State Domestic Violence Resources

Connecticut Coalition Against Domestic Violence (CCADV)

90 Pitkin Street
East Hartford, CT 06108

Toll-free phone number(s):
(800) 281-1481

Phone number(s):
(860) 282-7899

E-mail address: info@ctcadv.org

Web site address: http://www.ctcadv.org/

 IF YOU LIVE OUTSIDE OF CONNECTICUT  THE NATIONAL DOMESTIC VIOLENCE HOTLINE IS

1-800-799-7233.

Editor’s note: Leslie Morgan Steiner is the author of “Crazy Love,” a new memoir about domestic violence, and the anthology “Mommy Wars,” which explores the polarization between stay-at-home and career moms.

Leslie Morgan Steiner says domestic violence afflicts the well-to-do as well as the poor.

(CNN) — For two days, news reports called her “the 20-year old victim” allegedly attacked by R&B singer and dancer Chris Brown in his car early February 8 in Los Angeles, California.

We all now have good reason to believe that the alleged victim was pop singer Rihanna, Brown’s girlfriend.

The story has dominated the general media with good reason. Both singers are young, apple-cheek gorgeous, immensely talented and squeaky clean — the last couple you’d imagine as domestic violence headliners.

Perhaps the only good that will come from the Rihanna/Brown publicity is destruction of our culture’s misconception that abusers and their victims can only be universally poor, uneducated and powerless.

Brown, whose first song debuted at No. 1 and whose first album topped the Billboard Hot 100, appeared on a Disney sitcom and in Sesame Street, Got Milk? and Wrigley’s Doublemint Gum commercials. Barbados-born Rihanna has been big-brothered by music industry legends like Jay-Z and Kanye West and is signed to the Def Jam Recordings label.

She has been astonishingly successful in the short time she has been on the music scene, attaining five Billboard Hot 100 No. 1’s with “SOS,” “Umbrella,” “Take a Bow,” “Disturbia” and T.I.’s “Live Your Life.

Like Rihanna, I had a bright future in my early 20s. I met my abusive lover at 22. I’d just graduated from Harvard and had a job at Seventeen Magazine in New York.

My husband worked on Wall Street and was an Ivy League graduate as well. In our world, we were the last couple you’d imagine enmeshed in domestic violence.

Many of my ex-husband’s attacks also took place in our car. For reasons I never understood, the enclosed, soundproof space brought out his worst violence. He punched me so fiercely that my face had bruises from his fist on one side and from hitting the window on the other.

As trapped in the car as I was in our marriage, it was there that I endured tirades about how controlling I was with money, how flirtatious and naïve I was with other men, how defiant and disrespectful I was of my husband’s authority.

So, I suppose I have more understanding than most about the shame, fury, confusion and disappointment Rihanna may be experiencing. What’s hardest for outsiders to fathom is how lethal a cocktail love, hope and sympathy can be. I first fell for my husband the night he confided how he, like Chris Brown, had been traumatized as a young boy by domestic violence in his home.

“He used to hit my mom … He made me terrified all the time, terrified like I had to pee on myself,” Brown said during a 2007 interview with Giant magazine.

Brown hasn’t explained what happened in the recent incident, but this week he released a statement saying that he’s sorry and saddened by it.

Our culture encourages women to nurture men, making it predictable that many experience a seductive empathy for abusive men, as well as the misguided hope that love can obliterate an ugly past.

In my case, it took four years, myriad terrifying attacks, and the intervention of the police and family court before I understood how little I could help my ex get over his abusive childhood.

I certainly felt alone during my abusive relationship, but unfortunately I was in good company. The U.S. Department of Justice estimates that between 1 million and 3 million women in America are physically abused by their husband or boyfriend each year.

Every day, on average, three women are murdered by their husbands or boyfriends. At some point in our lives, 25 percent of American women will report being physically abused or raped by intimate partners, according to the National Violence Against Women Survey conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

However, these statistics, grim as they are, fail to highlight the root of the abuse cycle. A national survey showed that 50 percent of men who frequently assault their wives also frequently abuse their children.

Witnessing abuse, as Chris Brown and my ex-husband did as young boys, is a form of abuse itself. Tragically, many victims of childhood abuse grow up to be abusers themselves. I always sensed that my husband didn’t want to be hurting me — he knew exactly how excruciating love and fear felt mixed together — but his childhood rage overpowered his adult sensibilities.

A few months after I left my marriage, I happened across another couple in another car, late at night on an empty street. I slowed down as a well-dressed woman about 25 years old was walking away from a white Honda, brushing off a tall, handsome young man wearing a sports coat and jeans.

Suddenly she turned and tried to run. He grabbed her with his long arms and shoved her up against a dirty storefront. Even from my car I could see the fear on her pretty face.

