The Criminal Career of Intimate partner Violence Offenders: generalists or specialists?

To the attention of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada / Government of Canada

By Frédéric Ouellet, Ph.D. (frederic.ouellet.1@umontreal.ca)
School of Criminology, Université de Montréal
International Centre for Comparative Criminology (ICCC)
Centre de recherche de l'Institut universitaire en santé mentale de Montréal

With the collaboration of:
Arthur Nouvian, B.Sc., School of Criminology, Université de Montréal
Elise Soulier, M.Sc., School of Criminology, Université de Montréal
Valérie Thomas, M.Sc., Cégep régional de Lanaudière à L'Assomption

February 8, 2021

The views and opinions expressed in this document are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect those of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada or the Government of Canada.

Introduction

Context

• Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) assesses the risks of family violence in the context of immigration to Canada with the aim of improving policies to prevent family violence and better protect the sponsored persons in the reunification category family. This approach aligns with one of the objectives of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, to protect public health and safety and to ensure the safety of Canadian society.

Family violence

• There is no consensus on the definition of family violence.
• Empirical work has paid particular attention to physical, sexual, psychological, financial abuse, and neglect that can occur in kinship or intimate relationships.
• According to Barnett and his colleagues (2005), the nature of the relationship between the aggressor and the victim can lead to subcategories of family violence: intimate partner violence, parental violence against their children, violence by children towards their elderly parents or relatives, as well as violence in siblings.

This research is focused specifically on intimate partner violence as it is the most documented and most common category of family violence.

State of knowledge

• Studies of criminal careers conducted in several countries show that many offenders involved in intimate partner violence do not specialize only in this type of offense.
• Some empirical work shows that offenders who commit serious and frequent assaults in a family context, and more specifically in intimate relationships, are also more likely to engage in other types of violent and criminal behavior outside this setting.
• These individuals are known to commit a higher number of crimes, therefore require a sustained intervention and mobilize more resources. There is a real interest in identifying these individuals.
• Few Canadian studies establish a link between intimate partner violence, and other types of violent crime.

Based on Canadian data, this study presents an analysis of the official and self-revealed criminal careers of individuals convicted of family violence. The focus is more specifically on the sub-category of offenders involved in intimate partner violence.

• Particular attention is paid to the observation of violent behavior committed in a conjugal context, but also to violent behavior and other crimes that these offenders could have committed outside of the conjugal context.

Current study - research question and objectives

Research question

• Are individuals convicted of intimate partner violence in Canada also involved in other types of violent and criminal behavior outside the family, and more specifically are they involved in violent crimes that may result in bodily harm?

Main objective

• To portray the official and self-revealed criminal careers of individuals convicted of intimate partner violence, paying particular attention to acts of intimate partner violence committed, but also to other violent behaviors and other crimes committed outside the family.

Specific objectives

1. Describe long and short-term criminal involvement;
2. Examine parameters of domestic violence, age at first crime, nature of offenses, criminal diversification and frequency of crimes committed;
3. Compare the characteristics of offenders and predict serious violent behavior.

Method

Source of Data

• Research project (funded by SSHRC) focusing on offenders involved in intimate partner violence and aiming to analyze criminal trajectories and the processes behind the crime.
• Interviews conducted between 2018 and 2020 with 121 imprisoned violent spouses (provincial sentences).
  • An abusive spouse is defined as a man 18 years of age or older who has been convicted for violent crimes against his spouse or ex-spouse.
  • Participants were incarcerated for an offense committed in a conjugal context - correctional officers participated in the recruitment.
• Recruitment was made in six provincial detention facilities in the province of Quebec (sentence of less than two years).

Instruments and procedures

• The 121 violent spouses participated in a structured individual interview with the aim of reconstructing their criminal career.
  • Face-to-face interviews were conducted in questionnaire format.
  • Took an average of two hours ten minutes to complete.
• Official records on criminal history were consulted in order to complete certain information.
• Use of a series of psychometric instruments to assess the individual characteristics of participants, but also the characteristics of their intimate relationship.

Crimes committed

• Interest directed to the context in which the crimes were committed.
• Two types of data are used to measure crimes committed.
  • Official criminality: information from records held by the prison authorities (information relating to arrests and convictions) of the offenders encountered in this project.
  • Self-revealed crime: information gathered during structured interviews (using the method of life history calendars).

