Domestic Violence No Longer a Crime in Topeka, KS?

If you batter your spouse in Topeka, Kansas you will not be prosecuted. Shawnee County, Kansas District Attorney Chad Taylor announced last month he would no longer prosecute misdemeanors, including domestic batteries, committed in Topeka, according to the Topeka Capital-Journal. 

Taylor said he could no longer afford to do so after commissioners approved a 2012 budget cutting the district attorney’s budget for 2012 by 10 percent, or $347,765, from its 2011 amount of $3,477,651.

Taylor had announced before commissioners finalized the reduction in August that it would force him to stop prosecuting domestic batteries committed in Topeka. He indicated his move would require the Topeka city attorney’s office to begin prosecuting those crimes. The city says it lacks the resources to prosecute the cases, reported the Capital-Journal.

Topeka police Captain Brian Desch his department hs made 18 arrests in connection with misdemeanor domestic battery since September 8, but all of those taken into custody were released from the Shawnee County Jail after charges weren’t filed.

According to the Capital-Journal, the city council plans to consider repealing the part of the city code that bans domestic battery, which the city attorney’s office says would require Taylor to again begin prosecuting domestic batteries committed in Topeka.

In the meantime, women (a significant majority of domestic violence victims are women) remain vulnerable to a system that would have the audacity to use battered women as a bargaining chip during a budget squabble. 

The DA's charge is to prosecute crime.  The DA should prosecute all crime until it impossible to do so.  When the money runs out and he is the last man standing--then he can point the finger at someone else.  When he took the oath it didn't say "I'll do my duty as long as I have ample resoures." 

You'd like to think that Topeka, or any city in America, deserves better. 

To read more:  http://cjonline.com/news/2011-10-06/domestic-battery-state-now-leader-voices-outrage