After Her Boyfriend Attacked Her, Calling the Police Got This Woman Banned From Her Town
Between September 2011 and February 2012, Rosetta Watson called the police in Maplewood, Mo., four time to report instances of domestic violence she had sustained at the hands of her former boyfriend in her own home. After her fourth call to the police to report the violence she had survived — and needed police help in protecting herself from — the city of Maplewood not only evicted Watson from her home, but forced her to leave town for six months.
Watson was banned from her home and her community as a result of Maplewood’s “nuisance” ordinance, a law on the town’s books that meant that more than two calls to police regarding domestic violence specifically within 180 days qualifies as a “nuisance” to local law enforcement. And as the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) explains, once Maplewood determines that a “nuisance” has occurred, it can then revoke the offending person’s occupancy permits — an annual form that must be submitted along with a $15 fee for a person to be a full-time resident of Maplewood — and not grant a new permit for another six months, effectively banishing someone from their home and community.
“The city knew and in a couple of cases documented in detail in police reports how she was the victim of domestic violence, but they still moved forward with the ordinance against her based on these calls for help,” Sandra Park, a staff attorney with the ACLU, tells Yahoo Beauty.
In theory, nuisance ordinances are put in place by cities to keep neighborhoods quiet from the disruption that a late-night 911 call can involve. By putting in restrictions on how often residents can call the police, lawmakers insist they are incentivizing people to be conscientious in how they contact police.
However, victims of domestic violence already suffer from a lack of control, and limiting their ability to call for help when needed can make an already bad situation unimaginably worse.
Which is exactly what happened to Rosetta Watson, also of Maplewood, Mo. As a low-income woman, she was living in housing granted through a Section 8 voucher at the time. As a result of the nuisance ordinance being enacted against her, Park lost her Section 8 voucher and with it, her access to stable housing. She was unable to renew her lease as a result of the ordinance and became homeless, Park says, moving from rooming house to rooming house.
Watson’s second move after she was forced to leave Maplewood took her to St. Louis, Mo. — where her ex-boyfriend found her and assaulted her, stabbing her with knife.
“Because of her experience in Maplewood, she was scared to call the police,” Park says. “She wasn’t scared of her ex-boyfriend — she was scared of the police. What’s terrible about these ordinances is that they reinforce for people that law enforcement is not there to help.”
Ultimately, Watson took herself to the hospital for treatment of her injuries, where she was relieved to learn that St. Louis wasn’t going to punish her for having been the victim of a crime. There, not only was Watson free from further victimization, but her ex-boyfriend was also arrested and eventually convicted for his crime.
Unfortunately, Maplewood isn’t the only place where nuisance ordinances exist, and Watson isn’t the only survivor of domestic violence to be further punished by her community.
While the ACLU filed a federal lawsuit against the city of Maplewood — calling their nuisance ordinance unconstitutional for the way the law specifically targets calls to the police and threatens citizens’ right to free speech and right to petition their government — the ACLU’s work on the issue of nuisance laws doesn’t end there. The legal advocacy organization launched a public campaign entitled “I Am Not a Nuisance” in an effort to hear from others who have come up against nuisance ordinances in their own communities and suffered the effects as a survivor of domestic violence. The ACLU also filed suit in 2015 in Arizona and in 2013 in Pennsylvania to fight other nuisance ordinances that have further victimized survivors of domestic violence.
“We’ve been looking at the issue of nuisance ordinances for several years now and are engaged in a multipronged strategy to address them through litigation, research, and advocacy,” Park explains.
“My work deals with discrimination faced by survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault. I can’t think of anything worse than a law on the books saying that if you call the police over domestic violence, you’ll be removed from your home and your city. Recent legislation that we’re seeing nationally is all about supporting survivors, since leaving a violent situation and notifying law enforcement are already difficult and dangerous situations for survivors. Punishing them undermines the support we’ve created and sends a message that as a society, we don’t care about domestic violence and blame them for what they are experiencing,” Park says.
Park also notes that when abusers become aware of nuisance ordinances, like that which Watson encountered in Maplewood, they often use it to their advantage to further assault their victims, as they know that the ordinances effectively allow them to harass and stalk their victims in their own homes without risk of police involvement — and without any risk themselves of losing their own home.
“Everyone has the right to seek assistance from the government,” says Park. “This is an issue that affects all of us.”
Park also explains that while Maplewood’s ordinance is unique in that it specifically identifies victims of domestic violence, it’s like other nuisance ordinances in the way that it targets calls to police without distinguishing between those in need of emergency assistance and those committing crimes.
“I can’t think of anything worse than being a victim of a crime and then be removed from one’s home and one’s entire community and the support you’ve created there,” Park says. “[Nuisance ordinances are] codified victim-blaming and teach victims that they should not reach out for assistance because they are responsible for their own abuse. This is not the message to send to survivors, who should be able to seek assistance if they choose to.”
And yet Park also notes that “the vast majority of communities with one of these ordinances don’t know about it. … I don’t think people make the connection between the ordinances and domestic violence.”
As one of the biggest categories of calls to police is regarding domestic violence, Park says that “any time you’re enacting a law that affects a person’s ability to call the police, you’re necessarily impacting domestic violence victims. People need to think through the impact on survivors in enacting these policies.”
“Unfortunately, there’s a long history of domestic violence survivors being dismissed or ignored by law enforcement in many communities,” Park continues. Which is why the Department of Justice (DOJ) issued guidance in 2015 on the gender bias in policing domestic violence. DOJ set out eight principles to ensure that there’s fair policing of domestic violence. And in 2016, the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) issued a statement on how land use laws, zoning, and other practices may violate the civil rights afforded by the Fair Housing Act.
“One of the problems is that women are predominantly the victims of domestic violence and sexual assault. For too long, people assumed that domestic violence was a private issue unworthy of public attention. In my opinion, these ordinances are an example of that attitude being codified into law. They are particularly stark examples of that attitude, especially when they single out domestic violence the way that Maplewood does.”
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