Without thinking, I jerked my car over and got out. By this time the man had let the woman go and she’d slid behind the wheel of the car. He stepped back as I approached, his anger displaced by uncertainty and shame at being interrupted. I didn’t look at him. I leaned into the car as she sat clutching the wheel, crying and staring straight ahead.

“I just left a husband who beat me for three years,” I said. “You do not have to put up with this. You do not deserve to be treated like this.”

“I know,” she whispered as fresh tears poured down her face. She sniffed loudly and shook her head. She wouldn’t look at me. Her eyes were rimmed red, but I could see resolve in them.

“You’re right,” she said. “It’s just taking me longer than I thought.”

As I left, I gave the man a long stare. The spell had been broken and his face was open, sorrowful, filled with hope and fear — a look I had seen dozens of times on my husband’s face. How long would that look last before he got angry again? I could feel the woman’s determination as I got back into my car. I knew she would be all right, one day. The man, I was less certain about.

Family violence is a criminal act; perpetrators, while often former victims themselves, need to accept culpability. Until we can prevent children from witnessing and becoming victims of abuse, the cycle will repeat itself: there will be many more Chris Browns and “alleged victims” in our headlines and in our homes.

The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Leslie Morgan Steiner.

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OutAroad.com gets to understand thatRihanna and Chris Brown are now officially over confirmed her 55-year-old dad Ronald Fenty. Rihanna’s dad told Hindustantimes.com, “The relationship is over and I am pleased. She doesn’t want to speak to Chris. She is being very brave about things and said that she will be back on stage performing soon,” he said. Rihanna suffered from cuts and bruises on her face after her alleged fight with lover Chris Brown. “There is some bruising. She will be alright. I think so,” he said.

Chris Brown Speaks

OK  HERE’S  CHRIS’S  OOOPS  I MEAN  CHRIS’S  PUBLICISTS LAME ASS APOLOGY…

 Chris Brown, who was arrested last weekend on suspicion of attacking a woman widely believed to be the  Rihanna, said on Sunday he was “sorry and saddened” about the incident, and was seeking counseling.

The 19-year-old has been in hiding since the alleged altercation ( aka  beating) with his girlfriend in a rented Lamborghini.

He hired a public relations company that specializes in crisis management to issue a five-sentence statement in which he also said many media and blog reports have been wrong.

“Words cannot begin to express how sorry and saddened I am over what transpired,” he said. “I am seeking the counseling of my pastor, my mother and other loved ones and I am committed, with God’s help, to emerging a better person.” He did not mention his father, who was quoted on Friday as telling  People mag, that his son was “very remorseful.” Police and prosecutors have not officially disclosed that Rihanna was the victim of Brown’s attack just after midnight on February 8. But unidentified police sources told the Los Angeles Times that Rihanna was the victim, and numerous media outlets have reported the same information.

Brown turned himself in to police, and he was booked on suspicion of making criminal threats against a woman. The LAPD is still investigating, and a spokeswoman for the L.A. District Attorney’s Office said a decision has not yet been made on whether to file charges.

Celebrity websites and magazines have reported that the incident happened shortly after Brown left a Beverly Hills party with Rihanna as his passenger. The 20-year-old native of Barbados suffered bruises on her face and a split lip, according to several reports.

Brown added in his statement: “Much of what has been speculated or reported on blogs and/or reported in the media is wrong. While I would like to be able to talk about this more, until the legal issues are resolved, this is all I can say except that I have not written any messages or made any posts to Facebook, on blogs or any place else. Those posts or writings under my name are frauds.”

Despite the serious nature of the allegations, many of Brown’s showbiz comrades have defended him. Most recently, hip-hop star Kanye West said, “Can’t we give Chris a break?” during a taping of VH1’s “Storytellers” on Friday.  UM  KANYE  NO  WE CAN’T  GIVE CHRIS A BREAK  IF HE BEAT RI -RI UP….

STAY TUNED !!!!!!

THIS WAS SENT  TO ME TODAY AND WITHIN MINUTES THIS PIC WAS ALL OVER THE WEB.. THANK  GOD  TMZ.COM  HAD THE ORIGINAL PIC THAT SOMEONE HAD PHOTO-SHOPPED.. LEAVE HER ALONE ALREADY…SHE DOESN’T NEED TO BE VICTIMIZED AGAIN.  THERE ARE RUMORS  SHE WAS BRUISED UP BACK IN DECEMBER… I WILL TRY TO CONFIRM THESE REPORTS  STAY TUNED TO THE HOT MORNING CREW FOR ALL YOUR UPDATES…..

SEE YA SEE YA

NANCYB

It started with a text.

The explosive fight that landed Rihanna in the hospital ignited when Chris Brown got a text message from another young woman, a source said.

