Thomas MacMillan Photo
A woman in an abusive relationship is at her most vulnerable when she tells her boyfriend it’s over — especially if he owns a gun.
New legislation by U.S. Sens. Dick Blumenthal (pictured) and Chris Murphy would help protect women from retaliation, by preventing men with temporary restraining orders from having or buying guns.
Blumenthal and Murphy announced their plans Friday morning at a press conference on the third floor of police department headquarters on Union Avenue.
The bill, to be introduced in September, would be called the Domestic Violence Survivor Protection Act. It’s designed to protect people — mostly women — who are in abusive relationships.
As it stands, people who are the subject of permanent restraining orders are not permitted to buy guns. But a gap in the law exists, Blumenthal said. People with temporary restraining orders are not, in most states, restricted from buying or owning guns.
Temporary restraining orders are issued when a woman in an abusive relationship applies for a permanent order against her abuser. As the law stands, when a woman files for such and order, the boyfriend or husband is notified. There follows a period of seven to 14 days, before a hearing on the application, during which the abusive and likely angry partner may choose to take revenge on the woman.
Blumenthal and Murphy’s new bill would make sure the abusive partner doesn’t have access to a gun during that period.
Of the women killed by a firearm in 2010, two-thirds of them were killed by an intimate partner, said Blumenthal. He called guns and domestic violence a “lethal combination.”
“We need to close this gaping loophole in the law,” he said.
Women with a gun in the house are 20 times more likely to be the victim of a domestic homicide, said Murphy (pictured).
“This legislation is simple and it makes sense,” he said. “This will make existing background checks work better.”
“Domestic violence homicide is predictable and therefore preventable,” said Karen Jarmoc (pictured), head of the Connecticut Coalition Against Domestic Violence.
Detective Manmeet Colon (pictured), of the New Haven police department’s Special Victims Unit, said the seven to 14 days after a woman files for a restraining order are “such a volatile period.”
With a new law, “we can prevent many tragedies from happening,” she said.
Asked about the bill’s chances in a Congress that has made very little progress on gun control, Blumenthal said, “I think the chances are good that it will reach the Senate floor.”
“Republicans are interested,” he said. “There is something about domestic violence that makes this issues different.”
“At some point, Republicans have to back up their talk with action,” said Murphy. “If they can’t support this, it’s an admission that they can’t support anything.”
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