Crimes committed

• Text version: Crimes committed

  Conjugal context (intimate partner violence):

  • Psychological violence
  • Physical violence
  • Economic
  • Sexual

  Outside family context:

  • Violent crime
    • Common assault, assault with a weapon / injuries, threats / extortion, sexual assault, homicides, other violent crimes
  • Other crime
    • Acquisitive crime
      • Robbery, burglary, motor vehicle theft, theft, fraud business delinquency
    • Market crime
      • Sale and distribution of drugs, smuggling, loan sharking, illegal betting, sex market, concealment, and other market crime

Crimes committed

• Interest directed to the context in which the crimes were committed.
• Also devoted to crimes that can cause bodily harm
  • Bodily harm: injury which adversely affects the health or well-being of a person and which is not of a transient or insignificant nature. (Criminal Code, R.S.C., 1985, c. C-46).
    • The injury, of different kinds, should not be either ephemeral or frivolous to be qualified as “bodily harm”.
    • Thus, acts of verbal violence (e.g., certain forms of psychological or emotional violence in word or action within a family or outside the family aimed at controlling, isolating, intimidating or dehumanizing) or economic (e.g., financial abuse within a family or outside the family) that may cause psychological or physical injury may be considered bodily harm - if the injury is not temporary or insignificant.
    • Bodily harm does not only concern the family context but can also be perpetrated outside the family.
• Intimate partner violence (conjugal context - subcategory of family violence)
  • The instrument for measuring intimate partner violence is based on the revised version of the Conflict Tactics Scales (CTS2).
    • Instrument made up of five subscales: negotiation, psychological violence, physical violence, sexual violence and injury.
    • Each of the subscales contains items on minor or severe violence.
• Crime outside the family context
  • Violent crimes: common assault; assault with a weapon or with injuries; threats or extortion; sexual assault; homicides; other violent crimes (all of these crimes can be associated with bodily harm as defined in this study).
  • Other crimes = lucrative criminal activities
    • Acquisitive crimes: robbery, burglary, motor vehicle theft, theft, fraud, business delinquency.
    • Market crimes: sales and distribution of drugs, smuggling, loan sharking, illegal betting, sex-related markets, concealment and other market crime.

Description of participants

• All male
• 38.6 years old on average
• 86.9% Canadian
• 57.0% had not completed their high school diploma
• During the 3-year period before current incarceration
  • 39.7% reported having had mental health problems
  • 22.3% experienced physical limitations
• Family risk factors during childhood/adolescence
  • 51.2% parents with alcohol problems
  • 28.9% with drug problems
  • 30.6% parents with a criminal history
  • 49.6% of offenders were reported to youth protection services
• Exposure to intimate partner violence during childhood or adolescence
  • 50.4% witnesses psychological violence between their parents
  • 24.0% exposed to physical violence between parents

Abbreviations used in this table

SD: standard deviation

Analytic Strategy

• Objective A: essentially descriptive analyzes.
• Objective B: combination of descriptive and bivariate analyzes.
  • Means and chi-square tests were performed to determine if the differences observed between the groups of offenders.
• Objective C: multivariate analyzes.
  • Regressions (linear and logistic) are carried out in order to separate the predictive value of individual characteristics, parameters of intimate partner violence and criminal career.
• Analyzes performed using SPSS software, version 25.0.

objective a - criminal participation (the entire criminal career)

Observe the proportion of offenders who were involved in various spheres of criminal activity.

• Reminder - all participants are serving a prison sentence for intimate partner violence.
  • In other words, there is at least an involvement in intimate partner violence for all the participants.

• Criminal participation is therefore observed within three broad categories of crime: intimate partner violence, violent crime (outside the family context) and other crimes.
  • 4 possibilities:
    • Intimate partner violence only (group 1);
    • Intimate partner violence and violent crime (group 2);
    • Intimate partner violence and other crime (group 3);
    • Intimate partner, violent crime and other crime (group 4).

Criminal participation throughout the entire criminal career

• Self-revealed criminal participation:
  • 94.3% participated in two categories of crimes;
  • 71.1% involved in all categories of crimes;
  • 5.8% specialized in intimate partner violence.

• Official criminal involvement (crime leading to incarceration):
  • 7.4% involved in all categories of crimes;
  • According to official data, 40.5% of offenders are specialists throughout their criminal career.

