Overcoming barriers in communities.

PositionFamily violence

Panelists MARIA ARIAS Supervising Attorney, Battered Women's Rights Clinic, Main Street Legal Services EVELYN CARDONA Executive Director, North Brooklyn Coalition Against Family Violence ANGELA LEE Associate Director, New York Asian Women's Center MIRCIA SANCHEZ Director, COBRA; Coordinator for Specialized Victim Services, Harlem Dowling West Side Center for Children and Family Services ANURADHA SHARMA Executive Director, SAKHI for South Asian Women NECHAMA WOLFSON President, Shalom Task Force Evelyn Cardona (1) Executive Director North Brooklyn Coalition Against Family Violence (2) [Videotaped Testimony:]

BLACK WOMAN: You know, when he put that gun to my head, I knew that was it. The reason I knew it was it is because the girls were there. The girls saw everything. And that night, we were just so crazy trying to get out of that small apartment, running around from this crazy man. We were screaming. We were hysterical. And I said that would never happen again.

But you know what is really weird? I did not do it for me; I did it for them. I did not do it for me. But what they saw that day was fifteen years of abuse and ugliness that I had always tried to hide. I said I would not do it any more.

You know, the girls are the most important thing in my life. They are the things I love most. They are the priority. They are the good and the bad of me. But I am really fearful of doing what the lawyer I saw told me to do.

You see, I am afraid of losing him. When I went to talk to that lawyer, I was trying to let her know I do not know this system. It just doesn't feel right.

You know, at one point I was on welfare, and that was tough, trying to figure out that whole system. Now I am working and do not have to deal with that. I talked to the kids' teachers. But I will tell you, this legal system, these lawyers, these judges, the social workers--I am not sure I can do this.

So I consulted you because somebody suggested I should. But as I look at you, you look like me. Your skin color is the same as mine. Your hair texture is the same as mine. You speak to me in a language I understand, but do not understand. I do not know if you get what I am saying to you. You see, my experiences have been oppression in many ways. I have been raped. I have been sodomized.

I have dealt with racism and sexism in ways you could never understand. My womanhood, my womanhood itself, has been taking the place of that. I just do not think you can imagine. While I know you are trying to help me out, some of what you suggest does not work for me. I need you to understand that.

So, as you make a suggestion, the solution may not be good for me, or based on my experiences. My reality is different from yours. You are telling me to file for an order of protection. What is that really going to do for me?

I am thinking about going into a shelter. I put in my application. Won't that open up a whole can of worms that have been put to rest? You know, he said he would kill me if I went any further with this.

My mother said, "What is your problem? Black people do not call the police in Harlem. They do not do that. The police are not our friends." My sister says I am a traitor. She is not even talking to me.

What I wanted out of life was a family, children I could hug and love, and a relationship with someone who respects me. I did not get that. I absolutely did not get that. I am not sure about this order of protection; even though I can get child support, I do not know if it is worth it.

Do you get what I am saying? I am not sure.

Somehow I find myself in family court. Well, I will tell you. This is one heck of a place. I have been here since 9:30, and it is 4:00 now. My case was just heard. By the way, I had to look at him from across the way because he made bail. I did not realize, but I heard later from the guard downstairs. So, I have been sitting here looking at this man all day. If he could kill me, he would, as I sit here.

As I look at the people in the room, they look like me. The people who are sitting waiting for cases to be heard look like me. Their skin is brown and black. The people who are making decisions do not look like me at all. In fact, the court officers, I have watched them all day, have more control over that calendar than the judges. That is what I think.

I cannot do this. I do not want to do this. I do not ever want to come back to this place. And the court officers--which I think is really horrible--if you know them, you can get in. I am invisible. My life means nothing to them.

And so, I wait. The people look like they have been hit by bombs. They have blank stares and no looks on their face. When they come out of the room where they call the cases, they stumble out with bewildered looks on their faces. They usually huddle with their attorneys to figure out what just happened.

