Recording: Content warning. This episode discusses serious and potentially triggering subjects, including family violence and animal abuse, as well as the recounting of real-life events.

[Music]

Introduction: In this episode of the Every Lawyer, we take a closer look at The Violence Link in Practice, a new report prepared for Humane Canada, which is funded by the Department of Justice Canada. The Violence Link in Practice is an empirical analysis of implications of The Violence Link for family justice professionals. But what exactly is The Violence Link?

Broadly, it describes the intersection between animal abuse and a litany of violent criminal offences, from bestiality, child, elder and spousal abuse to gang violence, human trafficking, and homicide. And family lawyers are often on the front lines.

My name is Julia Tétrault-Provencher. Write to us anytime at podcasts@cba.org.

This is the Every Lawyer, presented by the Canadian Bar Association.

Julia: So, let’s meet our guests today. Dr. Amy Fitzgerald, Criminology Professor at the University of Windsor. Amy is the authority on The Violence Link. She has been researching the connection between animal abuse and family violence for many years now. And she is the principal author of The Violence Link in practice. Jenny Mason has practiced Family Law for several years and is active in the PEI branch of the CBA as Chair of the Family Law section, Chair of the ADR section, and Co-Chair of the Animal Law section.

Jenny has firsthand experience with The Violence Link in her practise. Carrie Thompson and Valarie Moncton, both from Humane Canada, they co-authored the report together with Amy, and oversaw much of the research. Welcome to you all.

I would start with Carrie and Valerie. Perhaps you could tell us more about a Humane Canada and how The Violence Link in Practice came into being and the methodology behind it.

Carrie: Well, I can start with that. So Humane Canada is formally known as the Canadian Federation of Humane Societies. The Criminal Justice System Reform Program, which is the program that Valeria and I both work for, works with key members of the criminal justice system to raise awareness, encourage collaboration and support legislative and policy amendments to bring about lasting change in terms of animal welfare.

So that program includes the Canadian Violence Link Coalition, which includes a diverse group of law enforcement, academics, social work, anti-violence, and victim’s service advocates, as well as the National Centre for the prosecution of animal cruelty, which we will refer to as NCPAC because that whole acronym is much easier to say.

And that is exclusively prosecutors and animal enforcement agents, or people who work directly in the prosecution of animal cruelty cases in Canada. The overall goal of both of them is to bring about an accessible system of justice where victims are supported, families are kept together and the vulnerability of animals and people is reduced.

So, family law came onto our radar with the amendments to the Divorce Act, which finally introduced a definition of family violence that included threats of harm and actual harm to animals. So when that amendment came into force in March of 2021 our Program Manager, Hannah Brown, submitted an application for the Justice Partnership and Innovation Program last year through Justice Canada. So once we found out that we had been accepted and awarded a grant under that program —

Julia: Congratulations!

Carrie: Oh, thank you. So, yeah, we had a little bit of time to put together a team for research. So that included Amy Jenny, [Dr. Kendra Coulter] from the Huron College at Western University, and Valerie and myself.

And so we went about identifying groups that we wanted to reach out to, specifically those who’ve been obviously historically overlooked in the research, like Indigenous groups, Black women lawyers, rural and remote representatives, and the official language minority community groups.

Valerie: Yeah. I can just speak to the methodology. Humane Canada has been doing violence in court for quite a while now, like Carrie said. Building a survey, we actually based it off of a previous survey that Humane Canada did that was looking at violence and cruelness in 10 key sectors across Canada, specifically took the questions that were geared towards prosecutors. And Carrie and modified those before sending them off to Amy and Jenny who did a lot of work modifying those questions and adding a lot of nuances.

Then we also got input from our cultural advisors. Like Carrie said, we were lucky enough to work with a bunch of different groups to help inform those questions. But yeah, the most difficult part of this whole project is that we had three months from when we figured out that we had received funding to when we had to have the survey and all of the interviews concluded. So, Carrie and I —

Julia: Three months for all of this?

