The latest law on domestic abuse isn’t going to get Missouri that far. The President of the Board of the Rape and Abuse Crisis Center in Jefferson City, Bill Tackett, says stronger penalties in the law are misleading. They make felonies out of repeat domestic assaults. But Tackett says most of those will end up in probation. And he predicts 120 days of “shock time” on the second offense, not the 5 to 10 years the bill’s sponsors promoted. Tackett wants to see legislation that focuses on the children of abuse victims, who’re likely to repeat their parents’ mistakes.
