Study objectives: We determine the differences between households with and without children at the scene of intimate partner violence (IPV) 911 telephone calls in regard to arrests, presence of a weapon, alcohol use, and injury severity.
Methods: 911 telephone calls for IPV in metropolitan Atlanta, Georgia, placed in 2002 were linked with cases of police-documented IPV incident reports. These incident reports were reviewed for relationship of offender and victim, sociodemographic information, weapon and substance use, previous incidents, and injury severity (measured by the Conflict Tactics Scale [CTS]).
Results: Incident reports (1,677) were characterized as IPV and linked with 911 calls. Of these, 1,505 came from unique addresses. Children were present at 45.7% of IPV incidents (n=664/1,453). IPV victims were less likely to be arrested (5.7% versus 11.2%; P<.001) if a child was present at the scene; offenders were also less likely to be arrested (50.5% versus 58%; P=.004) if a child was present at the scene. There were no differences in regard to weapon use (13.8% versus 13.2%; P=.78) or increased severity of violence/CTS score greater than 13 (87.7% versus 86.4%; P=.45) and presence of children at the scene. However, IPV victims (4.7% versus 16.6%; P<.001) and offenders (27% versus 39.2%; P<.001) were less likely to be intoxicated when children were present.
Conclusion: Households with children that called 911 for IPV were arrested less frequently and were less likely to be intoxicated at the incident. There are no differences in weapon use or severity of violence between households with and without children that call 911 for IPV.