Valerie: Yes.

Julia: OK. OK.

Valerie: So, Carrie and I spent a lot of time really trying to build out like who this is going to. So we spent a lot of time emailing CEO members and law societies and other like law groups. And also spending a lot of time collecting direct email addresses for family lawyers and mediators across Canada so that we had a big enough sample size to send this survey off to.

And then, of course, once we received all the survey responses back, we had a very short period of time to go through our survey responses and select only 12 interviewees out of over 300 responses. We ended up — for the interviews; we ended up using proposed or sample, which basically means that we were looking for select trades.

We wanted to get as diverse a sample as possible, as diverse of perspectives as possible. So, basically, we wanted to do a great spread of like violence and knowledge so people that really didn’t know anything before the survey, and people that were quite knowledgeable, we wanted to make sure that we were talking to people all across Canada, that we were talking to people that spoke English and French as native languages.

We also wanted to make sure we had indigenous representation in our interviews. And that’s just like a small look at the — all the things that we were looking for. So it was quite detailed for a short period of time.

Julia: Yeah. This is impressive, honestly. We can only tell our listeners to go and read it thoroughly. And what were some of the findings — or some of the key elements that you could tell us a bit — like those are the elements that you should keep in mind?

Carrie: We had 348 family law practitioners who participated through the survey, which was a great sample size. And then, as Valerie mentioned, then we collected 12 interviewees from those who participated in the survey and indicated they’d be willing to participate in a follow-up interview. There were a lot of really interesting findings.

One of the most interesting was that the overwhelming of the survey participants, so 98 percent, reported being aware of family violence in their cases. Which was an extremely large proportion. And additionally, when we asked a question about their awareness of animal maltreatment in their cases, 89 percent indicated they were aware of verified or suspected animal abuse in at least one of their cases since they’ve been practicing. So, also quite high.

Julia: This is huge. Yeah.

Carrie: Yeah. And they described in the interviews and in some of the written comments in the survey, you know, really troubling instances of pets being killed, abused, threatened, sold. So there was quite a bit of animal maltreatment. We also then followed up with a question about whether or not the participants were aware of a link between intimate partner violence and animal abuse. So understanding — you know, if they’re exposed to a lot of both, so are they aware that there’s a high rate of co-occurrence between the two that’s been established in the academic literature.

So one third said that they were unaware that there is a link between animal abuse and intimate partner violence. Then we also asked them to rate their knowledge on a scale from zero to 10 of the link between animal abuse and intimate partner violence, and the most common response was five. So despite common exposure to intimate partner violence and animal maltreatment there’s not a lot of knowledge about the high rates of co-occurrence between the two.

And, you know, the academic literature is pointing to the fact that animal maltreatment is associated with higher levels of controlling behaviour and more severe abuse of the human. And also, importantly, that it has a negative impact on help seeking. Research that I’ve conducted with my colleagues at the Animal Interpersonal Abuse Research Group at the University of Windsor has found that over half of the shelter — domestic violence shelter clients that were surveyed reported that their pets were one reason that they delayed leaving their abusive relationship.

So it’s also a troubling finding to know that there’s a fairly substantial proportion, at least in that sample. And we’re currently undertaking with a larger national sample, reporting that they delayed leaving specifically because, in most cases, they can’t bring their pets with them to domestic violence shelters. Which is something that I can speak to more later on if you’re interested in that aspect.

Julia: This aspect of people being unable to leave because they cannot bring their pets with them. I think that’s such an important aspect that I think is over — we don’t talk about it enough. You can jump in, since you already introduced it.

Carrie: So, unfortunately, still, the vast majority of shelters in Canada don’t have programs available where you can bring your companion animal to the shelter with you. More common, but still relatively rare, are shelters that will make arrangements for foster care in the community. But that’s still relatively uncommon.

