Is this woman in the wrong?

[The Doctor.]

This was an issue that came up between a couple that I work with on occasion. No identifying details are included, of course. After having the issue related to me, and looking, for myself, at the police report, I thought it would be interesting to get the opinions of our progressive community on this subject.

It unfolded as follows;


It's been nearly a year since she and her husband have been 'intimate'. Partly because she feels unworthy, overweight, and useless, and partly because he doesn't communicate with her even though she sometimes begs him to tell her what he wants, needs, or feels.
He works four nights a week, steadily, as a bartender making good money, but not enough to keep up for the family. He is a loving father.
She tried to start a business that might have been very lucrative and could have even supported the whole family, but it failed before it even started because the man she was buying the equipment from reneged on the deal he'd made with her. By the time she'd found that her cause was actionable, her investment dried up, and from there she sank into a black depression.

One morning her husband comes home after work. On occasion, he is fairly drunk on arrival. Those times are actually special to her, and she often waits up all hours just to be there when he arrives because he is sometimes talkative and reflective, and sometimes even a little affectionate.

This was one such morning.

He told her, as he often did in his state, many soothing, hopeful things. He apologized for not being better for her, and they watched TV for an hour before he went to bed.

Still glowing from the rare succor, she went upstairs a few minutes later. She put her arms around him, touched him, and tried to recapture, after so much time, a little intimacy with the man she'd pledged her life to. He threw her off without a word.

Frustrated, she went to take out the garbage, but couldn't find one of her shoes. Ostensibly, it became one of her young children's playthings.
In her frustration, she slammed a door while looking for the shoe in her own bedroom.

Her husband, without a word, got up, put the children in the car, and... still drunk... tried to drive away.

She got into the car and asked what he was doing. He yelled at her to "get out". She took the keys and went back into the house with the children. She pleaded with him to tell her what was wrong, she wanted to simply TALK about her frustration and his reaction. She wanted to work things out, but he persisted in trying to leave. She called the police, and took his phone while still hoping that he would talk to her instead of calling a friend or family member to take the children and he away.

He never said a word about the issue, instead he just demanded to have his phone and the car keys back.

The police arrived, and the parties, separated, explained what happened.

She explained that she called because her husband tried to drive away drunk with the children in the car over a slammed door.
He told the police that yes, he had been drinking, but because she acted violently on the house, he felt he had to get the children out of the house.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________


Now... I have spoken to both parties, I have seen the police report which reflects the details as related. Every detail herein is verified to more than my satisfaction.

It is the woman who is listed as the 'suspect', and the husband who is listed as the 'victim' on the police report.

If anyone would like to explain why the report is right or wrong, why she was in the right or the wrong, I'd be most interested to hear it. Naturally, I must maintain an objective attitude, but I'm curious as to just why she should be listed as the suspect and he the victim.

There is another purpose here as well, which I will illustrate later.

[elleng]

1. Police arrived at point when they couldn't tell who was what,

and I can't quite figure out why they wrote what. They might have discerned that he had been drinking. EVERYONE's a victim, if properly understood. COPS erred, imo, by labelling at all.