Comings, Goings, and Congratulations

Congratulations and heartfelt best wishes to Mary Twomey, who will be leaving her job as Director of the San Francisco Consortium for Elder Abuse Prevention at the Institute on Aging to become co-director, along with Laura Mosqueda, and northern California liaison of U.C. Irvine's Center of Excellence in Elder Abuse and Neglect.

Obviously I've had a strong interest in Mary's work since she took over as the Consortium's director when I left in 2000. I think it's only natural, when someone takes over a job you've had for 16 years, to have a certain amount of ambivalence. Of course you want them to do well and carry on your work. But there's also a nagging fear that they'll discover your skeletons or shortcomings; or worse, outshine you.

But watching Mary take the Consortium in new and exciting directions has been wonderful to watch. She's led the program with grace, skill, and panache. Under her guidance and with the help of IOA staffers Dana Smith, Melissa Anderson, and Tessa ten Tusscher, the Consortium has made remarkable strides. What was a fledgling support group and counseling program when I left is now an integral component of the IOA's geriatric psychology training program, which means that every participant in the program receives training in working with elder abuse victims. They currently have 20 marriage and family therapist interns, practicum students, and a post-doc. Plans are underway to secure funding for an elder abuse forensic center, which will be modeled on UC Irvine's. The Irvine Center is staffed by legal, medical, social services, and law enforcement professionals who review abuse cases, develop care plans, conduct in-home medical and mental status evaluations and evidentiary investigations, and provide training and consultation.

Mary's new job will involve working with other projects funded by the Archstone Foundation around the state, overseeing technical assistance to grantees, and helping the center provide leadership in statewide advocacy.

Of course I'm looking forward to seeing who fills "our" job next and will keep you posted.

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Congratulations too to Lori Jervis, Assistant professor of American Indian and Alaska Native Programs at the University of Colorado, Denver, for being awarded a grant from the National Institute on Aging for a pilot study on the mistreatment of American Indian and Alaska Native (AI/AN) elders. The goal is to lay the groundwork for studying the prevalence/incidence of mistreatment among rural and urban Native elders by exploring alternative methods and proposing recommendations for future research that are both scientific and "grounded in local realities."

They'll be assembling two groups to guide the project: 1) an interdisciplinary team of researchers with expertise in AI/AN communities and a track record in conducting epidemiological studies with the population, and 2) a culturally and geographically diverse panel of Community Experts with backgrounds in Native elder advocacy and abuse prevention. I'm pleased to have been asked to serve on the latter.

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Earlier this week, the Administration on Aging announced grants to operate the National Center for Elder Abuse. The National Committee for the Prevention of Elder Abuse will oversee NCEA's multidisciplinary efforts, the National Adult Protective Services Association will oversee training, and the University of Delaware will serve as co-manager.

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As many of you know, I've had a strong interest in restorative justice approaches to preventing elder abuse. So, I was intrigued and pleased to learn that Arlene Groh, Elder Abuse Restorative Justice Resource Consultant for the Elder Abuse Response Team in Waterloo, Ontario, spent the Second World Elder Abuse Awareness Day in Busan, Korea, giving a workshop on her work. Participants came from all over the country and included elders, academics, experts in family violence, and representative from Elder Abuse counseling centers across the country. The event was hosted by the Korean Information Network for the Prevention of Elder Abuse (KINPEA) in collaboration with the administration of Busan and the Metropolitan City National Health Insurance Corporation, which is playing a leading role in creating a long-term care insurance service in Korea.

Arlene's visit was at the invitation of Dr. Dong Hee Han, who has a doctorate in elder abuse and is attempting to make changes in how elder abuse is addressed in Korea by looking at a new definition of filial piety, connecting isolated seniors with "cyberspace families," and working with elderly prostitutes.

Offenders, Victims and Restorative Justice

Last month, I presented at the Offender Treatment, Victim Services, Restorative Justice conference in Miami, which was sponsored by the Institute of Evidence-Based and Best Practices. The conference was a bold one–it’s not that usual to bring victims’ and offenders’ advocates together, and when you throw in sessions on applying restorative justice (RJ) to domestic violence (DV), you know they were pushing the limits.

RJ draws from traditional Indian justice traditions. Rather than treating crime as a matter of guilt and innocence, it frames it as harm that affects not just victims, but offenders and the broader community. It assumes that certain conflicts, particularly ones involving families, are best resolved by repairing and improving relationships and controlling risk, rather than simply punishing offenders. It offers victims, abusers, and the community opportunities to come together to consider why crimes happened, what can be done to repair the harm, and how to prevent future harm. It also holds that society has an obligation to help offenders make amends and reintegrate them into the community. RJ isn’t a single technique but a variety of alternatives ranging from mediation to peacemaking courts to family conferences, which can be carried out with court involvement, under court supervision, or as an alternative to court intervention.

Critics see RJ as “light on crime,” offender focused, and dangerous to victims. Anti-DV advocates hold that mediation is impossible between victims and abusers because of imbalances in power. Others claim that involving victims’ and offenders’ friends, support systems, and communities, which is done in conferencing, won’t work because these networks may actually support, rather than discourage, DV.

Supporters counter that RJ often demands accountability where the traditional system doesn’t, particularly in cases involving first time or minor offenders who typically deny their guilt, get off with warnings, and never assume responsibility for what they’ve done. One of the speakers, Donna Coker, a nationally known expert in domestic violence, is among those who suggest that RJ approaches can and should be added to the arsenal of anti-DV tools. She’s written extensively on the limitations of criminal justice approaches to DV, including the “unintended consequences” of mandatory arrest policies. Because the laws fail to distinguish between one-time versus chronic and minor versus severe violence, they’ve resulted in dramatic increases in arrests of women, particularly women of color, as “mutual combatants.” This is in spite of research suggesting that most are acting in self-defense. Recent studies on recidivism also contradict early research that showed that arresting offenders reduced DV—the newer studies suggest that arrest reduces violence in some cases but increases it in others.

Coker and others urge caution in using RJ with DV and emphasize the need to ensure that women are safe and not being overtly or covertly coerced to participate. Among the advantages of RJ are that it offers victims a greater voice in the process, can potentially disrupt social and family support for battering, and provides women with opportunities to engage their families and friends in confronting their abusers.

What does all this have to do with elder abuse? I don’t really know. But the fact that so many elderly victims refuse to initiate punitive action against abusive family members for fear of loosing their relationships makes me think that RJ deserves our attention. I’ve been following the few elder abuse programs I’m aware of that use RJ and was pleased to hear that the director of one, Arlene Groh of Community Care Access Centre of Waterloo Region Ontario, will be presenting at the NAPSA conference in San Francisco in September. Another exciting model project was conducted by the Jamestown S’klallum tribe in Washington state, which uses family conferencing to address conflict in caregiving systems.

We’ve made huge strides in improving the criminal justice system’s response to elder abuse in recent years, which is critical. I don’t see RJ as a threat but rather, as providing opportunities for getting more juice out of the criminal justice system by supplementing court authority with the power of family and community relationships. While the research is sparse, there’s evidence that RJ approaches increase restitution rates and reduce recidivism. Victims’ satisfaction rates are higher. The Miami conference was billed as the “first annual” and I strongly urge anyone who’s interested in expanding the scope and focus of elder abuse prevention to watch for the next one.