So we’re currently at [APAR] conducting research, looking at what do these programs offer and how does it impact clients that use them, but also staff members, individuals at shelters who might have — there might be animals on site but they’re not necessarily their pet; so that’s research that we’re currently working on.

And in this study, we did find that a large proportion of respondents were keen on developing more programs at Domestic Violence Outburst. That’s something that was flagged. We also provided them with some recommendations for them to evaluate in the survey. And some of the recommendations that were the most highly recommended by the participants included providing family law practitioners with training resources regarding The Violence Link, which I’m hoping this report can be part of that effort.

I think we’re being very judiciary on The Violence Link. There was also another suggestion that was really well supported. The section guidelines for when to report animal abuse and how, especially, given that such a large proportion of the participants reported being aware of animal abuse, and screening questions for the presence of including animals to things like client intake forms, and other family law forms that screen for intimate partner violence.

Clarifying the relationship between ownership of companion animals and what to do when The Violence Link is present, so what to do if an abuser legally owns that animal but is using that animal as leverage against the other people in the home. And, finally, amending protection order legislation to enable the explicit inclusion of companion animals.

Julia: Thank you. And thank you also for listing some of the recommendations. I think that’s also something I wanted to know. And Jenny, I understand that you were one of the legal practitioners. You were a consultant. So did you fill the survey as well?

Jenny: Sure. Sure. So yes, I did fill out the survey. And then I did ask to work with the team at a couple of places as a consultant. And so I’ve worked as a family law lawyer for several years. And through that I gained an interest in the area of family violence, which is something that, sadly, I’ve encountered a lot through my work. I also have a personal interest in animal maltreatment. So given those two interests, I find The Violence Link to be really interesting and very important.

So I’ve been encountering the violence for years in my family law work, but unknowingly, and that it gave me in a sense about the actual link between family violence and animal abuse. It was a few years ago that I learned about the actual term Violence Link. And it was through Humane Canada work. I’ve joined the Canadian Violence Coalition, which everybody on this recording is part of. And I co-founded the informal group on PDI that offers free presentations about violence related topics once or twice a year.

Julia: You’re quite an expert then.

Jenny: Oh. I’m starting to learn more and more about it. And so from the get-go after learning about what the violence and abuse I thought this seems really applicable to family law, because we certainly do encounter family violence in our work and as research like Amy’s shows, the risk of family violence greatly increases after separation. And so it’s typically after separation that we as family law lawyers are most involved with victims of family violence.

So, some examples of my encounters with the [unintelligible 00:15:04], in my practice — so that’s when I worked at Family Legal Aid a few years ago. And this is when I wasn’t aware yet of the violence. I had a client, a woman who’d separated from her spouse years before. And she said that she and her children were victims of coercive and controlling violence from her spouse, and, now, ex-spouse. And she believed her ex-spouse had killed her two dogs after she left.

Because the dogs just — as she put it, “They disappeared”. And from her years of living with him, that’s something she thought he was capable of doing. I had another client, also a woman whose abusive ex-spouse kept the dog after they separated, the woman told me she wanted the dog to come live with her, in part because she was concerned about the dog’s wellbeing and her ex’s care, because she’d seen him mistreating the dog when they were together. Like, she’d seen him being very rough with the dog and throwing the dog across the room once when he was angry.

So in that situation, when I asked the ex’s lawyer for the dog to come live with my client, the other lawyer said, “We’re not going to deal with the dog. This is the end of the conversation about the dog. We’re only talking about arrangement with the kids.” And in that situation, after careful consideration, I encouraged my client to report her concerns to animal protection, and I provided her with the contact information to do that.

And the reason I said, “After careful consideration” is because I think reporting suspected or actual animal abuse in a situation where there’s been family violence can be really complicated. Like if an animal protection officer shows up at the ex-spouses door saying there’s been a report that they’ve been mistreating their dog, that’s really going to make somebody quite frustrated and angry.

