Article: 3 domestic shootings seen as coincidence

By TOM ALEX
talex@dmreg.com

Domestic violence experts say it's likely an anomaly that three Iowa women have been shot by their male partners in the last week.

Violence in domestic relationships can't be blamed on the weather or cabin fever, said Kirsten Faisal of the Iowa Coalition Against Domestic Violence.

"Sometimes there's more of a bump toward the weekend when people are home spending time together," she said. "But it's not about cabin fever, because lots of us are tired of that. It's almost always the culmination of long-term patterns of threats, coercion and controlling behavior."

The most recent of the three shootings occurred late Monday night when Kenny John Becker Sr., 61, of Hawkeye allegedly shot his wife, Gloria Becker, in the back with a shotgun as she tried to leave the house. Her injuries were considered life-threatening, authorities said.

Kenny Becker was arrested on a charge of attempted murder after a six-hour standoff.

Women in Iowa are more frequently victims of domestic assault than men by a wide margin, said Marti Anderson, director of the crime victim assistance division of the Iowa attorney general's office.

Since 1995, 131 women have been killed in Iowa in domestic assaults, compared with 24 men. During that period, 46 bystanders have been killed in domestic assaults. The bystanders frequently are children, someone the woman was dating or someone trying to protect a victim from a perpetrator.

The other two women shot by their partners last week died, and the men then killed themselves, authorities have said.

Leon Police Chief Ronald Zeiss said Brandan Broich, 21, shot Ashley Singh, 20, and then turned the gun on himself early Saturday at their Leon home.

"They were having some relationship problems," Zeiss said.



An autopsy showed that Mark and Laura Wharff, both 51, died from shotgun wounds to the head on Jan. 13 at their Altoona home. Police said Mark killed Laura, then himself.

Police were sent to check on Laura Wharff after she didn't show up for work.

Violence "often happens when the victim is resisting or tries to leave a relationship," Faisal said. "A threat of separation or feeling of losing control can create a trigger."

Cases of domestic homicides by firearms are dropping nationally, but not necessarily in Iowa, Faisal said.

She said firearms need to be taken away from those convicted of domestic violence and those with restraining orders filed against them. She said the Iowa Coalition Against Domestic Violence will again press for a state law during this legislative session.



Randall Moore, accused of shooting and killing his estranged wife, Tereseann Lynch Moore, in November, was not supposed to possess firearms, according to a protective order. Polk County District Judge Karen Romano barred Moore from having contact with his wife and ordered him to surrender all his firearms in October. Moore signed the document, agreeing to comply with the order.

The Violence Against Women Act, passed by Congress in 1994, prohibits gun ownership by any "intimate partner" subject to a domestic abuse no-contact order.

A 2006 study of court records by Iowans for the Prevention of Gun Violence showed that only 28 percent of Iowa judges enforced the federal law.



Court orders rarely require law enforcement officers to retrieve banned firearms from alleged abusers, said Deputy Jana Rooker, spokeswoman for the Polk County Sheriff's Office.

Polk County Medical Examiner Dr. Gregory Schmunk ended 2009 issuing a warning in December about domestic abuse cases.

"I just think we can do a better job of keeping people safe," he said. "Over the past few years these kind of cases - domestic assaults - may have fallen off the radar with the public. Maybe one of the reasons is we haven't had a lot of them lately, but I think the Tereseann Moore case screams out."