The Lethality Assessment: Assessing Lethality Based on Officer Belief in Nashville, Tennessee

The Lethality Assessment was designed to allow for a police officer to connect victims of domestic violence with a crisis counselor who can assist them with resources for their immediate needs. This protocol is for a police officer to administer a series of questions to the victim while they are on the scene of a domestic violence call. This study is specific to two aspects of the Lethality Assessment: 1) referral to a crisis counselor by a police officer based on his belief that their situation calls for crisis intervention and; 2) referral to a crisis counselor based on the appropriate number of “yes” answers per the Lethality Assessment protocol. This study shows that in Nashville, Davidson County Tennessee, the value of referring victims to the crisis counselor allows for earlier intervention to resources by showing that over 40% of officer belief referrals resulted in a completed crisis counselor phone call by the victim. This study shows that both ways of officer referral (through protocol and through officer belief) have immense value based on the study results