So as I stand in front of the judge, the judge does not look at me. She does not even know I exist. She is not even interested in why I am there. The only people the judge is talking to are the lawyers in the room. I am not quite sure I want to do this, because I have exposed myself in ways I never thought I could. Only worse. I did not get a chance to say what was on my mind.

So, I finally get a little yellow slip that tells me to come back to this God-awful, forsaken place, but I am not coming back here. I am not doing this. And as I stumble into the waiting room, I become one of the people who come out of the room looking confused and dazed with a blank stare, not knowing what happened.

MS. CARDONA: Pretty deep, huh? Well, I want you to close your eyes for a minute and feel that darkness and silence. I was that woman. I was that victim seventeen years ago. I was that woman thrown out in the street without any clothing on because I wanted to study. And I outsmarted him when he unscrewed the light bulbs from the socket so I could not read. But that was not the worst thing he did to me. The worst was breaking my schoolbooks. I did not have financial aid to pay for them. How was I going to buy those schoolbooks again?

Today I am the executive director of the North Brooklyn Coalition Against Family Violence. I am taking a stand against domestic violence. The organization I represent is the hottest, the best, because I vowed to not let what happened to me happen to anyone else.

We hold domestic support groups in the same precinct where my batterer beat me up. Right in the same precinct. Not in the community, but in the precinct, with police officers sitting down next to US.

How did this happen? You think I left the first time? No. It was a hard eight years. (3) I was known to the triage nurse, the orthopedic doctor, and the emergency room staff. I was in there every other week. They stopped asking what happened because, of course, I fell down the stairs; I banged into the cabinets. (4)

When I started college, I did not want to study domestic violence. I figured I would help prevent teenage kids from becoming teenage moms like myself. But, I had to do a residency program--my internship. I was working in the south side of Williamsburg with formerly homeless families who had just been placed in special incentive programs. (5) I had to do outreach, so I was going to do a women's coffee hour and get to see their kids, but as we went door to door I saw the faces of physical abuse, (6) psychological abuse, (7) emotional abuse, (8) and sexual abuse. (9)

I returned to my supervisor and told her, "I don't think a coffee hour is going to make it." She said to me, "What are you talking about?" I said, "There is domestic violence in these buildings." She is like, "Are you kidding me? These women just got out of the shelter system. They have not been here more than two months. They do not even have relationships." I am like, "Well, you better get a grip."

I told her I did not know the first thing about domestic violence. She asked me, "Then how did you know they were going through domestic violence?" I said, "Because I recognize the faces, I was a victim." I had closed that chapter of my life more than ten years ago, but she allowed me to reopen it in a safe way. In 1995, we started our first domestic violence program in the south side of Williamsburg, educating ten victims of domestic violence.

The program ran for eight weeks. We educated women. It was not a domestic violence support group. Everyone wants to say, "Oh, let's put them in a support group, they can compare scars. Oh, I got one here. Hey, I got fifteen over here."

No. I do not want to hear their stories. What I want to hear is, "What do you think domestic violence is? Give me examples." They give us what they believe it is. Once they start to realize, "Wow, this is domestic violence. I am a victim," it starts clicking for them. It starts becoming real.

We bring in a legal panel composed of the district attorney's office and our judges. Judge D'Emic, (10) for example, has not missed a panel. The program used to run for eight weeks. Now it runs for twelve. Only the legal panel takes two separate sessions. We have to break it down into criminal court, family court, and supreme court.

These women actually ask judges, "How come my batterer did "a," "b," and "c," yet he came out? How come the DA forgot to do this, and then the case was 30-30? (11) How come I never got my order of protection?" (12) All these "how comes" are turned into concrete answers that are given back to our victims. If all these committed lawyers cannot answer them, trust me, they are on the Internet the next day giving us the answers.

It gives women back a sense of power and control. Look at my terminology--a sense. If not the actual power and control, then at least a sense.

Of these first ten women that graduated back in 1995, six have gone on to complete bachelor's degrees in human services and currently sit on our board of directors. The other two are still in college, because they could not even read.

In the program we provide...

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