And in situations where there’s been family violence, I think the abusive partner might assume that it was their ex-spouse that reported that. And so it could escalate the violence against the person or against the animal. So it’s complicated and I can really relate to the family law professionals in their report is that I think that violence link is really important and relevant but they aren’t really sure how to address it without more guidance.

Moderator. Of course, yeah. And I was hearing you talking. And is there also a question with the vet? Sometimes we talk to medical personnel about being aware of some of the signs of some of the domestic violence. For instance, when a woman comes in for x, y, z reason for he own health and we tell them, you know, know the signs of some violence. And is it something that is also being discussed with a vet. I don't know, it’s such a hard word to say [French 00:17:43], but veterinary — vet —

Carrie: Veterinarian.

Julia: Veterinarian, thank you yeah. So veterinarians, is there any discussion of like training them, being aware of like this violence that can happen to a pet and know those signs, is there some kind of discussions of like multi-sectorial discussion that we can have between family lawyers and vets, or it’s not something that is happening yet?

Carrie: Well, that came up as one of the strategies sort of in cross reporting. Amy may be able to speak a little bit more to this. She’s obviously had more research experience in it. I know that we have a few vets on the Canadian Violence Link Coalition. And they are quite adept at being able to identify intentional abuse. And I know that some of the vet colleges throughout the country sort of do training on spotting intentional abuse and what to do about it, but I don't know if it’s necessarily about the family violence aspect, if that’s being incorporated into those programs or not.

Amy: There’s been a lot of growing awareness in the veterinary community about animal abuse and family violence and reporting, which is great. Part of the difficulty is that there’s a concern among some of us that reporting might give them a negative reputation in the community so that their clients might be less likely to take their animals to that specific vet. You know, that’s definitely been raised as a concern on their part. And as Carrie mentioned, cross-reporting was a strategy that we solicited feedback on. And what was interesting is that that strategy actually received the least amount of support.

And the reason was—and the interview has really helped to clarify this, was that there was some concern that cross-reporting could be used to disadvantage certain groups. We know that certain communities are over policed and so this could be another extension of that.

So there is a lot of caution urged, which I think is important advice to head that any cross-reporting strategies need to, you know be aware that we don’t want to just replicate forms of over policing and disadvantaging certain communities compared to others.

Julia: Yeah. Well, very interesting. And as Jenny was saying, there are so many things you need to take into consideration. Obviously it’s not a new phenomenon, but, personally, the phrase ‘Violence Link’ was the first time I heard it with the report. I’m pretty sure I’m not the only one. Especially since, now, I know the numbers. When you said a third said ‘I did not know about it’.

Therefore, I’m wondering, is Jenny’s experience, what you just shared, is it something that you would say is typical, is it something that happens, or not necessarily? Or, are there some other ways abusers will use their partners or the family pet in an instance of abuse and/or coercive control?

Carrie: Yeah. Unfortunately, it is very common. That’s what the empirical research is pointing to. So, one of the studies that I conducted with my colleagues at [APAR], we surveyed clients in domestic violence shelters in Canada, 17 different shelters, and we asked them about animal maltreatment by their abuser. And 89 percent reported some form of animal maltreatment by their abuser. And that’s consistent with other studies in other countries.

So the research points to a fairly high co-occurrence between these two forms of abuse. And sadly, Jenny’s stories are typical to what I’ve heard in my years of conducting research in this area. You know, there’s one that stuck with me where an abuser had poisoned the family dog. And the dog, unfortunately, died. And he abused the dog’s name as a threat to the family member. You know, even leave voice mail messages saying, “Remember what happened to the dog”, right, as a way of threatening but without being, you know, explicit. So that if you understood that underlying dynamic, you might really know what he was eluding to.

So, unfortunately, it is fairly common. There’s one finding from the literature that’s interesting that your audience might be interested in. Is it doesn’t seem like these individuals who perpetrate animal abuse in the context of intimate partner violence are necessarily generalized animal abusers, right? So they’re not going around kicking every dog they see or anything like that, it’s very targeted.

