A new study says Missouri is one of the worst states for women being murdered by men.
The National Violence Policy Center has used FBI numbers for 2012 to compile its ratings. That’s the last year for which figures are available. Missouri is seventh worst. Missouri has been in the bottom-ten for three of the last five years.
Legislative Director Kristen Rand says Nevada, Mississippi, Louisiana, Oklahoma,
South Carolina, and Alaska have worse records.
Average age of the women: 36, meaning, she says, they probably leave children behind. Fifty-three percent were white; forty-one percent black. Ninety-eight percent were killed by someone they knew, often when trying to break off an abusive relationship.
She says the state needs to have resources available to women teaching them how to get out of abusive relationships.
Rand says a woman who breaks off an abusive domestic situation is at greatest risk for a year after ending the relationship. She says the state also needs programs for removal of firearms from domestic abuse relationships. She says states like Missouri need to develop programs for men and women and look at the powers courts have in abusive situations.
