For years, I hid my personal domestic violence story out of fear and shame.
But as executive director of an organization dedicated to eliminating gun violence, I became part of an effort to remove firearms from dangerous people inflicting harm on their domestic partners. Now, during Domestic Violence Awareness Month, I’ve thought about my own life, and I realized that by keeping silent, I was complicit in the problem.
In my childhood home, my mother took on the brunt of my father’s abuse. When I eventually worked up the courage to confront him, his violence left me with an injury that still affects me to this day.
Since then, domestic violence has only gotten worse. Women are five times more likely to be murdered when their abuser has access to a firearm. Every month, an average of 70 women are shot to death by an intimate partner.
In fact, last year Illinois saw a 110% increase in domestic violence deaths, according to a report from the Illinois Coalition Against Domestic Violence. Eighty-two of the domestic violence deaths in 2023 were by firearms.
Local news is plagued with stories about firearm homicides at the hands of a domestic abuser.
In May, a man charged with domestic violence who was supposed to stay 1,000 feet away from his wife and surrender his firearms shot and killed her. In August, Zanetta Williams was shot and killed by an abusive partner. And just last week, a Southwest Side woman who had an order of protection against an ex-boyfriend was allegedly gunned down by him as she sat in her car.
What’s sadder is the Illinois Legislature has had a life-saving solution at its fingertips for over a year. Karina’s Bill is named for Karina Gonzalez, who, along with her 15-year-old daughter Daniela, was shot to death by her husband in July 2023 after she was granted an order of protection that should have led to the removal of his firearm by law enforcement.
The stalled Karina’s Bill would require law enforcement to remove any firearms from the home when certain orders of protection are granted.
Currently, even when survivors are granted an order of protection, law enforcement often does not have a clear directive to remove a firearm from the home.
The call for the passage of Karina’s Bill is underscored by this year’s Supreme Court ruling in United States v. Rahimi, which upheld the right of individual states to temporarily remove firearms from abusers when they pose a clear threat to the safety of others. This decisive 8-1 ruling provides a path for Illinois to strengthen protections for victims of domestic violence.
This protection is needed now more than ever. The Sun-Times reported in the spring a 90% increase in calls to the Illinois Domestic Violence Hotline since 2019.
The article pointed out that in the city, “there were no beds or cribs available in domestic violence shelters for 124 days last year,” and the suburbs reported “107 days where there were no beds or cribs available in domestic violence shelters.”
These shortages have forced survivors to stay where their abusers can find them. Simply put, the state is practically serving up victims on a platter to domestic violence abusers.
When a survivor is brave enough to ask the court to protect them and there’s no law to protect them from domestic violence-related gun violence, the state of Illinois is saying it doesn’t care. It doesn’t care about domestic violence victims. It doesn’t care about survivors. And it certainly doesn’t care about the disproportionate number of Black and Brown women being impacted by these horrible crimes.
If my mom hadn’t escaped my father’s abuse and removed his gun, my story could be very different.
But we survived, and I’ve found the courage to use my voice for change.
As the veto session approaches, I hope legislators find the courage to act, too. Because each day they let Karina’s Bill languish without action is another day they’re complicit in the problem.
Yolanda Androzzo is the executive director of One Aim Illinois.
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