• The portrait of criminal participation is therefore very different depending on the data source used.
  • The history of violence (36.3%) and intimate partner violence (71.9%) are not observable in reading the official records of prior convictions.

Self revealed criminal participation

• Text version: Self-revealed criminal participation

  5.8% intimate partner violence only; 2.5% intimate partner violence and violent crime; 20.7% intimate partner violence and other crime; 71.1% intimate partner, violent crime and other crime.

Official criminal participation

• Text version: Official criminal participation

  6.6% intimate partner violence only; 5.0% intimate partner violence and violent crime; 9.1% intimate partner violence and other crime; 7.4% intimate partner violence, violent crime and other crime; 14.1% violent crime only; 19.8% other crime only; 21.5% violent crime and other crime; 16.5% no incarceration.

(3 years prior to current incarceration)

Criminal participation during the three-year window period preceding current incarceration

• Self-revealed criminal participation:
  • More distributed within the four categories;
  • The proportion of individuals who claim a specialization in intimate partner violence (26.4%) or violent crime (19.8%) represents nearly half of the sample (46.2%);
  • 32.2% involved in all categories of crimes.

• Official criminal participation (grounds for arrest):
  • Criminal specialization is stronger than that displayed with self-revealed data (53.7% [27.3% + 19.0% + 7.4%] vs 26.4%);
  • 4.0% involved in all categories of crimes.

• The portrait of criminal participation is therefore very different depending on the data source used.
  • The two portraits taken over the three-year window period suggest an underestimation of criminal participation when based on official data

Self revealed criminal participation

• Text version: Self-revealed criminal participation

  26.4% intimate partner violence only; 19.8% intimate partner violence and violent crime; 21.5% intimate partner violence and other crime; 32.2% intimate partner violence, violent crime and other crime.

Official criminal participation

• Text version: Official criminal participation

  27.3% intimate partner violence only; 5.8% intimate partner violence and violent crime; 19.0% intimate partner violence and other crime; 4.0% intimate partner violence, violent crime and other crime; 19.0% violent crime only; 7.4% other crime only; 14.9% violent crime and other crime; 2.5% no incarceration.

Results summary

• Over the entire criminal career, 94.3% of offenders revealed participation in at least two spheres of criminal activity, while 71.1% reported participation in the three spheres of crime under study (intimate partner violence, violent crimes [outside the family context], other crimes).
• During the three-year period preceding the current incarceration, participation in two spheres of crime is 73.6%. In addition, 32.2% of the participants revealed involvement in all three spheres of criminal activity during this period.
• Very few specialize in intimate partner violence, both over the entire criminal career (5.8%) and over the three-year window period (26.4%).
• Official data (arrest and incarceration) present significant limits in reconstructing criminal trajectories. It is safe to say that official data underestimates criminal involvement, especially regarding intimate partner violence.

objective b - criminal career parameters

Explore the parameters of the criminal career for the different groups of offenders (group based on criminal participation during the 3 years preceding current incarceration).

• This comparison makes it possible to determine the existence of differences between the groups in order to identify distinctive elements in the criminal path.
• More specifically, examining for each group of offenders:
  1. Age at first crime
  2. Nature of the offenses committed;
  3. Criminal diversification;
  4. Frequency of crimes.

Age at first crime

• The age at which an individual commits their first offense has received significant attention in criminology and is considered one of the best predictors of future delinquency.

Abbreviations used in this table

SD: standard deviation

Eta: size of affect

p: probability

• Offenders were on average younger at the time of 1st self-revealed crime (15.08 years) than at the 1st arrest (18.99 years) or 1st conviction (19.87 years).
• Regarding the age of the first crime and according to the different groups of offenders, the more individuals display participation in a greater number of spheres of criminal activity, the earlier the age of initiation to crime is (significant differences).

Nature of offenses committed and criminal diversification

• Intimate partner violence
  • The perpetration of intimate partner violence can be examined in its different forms (psychological, economic, physical or sexual violence).
  • The instrument used to measure intimate partner violence is the CTS2 (Conflict Tactics Scales 2).
    • The CTS2 is made up of several subscales: psychological violence (8 items), economic violence (5 items), physical violence (12 items; as well as the severe physical violence subscale - 7 items), sexual violence (7 items; as well as the severe sexual violence subscale - 4 items) and injuries (6 items). Each item corresponds to a distinct behavior.
  • Two measures are used to assess the perpetration of this violence.
    1. The first is to determine the participation, so whether at least one of the items (a specific behavior) of the subscale has been declared as having been committed.
    2. The second measure is the sum of the items confirmed to have been committed. In other words, it is an indicator of the diversification of behaviors perpetrated in each of the subscales.

