Starting July 1st, domestic violence victims will no longer need to show visible marks to prove a strangulation assault. Tennessee has gone further than most states to remove barriers in prosecuting strangulation.
Just a few years ago, strangling wasn’t even a felony in Tennessee if the victim survived. But many states have recently started taking the crime more seriously. Now, a new law makes Tennessee one of the first to lower the amount of evidence required in strangulation cases.
Sara Beth Myers, whose advocacy group, Awake TN, backed the legislation. They threw a victory party to celebrate it becoming law next week.
“It updates the definition of strangulation meaning that there actually now is no requirement of visible injury, which is very important because in about half of strangulation cases there is no sign of outward visible injury. It’s internal injuries,” Myers says.
Without visible marks, it used to be hard for police on the scene to find evidence of an attack. Attorney and activist Meera Ballal says another challenge was showing that the violence was “intentional.”
“That is very difficult to prove on the stand for attorneys,” Ballal says. “To actually say your intent, you were absolutely sure that when you put your hands around her neck, you were absolutely sure that you were going to kill her, thought that you would kill her, understood that more than likely you would kill her.”
Now, with the new law, prosecutors in Tennessee only have to prove that an attacker was “aware” the strangulation was happening.
Advocates say this law is important because if a victim is strangled, then their attacker is more likely to kill them in the future.
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