“He got a booty call. He got a text. Rihanna saw it and she got upset. They started to argue. She got out of the car. He wanted her to get back in, so he grabbed her,” the industry source said. “She pulled away. That’s when she’s told people he hit her.”

The Barbados-born beauty had “visible injuries” when cops arrived, and she’s been cooperating with the investigation ever since, while freezing out Brown.

“Chris has been trying to contact her. So far she hasn’t taken his call,” the music business source said. “Her family is on their way to be with her. She has some close girlfriend looking after her.”

The source scoffed at reports that the fight erupted after a jealous Brown scolded Rihanna for spending time with producerTimbaland at a pre-Grammy party.

Cops and sources say the two were driving a rented Lambo on a ritzy street south of Rihanna’s pad in the Hollywood Hills early Sunday when they quarreled, parked, got out and “the argument escalated.”  There are reports  that she took the keys to the lambo and threw them out the car windwow  , chris  got pissed and couldnt find the keys  came back to the car  and told  her that he was going to kill her and choked her til she was unconscious. she told cops when she came to  Chris had fled the scene.

Cops responding to a 911 call found the “Umbrella” singer with a split lip and contusions on either side of her forehead, according to People.com.

“She looked distraught and in a lot of pain. Her eyes were closed because she was looking down,” a police source who saw photos told People.com.

Rihanna also reportedly had bite marks on her hand and was treated at Cedars-Sinai Hopsital.Cops delivered their case to prosecutors Tuesday, but the district attorney sent them back to the drawing board.

“LAPD did present a case this morning and we have asked for further investigation,” DA spokeswoman  Jane Robison said.

Robison wouldn’t describe the holes that prosecutors want plugged.

A legal expert said prosecutors generally ask for an overabundance of “witness work” in cases like this because victims often lose their nerve when it comes to trial.

“These cases are often stymied by the refusal of victims to testify,” said attorney Alexandra Leichter, a Beverly Hills based private arbitrator. “If witnesses saw the victim before the attack, witnesses heard the screams and then cops came and she was bloodied, then the circumstantial evidence could be enough to convict.”

The Daily News spoke to a witness Tuesday who heard the raucous fight explode outside her house: “I heard the screaming. It was loud,” the homeowner said.

“In my opinion, either [the cops] have conflicting stories and not enough evidence, or the DA is debating whether to file this as misdemeanor or felony battery,” said defense attorney Steve Cron. “If you have a scratch or a bruise, that’s more in the realm of misdemeanor. If you have a cut that requires stitches, bruising showing multiple blows, a broken bone or a chipped tooth, that’s more felony.”

Brown, 19, has kept a low profile since he was booked on a felony criminal threats charge and released on $50,000 bail. His attorney  Mark Geragos did not return calls seeking comment.

Prosecutors said Tuesday they want more evidence from police before determining whether to press charges against Chris Brown, who’s accused in a domestic dispute that reportedly involves pop superstar Rihanna.Police presented a case regarding Brown on Tuesday, but did not release any of its details, Los Angeles County District Attorney spokeswoman Jane Robison said. She said the office would have no further comment on the case.

Brown was arrested Sunday night after surrendering to police, who sought the 19-year-old singer when a woman identified him as he attacker during a fight the night before. Numerous media outlets, citing sources and police officials who were not named, have identified the woman as 20-year-old Rihanna, Brown’s longtime girlfriend.

Though an initial police news release indicated that they were investigating a battery on a woman who was injured, Brown was booked only on suspicion of making a criminal threat, a felony. Police have said that prosecutors would determine what charges, if any, were warranted.

The district attorney’s kicking the case back to police could signal that prosecutors are seeking to build stronger charges against Brown; or it could mean the current evidence is too flimsy or has holes that would drop it to a misdemeanor or make it go away altogether, Loyola University law professor Stan Goldman said.

“Sending it back certainly isn’t the death penalty,” Goldman said.

“If you’re Chris Brown,” he added, “it’s both bad and good.”

A police spokeswoman said the department had no comment about the district attorney’s decision.

The department has said it was alerted to the incident in the upscale Hancock Park neighborhood by a 911 call, but have provided few official details beyond the initial report. Brown’s attorney and spokesman have not returned multiple calls and e-mails seeking comment since Sunday.

Brown remains free on $50,000 bail.

The allegations have at least momentarily tarnished Brown’s squeaky-clean image. At least one major sponsor, Wrigley, has suspended ad campaigns featuring the singer, who has scored with hits such as 2005’s “Run It!” and a Grammy-nominated duet with Jordin Sparks, “No Air.”

Brown has withdrawn from public appearances in Phoenix scheduled for this weekend before the NBA All-Star game. Rihanna on Tuesday postponed a planned concert in Malaysia.

