At least not until she met Anthony Rinaldi.

Amanda and Anthony Rinaldi met in Naples, Fla., and had known eachother briefly when she found out she was pregnant in 2009. Theymarried while Anthony was on leave from duty as an Army sniperbased in Germany. But even during Anthony's long-distance calls from Germany, thecouple argued, screaming back and forth. When he got out of themilitary, Pamela says, there was more screaming, name calling, andholes punched in walls.

Their baby was born in March 2010, six years after Amanda's firstson. In May 2010, court records in Florida's Collier County show, Amandafiled for a temporary order of protection. In the petition, shereported that Anthony punched through walls, broke door frames, andsmashed glasses and potted plants. She also wrote that he told herhe used prescription painkillers and steroids.

The petition was dismissed when Amanda didn't show up for ahearing. That was because she already was on her way to Arizona,where her mother lived. Her twin brother, Jonny Blaies, agreed tomove too if she would leave Anthony, and packed the boys and herbelongings into his truck. But halfway across the country, Amanda was on the phone to Anthony.Jonny recalls Anthony pleading with his sister: "I love you. Don'tdo this to me." Within weeks, Anthony had followed and moved in with Amanda.

Sheran a licensed day care out of their house. He went to work for theDepartment of Corrections. "He knew the right things to say so she would take him back," Jonnysays. "They split up and got back together more times than I cancount." Jonny was torn, mad that his sister kept taking Anthony back andworried that it would end the way it did.

"My sister was a bright, beautiful woman," he says. Neither he northeir mother could understand what Amanda saw in Anthony. He was angry all the time and hardly ever smiled. He would threatento kill himself, and Amanda would beg him not to. "His life meant nothing to him because he always hated life,"Pamela says.

"He had no respect for life." Amanda had decorated her house with posters that said, "Love life,"and "Life is beautiful." As kids, the twins brought home every wounded bird and everyoverweight kid they saw get bullied. Amanda thought she could saveAnthony, Pamela says. Anthony grew up in foster care, an unstable life compared with thatof his wife, who had a close and loving family. "Everyone who has ever loved him has left him," Amanda wouldexplain to her mother.

"You can't fix him," her mother says she would tell her. When her mother called the police, Pamela says, Amanda would coverfor Anthony, fearful he would lose his job and the family's healthbenefits. But Amanda told a friend that if anything happened toher, look for Anthony. At 26, she wrote a will.

On Dec. 12, Anthony took Amanda and the boys to look at Christmaslights. Pamela called Amanda afterward. She sounded happy. But when Anthony called Pamela the next night, he was furious withhis wife and wanted his mother-in-law to intervene.

He told his mother-in-law that Amanda had opened a credit card inher own name so she could buy Christmas gifts. Now it was missing,and she had accused Anthony of taking it. He claimed to have simplymisplaced it. But Amanda refused to talk about it any longer and turned herattention to decorating the Christmas tree.

She had promised thekids in her day care that it would be done in the morning. "He couldn't control her. He wanted me to do something about it,"Pamela says. As Anthony yelled, Pamela, a psychiatric nurse, talked soothingly,suggesting that he head to his apartment and get a good night'ssleep.

"Tomorrow will be a new day. You'll be able to think clearer," sheremembers telling him. Amanda got on the phone and told her mother not to worry: "I'm overit. I'm not going to fight with him anymore." Amanda sounded weary. Pamela wanted to call the police, but her daughter asked her notto: "No, Mom, please don't.

It will just make it worse." "It sounds pretty bad right now," Pamela said she told her. Then Anthony was back on the phone. Pamela says he told her, "Ijust want to know it must have been really hard for you to raisesuch a stubborn daughter that you can't control." And then he hung up. Amanda's 7-year-old was in the living room, playing video games andpretending not to listen. He later told his grandmother that hisstepfather sat on the couch and took five deep breaths: "You know,Grandma, like when people try to calm themselves down." And then Anthony told the boy to go upstairs.

When he hesitated,Anthony told him to run. The boy told his grandmother that hebegged, "Please don't kill my mom." The boy ran, and then he heardthe shots from below. Anthony left the house, and a few minutes later, he also called 911to report that he shot his wife. He told the dispatcher that heplanned to shoot himself. Then he hung up.

The dispatcher called back, and Anthony told her he was pulling upbehind an Arizona Department of Public Safety officer doing atraffic stop on the side of Interstate 10. Anthony approached the officer and said, "You're going to want toput me in handcuffs, sir," according to court documents. Police found Amanda's body in the garage, her purse on her shoulderand car keys near her hand. Anthony told police that he "snapped" and his "military trainingkicked in," according to court records.

When he was arrested, hehad Amanda's crumpled credit card in his pocket. He is in Maricopa County Jail, charged with first-degree murder. Hehas pleaded not guilty. His next court hearing is scheduled forJuly. The boys miss their mother.

The oldest, now 8, a second-grader whoreads books meant for sixth-graders, asks, "How could he take mymost precious possession?" The baby is 2 and calls his grandmother"Mommy." They fall asleep with Grandma, each boy with one hand on her forsecurity. In the dark, the older boy whispers that he's afraid hisstepfather will break out of jail and hurt him. "We're just getting by, day by day," Jonny says. There's been little time to really grieve, between caring for thechildren and preparing for the trial, Pamela, 60, says.

She criesevery day. "It doesn't feel real. You think it can't be true, but it is true.She's never coming back," Pamela says. She hopes that other women, who tell their mothers not to worry andthink that it could never happen to them, will learn from herdaughter's story, and get out before it's too late. Reach the reporter at 602-444-8614 orkarina.bland@arizonarepublic.com.

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