Nature of offenses committed and criminal diversification

• Intimate partner violence
  • Participation, if at least one of the items (a specific behavior) of the subscale has been declared to have been committed.

Abbreviations used in this table

n.s.: not significant

• Almost all the offenders (98.3%) committed psychological violence.
• 92.6% and 81.8% respectively committed acts of physical and economic violence.
• Most offenders have committed all three of these forms of intimate partner violence.
• Sexual violence is rarer (8.3% of offenders admitted to having committed an act of sexual violence).
• It is important to stress here that there is no significant difference between the groups of offenders.

Nature of offenses committed and criminal diversification

• Intimate partner violence
  • The diversification of behaviors perpetrated in each of the subscales (sum of items whose perpetration has been confirmed).

Abbreviations used in this table

n.s.: not significant

• The average of separate acts of psychological violence is very high (6.34 acts of psychological violence out of a possible eight).
• Offenders inflicted 4.0 types of physical violence behaviors over the three-year period.
• On average 1.51 acts of economic violence (out of a possible five) were perpetrated during the 3-year period.
• It is important to stress here that there is no significant difference between the groups of offenders.

Nature of offenses committed and criminal diversification

• Intimate partner violence
  • The CTS2 allowed to examine certain forms of severe violence, as well as the injuries that the perpetrator may have sustained to his victim.

Abbreviations used in this table

n.s.: not significant

• Most offenders have committed severe physical violence (66.1%) and have inflicted injuries (62.0%).
• The number of distinct behaviors of severe physical violence and the number of different injuries that were done are on average similar (1.4 in both cases).
• It is important to stress here that there is no significant difference between the groups of offenders.
• Considering the definition of bodily harm and results obtained, we conclude that all offenders have, at least in intimate relationship context, committed acts that could cause bodily harm during the window period.

Nature of offenses committed and criminal diversification

• Violent crime and other crime
  • Criminal diversification
    • On average, offenders are involved in two types of offenses (2.06) outside the conjugal context during the window period.
    • Group 4 offenders are involved in a greater variety of criminal activities (4.51 types of offenses) than group 3 (1.58) or group 2 (1.33) offenders.

Abbreviations used in this table

n.s.: not significant

Eta: size of affect

p: probability

Nature of offenses committed and criminal diversification

• Violent crime and other crime
  • Criminal diversification
    • Violent crimes
      • The crime committed by the greatest number of offenders is assault (54.2% - 74.4%), followed by threats / extortion (37.5% - 59.0%).
      • 52.0% of the participants interviewed committed acts that could cause bodily harm outside the family setting.
      • Severe bodily harm (assault with a weapon / injury, sexual assault, and homicide) was committed by almost a third of our sample of offenders (33.3% - 28.2%).

Frequency of crimes committed

• Intimate partner violence
  • The frequencies of physical violence, injuries and sexual violence are taken from data collected on a monthly basis during the window period.

Abbreviations used in this table

n.s.: not significant

• On average, offenders committed just over thirteen (13.17) acts of physical violence, with an average of almost four (3.58) acts judged to be more serious over the entire window period.
• Injuries resulting from this physical violence were recorded on average twice (2.25) during the 36-month study.
• It is important to stress here that there is no significant difference between the groups of offenders.

Frequency of crimes committed

• Violent crime and other crime
  • Information on when offenders were active in each of the crime types and the number of crimes they committed were collected for each month of the window period.

Abbreviations used in this table

n.s.: not significant

Freq.: Frequency

Mths: months

Eta: size of affect

p: probability

• For most offenders, criminal activity is diverse and frequent.
• About 50% of offenders committed 19 or more crimes during the months they were criminally active. This is equivalent to almost 3 (2.62) crimes per month.
• There is a great disparity between the groups. Group 3 is generally more active than group 2, and group 4 is much more active.

objective c - characteristics of offenders and prediction of severe violent

The objective pursued is divided into two parts:

1. Examine the individual characteristics that distinguish different groups of offenders;
2. Predict offenders who commit severe and frequent intimate partner violence.