They might even have pets of their own that they consider to be theirs that they’re nice too, right. And it’s also important to keep in mind that the research has documented a very tight bond between companion animals and intimate partner violence victims and survivors. So some of the research that I’ve conducted, my participants have told me that their companion animal is the one thing that kept them from taking their own life, for instance, so it can be a very strong bond.

And so it’s something that we need to be cautious about and try to foster and keep them together as much as possible instead of you know, just separating them and saying OK, you know, the dog belongs to your spouse, so the dog goes with the.

Valerie: It doesn’t always have to be physical, right. Like we had this one interviewee that talked about an instance she saw where an abuser had just — I think she had sold or given away the pet while the victim was away.

And it was just kind of crazy, because I think we think about abuse as being something so physical all the time. But, really, because animals are property, there’s just like a whole range of ways to abuse a partner and an animal that you wouldn’t even think of. And it just emphasizes the fact that if this person had had somewhere that they could’ve gone where they could’ve brought their animal you know, maybe this wouldn’t have happened.

Julia: And why do you say, “Because animal is property?” Like, my question was going there; so, can you just spend a little bit what’s the status of animals right now, in Canada?

Valerie: Carrie, do you want to, because you know more about the legal aspect.

Carrie: So, the legal status of animals in Canada is the same as property. So under the Criminal Code, cruelty to animals is under the same section as wilful acts against, you know, property. We weren’t going to include it. And Amy may speak to this more, in our questions, because we didn’t want to create a divisive environment where people were immediately on edge.

We weren’t looking to, you know, try to change the status of animals with this survey. But still, what came up quite a bit were so much in the survey responses like the open-ended responses that we had to include it as part of the interview questions.

Julia: And Valerie, you were saying — so going back to that, because animal is property that can lead to different types of violence that we don’t expect.

Valerie: Yeah. I mean, when we think of committing violence, most of the time I think most people think of committing it against other humans. And I mean there’s certain protections for humans, right? But those don’t extend to animals. So, I feel like there’s just an array of things that you could do to animals that you wouldn’t even consider doing that you wouldn’t be able to get away with with humans.

Carrie: And that goes back to the coercive aspect of family violence as well. So coercion is a huge part of it that’s the psychological part. And that, unfortunately, often includes animal sexual abuse, both of the partner and the children. And nobody wants to talk about animal sexual abuse; I get it. But it’s one of those factors.

So, coercing a partner into engaging in sex acts with an animal as a means to degrade or humanize them and show their control is not uncommon. And it’s also recorded, oftentimes, especially in the modern age, and put up on the internet, and possibly used as blackmail to exert even more power over that person.

And there’s documented academic evidence where animal sexual abuse and sexual exploitation materials or animal pornography is often used as a grooming tool for child sexual abuse. So you touch the dog here, then you touch me here, I touch you there. And see it’s OK, because you’re touching the dog there you can touch me there too. And it exploits the child’s bond with their animal at its most disgusting level.

Finally, because before the Supreme Court decision, or the DLW in 2016, where they left to the government to decide the definition of bestiality, they just used the narrow interpretation of actual penetration up until that time.

So DLW is a case. It’s a criminal case of a stepfather abusing — his horrific years of abuse, including sex acts of an animal, of his stepdaughter. So he would force his stepdaughter into engaging in sex acts with the family dog. So the government’s hand was forced in that they produced Bill C 84, which expanded the definition of bestiality from the act of just penetration to encompass all conduct of sexual nature toward an animal. And I don't know if that’s why we’re seeing more bestiality cases come up, because of that, or if there’s more awareness around it. I don't know which came first.

Julia: Yeah. Because you kind of putting also your finger on the tabloid aspect of it that might also lead to why we have no decision or jurisprudence. But I understand now that we have this. Is it like the only one? Is it we have a lot of cases about that? Or it’s growing you say, so maybe we’ll have more in the future to report, maybe?

