ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Saturday, June 22, 1996 TAG: 9606240048
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JAN VERTEFEUILLE STAFF WRITER
A CONNECTICUT JUDGE'S decision to uphold the Violence Against Women Act as constitutional may be a harbinger of good things for former Virginia Tech student Christy Brzonkala.
In the first ruling on the Violence Against Women Act, a federal judge in Connecticut - who heard arguments similar to those in the Christy Brzonkala case - upheld the law as constitutional.
Lawyers in the local case differ on the significance of Wednesday's ruling on their case. Chief U.S. District Judge Jackson Kiser in Roanoke is considering the same constitutionality question and is expected to rule soon.
In the Connecticut case, a woman is suing her estranged husband after what she says were years of abuse. Brzonkala is suing two Virginia Tech football players she says raped her in their dorm room in September 1994.
Brzonkala's attorney said the Connecticut ruling could only help her case, while football player Tony Morrison's attorney said it probably means nothing. The decision was made by a trial judge, not an appellate court, and was in a different judicial jurisdiction.
"One district judge is not required to follow another, but they tend to watch each other," said Eileen Wagner, who represents Brzonkala. "It's a tradition of judges to at least give consideration to each other."
But Morrison's attorney, David Paxton, said: "I doubt seriously it's going to influence Judge Kiser one way or the other. It's not uncommon at all for federal judges to disagree on issues like this."
The Violence Against Women Act, passed by Congress in 1994, makes gender-motivated crimes civil rights violations and allows victims to sue their attackers for damages. Critics of the law argue that Congress overstepped its authority and improperly involved itself in criminal matters that are state and local responsibilities.
The attorney for the Connecticut husband being sued argued that the act is "an open and sweeping invitation to the federal government to intervene almost at will in almost any area of anyone's life."
But U.S. District Judge Janet Bond Arterton ruled Wednesday that the law is "narrowly tailored and reasonably adopted to accomplish a constitutionally permitted end." She upheld the law as permissible under the clause in the Constitution giving Congress authority over interstate commerce and activities that affect it. She said the act does not encroach on traditional areas of state law.
``It complements them by recognition of a societal interest in ensuring that persons have a civil right to be free from gender-based violence,'' she said. Congress ``found that both existing state and federal criminal laws were inadequate to protect against gender-motivated violence.''
As in Brzonkala's case, the Justice Department intervened in the Connecticut case to defend the law. The men being sued in the two cases made similar arguments against it.
In light of a Supreme Court decision last year that curbs the expansion of federal control over traditionally local matters, they argue, the Violence Against Women Act cannot withstand the stricter scrutiny. Calling such crimes as domestic violence and rape violations of the Constitution's commerce clause is too much of a stretch, they say.
But Arterton agreed with the Justice Department that "the repetitive nationwide impact of women withholding, withdrawing or limiting their participation in the workplace or marketplace" because of gender-based violence has a "substantial" impact on interstate commerce.
An attorney for the Virginia Tech football players argued at a recent hearing that under Congress' rationale for passing the law, "there is nothing Congress cannot do." Lawyers for the players also say that statistics on violence against women are irrelevant to the debate. Congress looked at the effect all rape and all violence have on women's decisions to curtail work opportunities and travel, but failed to look at the impact of specifically "gender-motivated" crime - which is the only kind the law addresses.
In Roanoke, Kiser heard arguments June 10 from the Justice Department and the National Organization for Women in support of the law and from the Center for Individual Rights opposing the law. He may rule on the constitutionality of the law, or he could simply decide that Brzonkala does not have a case under the law without ruling on the law itself.
The Justice Department on Thursday submitted Arterton's decision to Kiser for his review.
The Connecticut lawsuit and Brzonkala's suit were filed just five days apart, in December. The Connecticut husband plans to appeal the judge's ruling immediately, taking it to an appeals court while the lawsuit is pending. The case has not yet been heard; Arterton ruled on the law's constitutionality in denying the husband's motion to dismiss the case before trial.
The woman, who is suing under the pseudonym Jane Doe, alleged that her husband treated her as a slave, even forcing her to take care of his mistress's poodle and pick out clothes for his extramarital affairs.
She claimed her husband had violent outbursts four to five times a week, and that she was thrown down stairs, hurled against a wall, kicked, shoved and pushed. She also said that at one time, her husband kept a loaded shotgun in the house and repeatedly threatened her with it.
The lawsuit claimed she suffered permanent physical and mental injuries, including battered woman's syndrome. It sought at least $50,000 in damages.
The Violence Against Women Act allows crime victims who can prove they were targeted because of hostility toward their gender to sue their attackers for damages. The law made such attacks a "hate crime" and a violation of the victim's civil rights.
If federal courts around the country split over the act's constitutionality, it may end up in the Supreme Court's lap.
The Associated Press contributed to this story.
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