• The idea here is to test the predictive value of certain individual characteristics, as well as the parameters of intimate partner violence and those of the criminal career.
• These are exploratory analyzes.

Examine the individual characteristics that distinguish different groups of offenders

• The individuals encountered exhibit many risk factors.
• The more offenders participated in a greater number of spheres of criminal activity:
  • The younger they are;
  • The less they are educated (in proportion);
  • The more likely their partner was pregnant during the window period;
  • More it was possible that there was a report to the services of youth protection.
• Group 4 offenders exhibit more risk factors than offenders in other groups.

Abbreviations used in this table

n.s.: not significant

p: probability

DYP: Director of Youth Protection

Prediction of severe and frequent intimate partner violence and crimes which may cause bodily harm outside the family context

• Physical violence
• Frequency of physical violence
  • Individual characteristics do not help explain the frequency of physical violence.
  • The more intense the psychological violence, the higher the frequency of physical violence.
  • The mere presence of sexual violence is associated with a higher frequency of physical violence.
  • The more the offenders diversified their criminal activities outside the conjugal context during the window period, the higher the frequency of physical violence is during the same period.

Frequency of physical assault

Prediction of severe and frequent intimate partner violence and crimes which may cause bodily harm outside the family context

• Physical violence
• Occurrence of severe physical violence
  • The more intense the psychological violence, the more likely it is that serious physical violence will occur.
  • A greater diversification of criminal activities outside the family context increases the likelihood of inflicting severe physical violence during the window period.

Occurrence of serious physical assault

Prediction of severe and frequent intimate partner violence and crimes which may cause bodily harm outside the family context

• Physical violence
• Injuries
  • Individual characteristics do not help explain the frequency of physical violence.
  • The more intense the psychological violence, the more likely it is that injury will occur.
  • A greater diversification of criminal activity outside the family context increases the likelihood of inflicting injury during the window period.

Occurrence of injuries

Prediction of severe and frequent intimate partner violence and crimes which may cause bodily harm outside the family context

• Crimes that may cause serious bodily harm outside the marital context.
  • The younger the offenders, the more likely they are to commit this type of crime during the window period.
  • Intimate partner violence perpetrated does not affect the likelihood of committing a crime that could cause harm to someone other than their partner or ex-partner.
  • The parameters of a criminal career have a great influence on the fact of committing bodily harm crimes.
    • Offenders registering involvement in other lucrative crimes are at greater risk of committing harm-causing crimes.
    • Those who commit more crimes and who diversify more in their criminal activities are also at greater risk.

Results summary

• The prevalence of several risk factors is high within the sample.
• The intensity of psychological violence perpetrated during the window period is the best predictor of physical violence (frequency of physical violence, occurrence of severe physical violence, as well as injuries).
• The occurrence of crimes that may cause bodily harm outside of the intimate partner relationship context is effectively predicted by the parameters of the criminal career.

discussion

The results of this research tend to show that for offenders who commit intimate partner violence, this form of violence is only the result and projection of other types of crimes committed outside the family context.

• This finding prevails whether one examines crimes committed over the entire criminal career or over a shorter period.
• These elements corroborate the notion of generalist offenders and emphasize the importance of considering the criminal history of perpetrators of domestic violence.
• It is therefore possible to suggest that intimate partner violence is only one manifestation of a variety of criminal behaviors within individual pathways. Intimate partner violence is often part of a larger constellation of anti-social behavior.
• It is therefore recommended to intervene intensively on individuals who display chronic delinquency, to reduce the prevalence and the commission of violence between partners.

Severity of crimes committed - bodily harm

• In a conjugal context, all the offenders had committed violent acts that could cause bodily harm.
• More than half of the offenders interviewed had committed at least one crime that could result in bodily harm outside the family, and nearly one in three offenders had committed an act that could cause serious bodily harm.

It is hard to believe that the violent behavior of offenders interviewed did not extend to other intimate relationships, whether they are also involved in other forms of family violence.

• Moreover, studies that examined the link between intimate partner violence and other forms of family violence show that in many situations, such violence occur concurrently within the same family.
• It would be desirable to adopt a comprehensive analysis of the phenomenon that can account for its complexity and the connections between these forms of violence in intimate relationships.