Carrie: It’s more growing in the criminal aspect. There was a major decision in November of 2021 from the Alberta Court of Appeal. It’s R v. Chen. The judge declares animals as sentient beings, which is very different from abusing an animal than it is like breaking a window. And differentiating animals as in their own category and not necessarily as property. So they’re capable of pain, and capable of suffering. And some of that suffering is psychological as well.

So there’s been a lot of court cases since then that even outside of Alberta that have referenced in favour of Chen. So pain and suffering of an animal has been included and considered in the sentiency decisions. And yeah, jurisprudence in terms of family law, we’ve got the Divorce Act. And Jenny can probably speak more about that aspect of it.

Sorry. I just threw it to Jenny with no warning at all.

Jenny: Sure. So we did a summary review of legislation in Canada. Family law legislation specifically that’s applicable to The Violence Link. So, as Carrie mentioned, we have the Divorce Act amendments that were made in 2021; so the Divorce Act applies to married people, and the 2021 amendments. One of the reasons they’re notable is that they really emphasize family violence. Whereas before 2021, the Divorce Act was silent on family violence. So one of those amendments is that the Divorce Act now includes an evidence-based definition of family violence and it includes a non-exhaustive list of examples of family violence. One of the examples listed in the Divorce Act is the threat of or actually killing or harming of an animal.

So this is applicable to The Violence Link. And the Divorce Act now, in making a parenting order or a contact order related to a child the court has to determine the best interest of the child by considering a number of factors. And one of those factors is to consider family violence and its impact and to help determine the impact of the family violence the Divorce Act includes a list of specific factors for the court to consider, like the nature and the seriousness of the violence.

And also under the amended Act, when making a decision about parenting or contact, the court has to consider any preceding order that’s potentially relevant to the child’s best interest. And that could include a civil protection order related to family violence.

So that was the Divorce Act and some of the ways that those 2021 amendments emphasized family violence. Every province and territory also has their own family law legislation, which usually that applies to non-married couples. And we’re seeing that, increasingly, family violence is being emphasized in those statutes too.

In our review, we saw that over half of the provincial and territorial family law statutes we scanned. In over half of them, there’s now a definition of family violence that includes harm or threats of harm to animals. And there’s a couple of problems, because it’s limited to pets, not to all animals. And just following those 2021 Divorce Act amendments that four provinces adopted is a definition of family violence that basically mirrors the Divorce Act definition.

Like in the Divorce Act, in the provinces and territorial legislation, the provincial and territorial legislation the meaning of family violence is especially relevant to decisions about parenting and contact related to children. And then one last thing is that BC recently did something unique in Canada that’s applicable to The Violence Link. They passed amendments to their Family Law Act this spring.

They’re not in force yet; the ones related to pets. But these amendments provide some guidance for parties and the court when deciding how we addressed ownership and possession of pets. The new provisions will require the court to consider factors like whether there’s been a history of family violence, the risk of family violence, and the spouse’s cruelty or threat of cruelty toward an animal. And so BC is the first and currently the only Canadian jurisdiction that offers guidance specifically on how to resolve pet custody disputes.

Julia: Which is the overall legislation right now? Because you did name some newer aspects whereby it’s taken into consideration, but do you feel that we have enough. Is it enough or do we need more? For instance, because I’m thinking, are animals included right now in protection orders? Or is it — you know, what would be the change that we need right now or amendments that we need, or maybe even a new law to make sure that we really answer the issues right now and that we have good protection?

Carrie: They’re an issue, but we really need to be more aware of it. And that probably needs to be reflected in legislation or that the courts need more guidance for, as there’s a strong relationship between child abuse and animal abuse. When you think about it, both children and animals often lack voices, whether that’s legal or just they can’t talk yet, in the case of children. There’s also research that children who are exposed to animal abuse, that witness animal abuse, can develop difficulties down the road.

So yeah, it’s a really important issue that doesn’t — it was sort of like perfected in our interviews as well, like sometimes there were discussions about, you know, the pets going with the children. But there doesn’t seem to be enough awareness about that strong connection.

