By Julia Prodis Sulek
jsulek@mercurynews.com
Posted: 01/11/2010 12:01:00 AM PST
On a ride home from her McDonald's job two days before she was killed, Leti Martinez told her cousin that her violent relationship with her girlfriend was over, that she wanted a fresh start.
Despite fistfights, scratches, chokeholds, black eyes and one restraining order during their four-year relationship, Martinez and Jennifer Bautista made up as often as they broke up — a typical pattern in domestic cases, whether gay or straight. And, like the worst of abuse cases, this one ended in tragedy after Bautista allegedly ran over Martinez on Dec. 28.
The case has drawn attention to domestic abuse that is often hidden within the gay community, a group that is trying to put its best foot forward as it fights for equal rights. The problem can be particularly difficult to recognize within the lesbian community because of a lingering perception that "women don't hurt each other."
But the percentage of domestic violence cases among gay couples is the same as for straight couples — up to 33 percent, studies show — and abusive relationships in both groups suffer the same power and control issues that can lead to violence.
"This was always seen as a guy thing: Guys do this to gals, or they do it to each other, but women don't do it to each other," said Wiggsy Sivertsen professor of counseling services at San Jose State University, who has been involved in domestic violence issues for many years, including training San Jose police officers in how to handle abuse among gay couples.
While the gay community makes strides in gaining acceptance in society, "we're much like other at-risk communities," Sivertsen said. "If we expose the dirty laundry in our community, they say, 'See? Look what those people do to each other.' There's a kind of reluctance to put ourselves in a situation to be judged that way."
Just what Martinez, 20, and Bautista, 19, did to each other over the course of their relationship will likely be a major issue in the case against Bautista, who has been charged with vehicular manslaughter and is being held on $500,000 bail.
Deputy District Attorney Dana Overstreet said she couldn't discuss the details of the investigation, though she noted "any evidence of domestic violence may become extremely important in this case, regardless of who the aggressor is."
The only details released about the case so far is that neighbors saw the two women arguing outside Martinez's Alviso home, then one witness saw Martinez jump on top of the Honda's hood before Bautista started driving down the street. Bautista stopped twice but then fled. At some point during the nearly three-block ordeal, Martinez was run over.
A restraining order filed by Bautista against Martinez a year ago, and interviews with Martinez's family, indicate that at various times, the women appeared to be mutual combatants.
Some of the conflict appeared to surround Bautista's other relationships. In the court document granting a temporary restraining order last January, Bautista hand-wrote, with often poor punctuation and spelling, her allegations against Martinez:
"She come to my house and she started arguing about a guy I'm seeing now. She got jealous and broke my phone. Started hitting me and slapping me chocked me left me bruises, marks," Bautista wrote. "She was threanting me she was going to 'kill me' and that, 'if she can't have me no one can.' "
Bautista has declined media interviews from jail and her family could not be located for comment. Police are hoping the Bautista family will come forward to speak with investigators as well as turn over the purple Honda that is registered to Bautista's mother.
Martinez's family, meanwhile, is outraged that instead of being charged with murder, Bautista has been charged with vehicular manslaughter with gross negligence, which carries a penalty of up to seven years. They say that Martinez would often come home with her face scratched and black eyes.
"Leave her," Martinez's mother, Rhoda Vasquez, would tell her. But her daughter would always say, "No, I love her. Mind your own business."
It's a refrain heard time and time again in domestic violence cases of all kinds. And for better or worse, Sivertsen said, "we are really not that different from each other."
At the LGBTQ Youth Space at the Billy DeFrank Center in San Jose, advice pamphlets about "unhealthy and abusive relationships" are available in the hangout room for their clients between the ages of 13 and 25. Of the 45 young people who are taking advantage of the center's free counseling service, 20 say they are in an abusive relationship, and six of those are women.
"I wish one of these people were referred here," said Cassie Blume of the Youth Space program, "to get these kids connected rather than have 19- and 20-year-olds dealing with this themselves."
Contact Julia Prodis Sulek at 408-278-3409.
No comments:
Post a Comment