Victim or Perpetrator?
An issue which may occur is when both the abuser and the person experiencing domestic abuse present as the ‘victim’.
With the exception of criminal justice services, which need to identify the perpetrator, best practice is always to believe someone who presents as having experienced domestic abuse. Unfortunately, this does mean that service providers may, in a small number of cases, be providing support to the abuser, which is unhelpful. However, as there is no way to know for certain, this is more beneficial than potentially getting it wrong and sending the person who really needs help away.
Clearly service providers cannot support both parties at the same time. Various arrangements could be made – for example, where agencies have another local service, they can refer one party to this other service or they could arrange meeting places outwith the organisation – the main point would be still to support both parties without the abuser knowing where the abused partner/ex-partner is. If it is in terms of housing services, they can just be aware of this when re-housing to ensure they are not potentially re-housing in the same area.
For Criminal Justice services, it would be worthwhile developing screening services to prevent arrest and prosecution of the abused partner. The Dyn Project in South Wales has been provided with the ‘Intimate partner abuse screening tool for LGBT relationships’ by the LGBT Domestic Violence Coalition in Massachusetts, and would be an excellent contact for taking this work forward. Screening can only be safely done with appropriate training – please do not try to take this work on without it.