And yeah, like when you think about it, too, you know, people that are more likely to be violent or neglectful of animals, who are very vulnerable, are going to be likely to be violent toward and neglectful of other vulnerable people as well, including children.

Amy: And if I can just add, this is another area of the property status of animals comes in. I’ve conducted research on protection order statutes in the US, and 36 states now allow the inclusion of companion animals and protection orders explicitly. But part of the challenges is there are only some of those jurisdictions that allow the inclusion of animals that aren’t legally owned by the individual who is petitioning for the protection order. So, they need to be some leeway given, right.

Because, as we mentioned, the property status of animals is problematic in the sense that, you know, someone can be extremely harmful and threatening towards an animal that they legally own, right, knowing that others in the family have formed relationships with that animal. So we need to have a fairly broad definition of what animals can be included in the protection orders, because of that property status issue.

Carrie: One of the problems with the legislation is that it frequently lumps animals into the category of also ‘and other property’. So harming of animals or damaging ‘other property’.

So, Humane Canada has long been advocating for some strength and effectiveness in the Criminal Code in recognizing those links between crime against people and crimes against animals by including animals as an actual victim and adding animal cruelty as an aggravating feature of other offences that go along with human offences.

The problem is they’re often tried separately, entirely, or the animal offences — the animal cruelty offences are dismissed or ignored in favour of the prosecution of the human crimes involved, if they happen to be the same. Which completely fails to recognize the fact that they are so connected to each other.

Julia: And is there anything that you think the Bar Association and Law Societies in the provinces should do regarding this matter?

Carrie: I think any help that we can get to raise awareness of issues with animal abuse often lead to human violence, or they’re often connected with each other so that lawmakers and law enforcement agencies can begin to recognize it as a significant predictor, especially in cases of intimate partner and family violence. So there’s been a number of, you know, reports that have indicated and made recommendations.

The most recent one is the Mass Casualty Commission Report, that came out at the end of March. It made recommendations on a national scale, including tracking perpetrators with a history of violence, that includes coercive control, threatening, and harming, or killing pets or animals as part of their data collection, research and policy development.

But the problem is that stats Canada does not include stats on animal abuse, except for the bestiality portion of the Criminal Code when you’re looking at crimes. So the statistics come from like gleaning the different studies, like Amy does in her research, or independent police associations, that sort of thing, that’s where we get our information from.

Julia: And right now, because you mentioned coercive control, and I know there’s a lot of movement also in this area in Canada, with the federal government talking about that, maybe criminalizing it. But we’re not to have this discussion here about caramelization or, you know, of coercive control; but what I would like to know is, do you know if in the conversation we talk about The Violence Link? Is it mentioned when we talk about the definition of coercive control? And I know there’s — no, I haven’t heard it.

Valerie: It’s not mentioned right now. We’ve been pushing several — we’ve been pushing it hard to get it included and mentioned in the definition coercive control.

Julia: Yeah, of course. Yeah, yeah, yeah. OK.

Valerie: But it’s not frequently mentioned in any of the proposed legislation as of yet. But, you know, parliament comes back in a few weeks; so who knows.

Julia: exactly. No, exactly. And that’s something on the table for sure. And it is just like, as a side note, I’m also part of the discussion, of course, in another organization. I think that’s definitely something that should be put into the discussion. So let’s keep that in mind.

But talking about education, that’s my segue for this. We at Every Lawyer, we would like to see The Violence Link in Practice become a non-optional professional development webinar. And I would love to have the Quebec Bar adding this and forcing all lawyers to have this. I would follow it for sure. And I think we should have different versions for judges, lawyers and the general public, and of course pet purchasers. Do we have any plans going in that direction? Is there something in the pipeline?

Carrie: Well its something that we’re always working on. But if individual organizations are interested, you can always contact me. We offer virtual Violence Link training for different organizations on how they can incorporate like awareness of The Violence Link in their own organizations and develop their own sort of tools, that kind of thing.

