What George Zimmerman’s Story Can Teach Us About Domestic Abusers
They abuse more than once.
Zimmerman’s ex-wife and his current girlfriend aren’t the only two people who have accused him of abuse or violence. During his trial over the shooting of Trayvon Martin, one of the witnesses, a female cousin of Zimmerman, said that he had molested her as a child. And Zimmerman’s ex-fiance petitioned for a restraining order against him after he allegedly slapped her — long before his name became nationally recognized. This is a classic pattern for domestic abusers, who will go find another victim if the previous one is no longer available to them. A 2000 study found that 41 percent of abusers re-abuse their victim within a 30-month follow-up period, and another study found that almost half of people who had been arrested for violating a restraining order had two or more victims within six years.
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