Brown and Rihanna, whose real name is Robyn Rihanna Fenty, skipped planned performances at Sunday’s Grammy Awards, leaving fellow recording artists to try to make sense of the allegations.

Kanye West, who toured with Rihanna, said on Ryan Seacrest’s morning radio show Tuesday morning that the reports of abuse were “devastating.”

“I feel like, just as a person, I don’t care how famous she is or even if she just worked at McDonald’s, that should never happen,” West said on the show, which is broadcast on KIIS-FM in Los Angeles. “It should never come to that place.”

The police are getting cooperation from Rihanna, and what she has told them so far is chilling.

A source close to the investigation tells E! News exclusively that Rihanna has alleged to police that Brown choked her while threatening to kill her and, subsequently, she lost consciousness.

They began squabbling after leaving Clive Davis‘ pre-Grammy party late Saturday. Shortly after midnight, things blew up. Brown pulled his silver Lamborghini to the side of a street in L.A.’s Hancock Park neighborhood. That’s when, per the source, Rihanna grabbed the car keys and tossed them out the window, sending Brown into a rage.

He tried in vain to find the keys, then came back to the car, put his hands around her neck and, according to the insider, said, “I’m going to kill you!”

According to the source, the 20-year-old “Disturbia” singer told police that she lost consciousness, and when she awoke, Brown had fled.

According to the source, her right eye was blackened and badly swollen and she had hand prints on her arms. The responding officers were so concerned about her, they drove Rihanna to the hospital in their squad car instead of waiting for an ambulance.

Officers took two sets of photographs of the banged-up singer, one at the scene and the second after she was admitted to Cedars-Sinai Medical Center for treatment. Those photos were presumably among the evidence presented to the district attorney.

After being treated for her injuries, police escorted her down a rear elevator and into a waiting Mercedes, the source says.

KESHIA CHANTE …This is the girl that is allegedly the new object of Chris Brown’s desire. I am told that she was held up in questioning for 6 hours by the cops. Now, people on the Chris Brown side of things are very worried that Keshia might confirm what Rihanna has already told police – that the R&B star hit her. From what I understand, Chris has been dating Keshia for a while now and that he even used to date her a few years back.

She is a Canadian singer in her own right, but she is known as the girl that is going to be playing Aaliyah in the new movie about the deceased love of my life. They are saying she actually called the cops when she saw “blood flying,” as one of my sources said. I heard Chris Breezy has a pretty prominent mark on his neck from Rihanna scratching him. 

Of course there are rumors  flying that Ri Ri  gave Chris  Herpes… that’s been circulating for awhile. According to unverified sources, Rihanna and Chris Brown broke up two weeks ago. Rihanna didn’t want to break up with Chris, but he was reportedly done with her. Management forced him to act “lovey” for the Clive Davis’ pre-Grammy party. He didn’t want to. Rihanna’s publicist, in confidence, asked him to the same. He agreed. They attended the Clive Davis party together. Management allegedly asked for Chris to drive with Rihanna in his car after the event was over for paparazzi pictures.

According to  sources, Rihanna started acting like they were in a relationship still, not realizing that it was indeed completely over. Chris told her he wasn’t really with her, it was for publicity and that she needed to get it through her head that it was over. Adding insult to injury - like my previous source said - Chris picked up a girl he had a date with that night while Rihanna was in the car. So, the girl was in the car like a third whell.

It would appear that Chris has completely moved on from Rihanna from this new girl. My source tells me that Chris was actually acting very childish for doing his in front of Rihanna. Suddenly, Rihanna snapped and that’s the situation got crazy, my sources say. Rihanna allegedly punched Chris in the face while she was screaming, and then he hit started hitting her back. Noticing there was blood, somebody called 911 and my sources say “the girl” is the one that made that call.

As of right now, Rihanna’s headed to Barbados, I am getting from people. Not sure, because I heard she’s working with police. Chris is being flown out so things can settle a bit. They say he’s in Vegas now. The other “girl,” allegedly Keshia Chante – has been questioned by the label people to get her mind right, so to speak. Both Rihanna and Chris’ teams are trying to get her to side with them. If she testifies as an eyewitness saying Rihanna was the injured party, she could put Chris in jail for a maximum of 12 years. If the girl testifies stating Rihanna indeed made the first punch and if Chris’ attorneys can spin it in court, Chris can get off his charges all together. A lot is at stake.

Also, my sources are saying that, there’s proof lingering around and Rebel One Management (Rihanna’s team) is trying to stop it from leaking to the media. People are reportedly bracing for the worse in this matter, legally and otherwise. Rihanna’s team doesn’t want her to press charges, as it could possibly damage her name and career. So far, looks like she is going to work with the coppers. The LA Times is saying this already so any notion that she isn’t is likely FALSE.