Program Brief

INTRODUCTION
The Grants to Encourage Arrest Policies and Enforcement of Protection Orders Program (hereinafter referred to as the Arrest Program) recognizes that domestic violence, sexual assault, dating violence and stalking are crimes that require the criminal justice system to hold offenders accountable for their actions through investigation, arrest, and prosecution of violent offenders, and through close judicial scrutiny and management of offender behavior.

This discretionary grant program is designed to encourage state, local, and tribal governments and state, local, and tribal courts to treat domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking as serious violations of criminal law requiring the coordinated involvement of the entire criminal justice system.   This program challenges the entire community to listen, communicate, identify problems, and share ideas that will result in new responses to ensure victim safety and offender accountability.

SCOPE OF PROGRAM

Program Purpose Areas

Arrest Program will support projects that:

• Implement pro-arrest programs and policies in police departments, including policies for protection order violations;
  
  
• Develop policies, educational programs, protection order registries, and training in police departments to improve tracking of cases involving domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault and stalking.  Policies, educational programs, protection order registries, and training described in the application shall incorporate confidentiality, and privacy protections for victims of domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault and stalking;
  
  
• Centralize and coordinate police enforcement, prosecution, or judicial responsibility for domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault and stalking cases in teams or units of police officers, prosecutors, parole, probation, or judges;
  
  
• Coordinate computer tracking systems to ensure communication between police, prosecutors, parole and probation officers, and both criminal and family courts;
  
  
• Strengthen legal advocacy service programs for victims of domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault and stalking including strengthening assistance to such victims in immigration matters;
  
  
• Educate judges in criminal and civil courts (including juvenile courts) about domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault and stalking and improve judicial handling of such cases;
  
  
• Provide technical assistance and computer and other equipment to police departments, prosecutors, courts, and tribal jurisdictions to facilitate the widespread enforcement of protection orders, including interstate enforcement, enforcement between States and tribal jurisdiction, and enforcement between tribal jurisdictions;
  
  
• Develop or strengthen policies and training for police, prosecutors, and the judiciary in recognizing, investigating, and prosecuting instances of domestic violence and sexual assault against older individuals and individuals with disabilities;
  
  
• Develop State, tribal, territorial, or local policies, procedures, and protocols for preventing dual arrests and prosecutions in cases of domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking, and develop effective methods for identifying the pattern and history of abuse that indicates which party is the actual perpetrator of abuse;
  
  
• Plan, develop and establish comprehensive victim service and support centers, such as family justice centers, designed to bring together victim advocates from non-profit, non-governmental victim services organizations, law enforcement officers, prosecutors, probation officers, governmental victim assistants, forensic medical professionals, civil legal attorneys, chaplains, legal advocates, representatives from community-based organizations and other relevant public or private agencies or organizations into one centralized location, in order to improve safety, access to services, and confidentiality for victims and families.  Although funds may be used to support co location of project partners under this purpose area, funds may not support construction or major renovation expenses or activities that fall outside of the scope of the other statutory purpose areas;
  
  
• Develop and implement policies and training for police, prosecutors, probation, and parole officers, and the judiciary in recognizing, investigating, and prosecuting instances of sexual assault, with an emphasis on recognizing the threat to the community for repeat crime perpetration by such individuals;
  
  
• Develop, enhance and maintain protection order registries; and
  
  
• Develop human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) testing programs for sexual assault perpetrators and notification of counseling protocols

Special Interest Categories

OVW has an interest in projects that:

• Involve faith-based and/or community-driven initiatives to address violence against women among diverse and traditionally underserved populations. If this interest area is included in your application, you must illustrate capacity and expertise in the budget and MOU section;
  
  
• Include dedicated parole and probation officers within existing or newly created domestic violence units to actively participate in holding perpetrators accountable;
  
  
• Develop innovative programs to improve judicial handling of domestic violence cases (i.e., specialized courts or dockets for domestic violence cases, enhanced judicial monitoring of domestic violence offenders, or the creation or enhancement of technology to provide prosecutors and judges access to case information on prior arrests;
  
  
• Address system accountability by conducting a safety audit of the jurisdiction's criminal justice system;
  
  
• Develop Sexual Assault Response Teams (SART) to actively respond to sexual assault victims.