Julia: OK. And Jenny, maybe that’s something for the animal law section of the PEI Grant, would that be? Oh, I see your dog come in.

Jenny: Yeah. That’s Ben.

Julia: As we’re talking about pets.

Jenny: Relating to The Violence Link, we actually did the CBA PEI, and the Law Section had an event this past winter. It was about an hour-long presentation from two crown prosecutors about The Violence Link. But it was actually an event that was co-hosted by the Animal Law Section, the Family Law Section and the Criminal Law Section; which just goes to show the intersectionality of The Violence Link.

Julia: And the judges? Regarding judges, is there anything?

Carrie: It’s being worked on. That’s all I can say about that.

Julia: OK. That’s good.

Carrie: Yeah. And that — as I mentioned earlier that’s one of the areas that our participants really emphasized that they thought judicial training would be really helpful. As they pointed out, sometimes judges are more removed from the — you know, the everyday lives of individuals in their homes suffering from abuse and having companion animals. So that that type of training might be helpful.

And they also emphasized, which I would agree with, that it’s important that any educational materials are grounded in empirical research. Now, there’s a substantial body of research to draw on, so we know, you know, sometimes it’s not as straightforward as you might assume, right, as some of the research points to some nuances; so, I think those nuances are important to include in training.

Valerie: And so — I just want to add in there that although of course it is really important to educate the specific groups, I want to emphasize there really is the general public that need to be aware of this connection even — yeah, even if it is harder to educate such a diffuse group.

I think a lot of people when they think of The Violence Link, they think of the association between people that commit like very violent crimes and like having a history with very violent illegal animal violence. But it’s not just that. The Violence Link is really like this broad phenomenon that’s about how violence and abusive behaviours against non-human animals can spill over to humans and the vice versa.

And, unfortunately, because animals are objectified, because they’re seen as property and they have so few protections, yeah, like there’s so many facets of our society that normalize this violence, and animals end up by-and-large being the victims of that violence. So, having a society that is better educated about The Violence Link, that is more of how prevalent it is and that is on the lookout for that violent abusive behaviour, would be, I think, a lot healthier overall.

Julia: That is also the goal with this podcast, is that, of course, the Every Lawyer, it’s aimed at legal professionals, but I think the idea is also that, you know, I want to share it on this day to talk about it, because I agree with you, Valerie, this is essential. We definitely highly recommend everyone to read The Violence Link in Practice. But Jenny, Amy, Carrie, Valerie, is there anything else you’d like to add that I forgot to ask?

Amy: Well registration opened just today, actually, for the Community and Violence Link Conference for 2023, which is happening online November 8th and 9th, where you can learn more about The Violence Link in Practice, and the Family Law Amendment from B.C. Those are both sessions that are on the schedule, as well as a number of sessions relating to The Violence Link and how it can impact different parts of different sectors.

Julia: Well that’s important. And so, see you then in November! That’s it.

Amy: Yeah. In November, November 8th and 9th.

Julia: Well, thank you very much the four of you. It has been a pleasure. Does anyone else want to add something?

Carrie: The only other thing I would add is if you don’t have a lot of time to read the full report, even though the full report is fantastic, we also produce two summary reports, one in English and one in French. So those might be more digestible if you were short on time, or you want it to be in French.

Julia: If you want to practice. Or if you want also to share, you know — if you want to share with your friends; you just send them this part. Yeah. But thank you, and congratulations for all this work. We need people like you working on those kinds of issues. So, thank you very much.

Collective: Thank you. Thank you for having us.

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Thank you so much for listening to us today on the Every Lawyer. And yes, of course, we would love you to share this episode with friends and colleagues. But please remember that abusers often monitor their victim’s online activity and correspondence. When sharing any information about abuse of any kind, it may be safer to do so verbally or in person. Don’t wait to reach out for help when you need to. And have a beautiful day.