Program Limitations
Applicants should also consider the following guidelines in response the Arrest Solicitation:

• Grant funds may not be used to provide legal representation in civil and criminal matters, such as family law cases (divorce, custody, visitation and child support), housing cases, consumer law cases and others.  Grant funds may be used to provide legal representation to victims of domestic violence, sexual assault, dating violence, and stalking only in the limited context of protection order proceedings;
  
  
• Grant funds may not be used to address prevention activities (i.e., outreach to elementary and secondary schools, implementation of educational programs regarding domestic or dating violence intervention and public awareness campaigns);
  
  
• Grant funds may not be used to directly address child abuse, or other family violence issues such as violence perpetrated by a child against a parent, or violence perpetrated by a sibling against another sibling;
  
  
• Grant funds may not use grant funds to provide direct services to children, children who witness domestic violence and/or services addressing child maltreatment, except where the child receiving such services is a victim of sexual assault or where such services are an ancillary part of providing services to the child’s mother who is a victim of domestic violence, sexual assault, or stalking such as providing child care services while the victim receives services.  Any direct services that are provided to a child victim of sexual assault must meet a statutory purpose area of the Arrest program.  Funds may be not be used to investigate or prosecute child abuse except for cases of child sexual abuse.  However, no more than 10% of the total award amount can be used to address the issue of child sexual abuse.

PROGRAM ELIGIBILITY

By statute, eligible grantees for the Arrest Program are States, Indian tribal governments, State, tribal, territorial, and local courts (including juvenile courts), and units of local government.   For the purpose of this Program, a unit of local government is any city, county, township, town, borough, parish, village, or other general-purpose political subdivision of a State; an Indian tribe that performs law enforcement functions as determined by the Secretary of Interior; or, for the purpose of assistance eligibility, any agency of the District of Columbia government or the United States Government performing law enforcement functions in and for the District of Columbia, and any Trust Territory of the United States.

To be eligible for a grant, applicants are required to enter into a collaborative working relationship with a nonprofit, nongovernmental sexual assault and/or domestic violence program in the community to be served.

Applicants must:

1. certify in writing that their laws or official policies–
   1. encourage or mandate arrests of domestic violence offenders based on probable cause that an offense has been committed;  and
   2. encourage or mandate arrest of domestic violence offenders who violate the terms of a valid and outstanding protection order;
2. demonstrate that their laws, policies, or practices and their training programs discourage dual arrests of offender and victim;
3. certify that their laws, policies, or practices prohibit issuance of mutual restraining orders of protection except in cases where both spouses file a claim and the court makes detailed findings of fact indicating that both spouses acted primarily as aggressors and that neither spouse acted primarily in self-defense; and
4. certify that their laws, policies, and practices do not require, in connection with the prosecution of any misdemeanor or felony domestic violence offense, or in connection with the filing, issuance, registration, or service of a protection order, or a petition for a protection order, to protect a victim of domestic violence, stalking, or sexual assault, that the victim bear the costs associated with the filing of criminal charges against the offender, or the costs associated with the filing, issuance, registration, or service of a warrant, protection order, petition for a protection order, or witness subpoena, whether issued inside or outside the State, tribal or local jurisdiction; and
5. certify that, not later than January 5, 2009, their laws, policies, or practices will ensure that—
   1. no law enforcement officer, prosecuting officer or other government official shall ask or require an adult, youth, or child victim of a sex offense as defined under Federal, tribal, State, territorial, or local law to submit to a polygraph examination or other truth telling device as a condition for proceeding with the investigation of such an offense; and
   2. the refusal of a victim to submit to an examination described in subparagraph (A) shall not prevent the investigation of the offense.

For more information about the Grants to Encourage Arrest Policies and Enforcement of Protection orders Program, please contact:

Office on Violence Against Women (OVW)
800 K Street, N.W., Suite 920
Washington, D.C. 20530
Phone: 202-307-6026
Fax: 202-307-3911
TTY: 202-307-2277
Website: www.usdoj.gov/ovw