Doe v. Doe, 3:95cv2722 (JBA).

929 F. Supp. 608

Jane DOE v. John DOE.

No. 3:95cv2722 (JBA).

United States District Court, D. Connecticut.

June 19, 1996.

Deborah Chang, Rali Wakeman, Cummings & Lockwood, Stamford, CT, for Plaintiff.

Christine Sciarrino, Office of the U.S. Attorney, New Haven, CT, for USA/amicus curiae.

Julie Goldshein, Maureen Murphy, Sara Kay, NOW Legal Defense Fund, New York City, for NOW, Legal Aid Society, Nat'l. Coalition Against Domestic Violence/amicus curiae.

Diane Polan, Norman Pattis, Office of John R. Williams, New Haven, CT, for Defendant.

RULING ON DEFENDANT'S MOTION TO DISMISS

ARTERTON, District Judge.

Plaintiff Jane Doe¹ seeks to avail herself of the civil rights remedy provided under the Violence Against Women Act of 1994 ("VAWA" or the "Act"), 42 U.S.C. § 13981, seeking damages for deprivation of her federal right to be free from her husband's alleged gender-based violence against her. Plaintiff alleges that from 1978 until 1995 the defendant "systematically and continuously inflicted a violent pattern of physical and mental abuse and cruelty upon the plaintiff," including throwing her to the floor, kicking her, throwing sharp and dangerous objects at her, threatening to kill her, and destroying property belonging to the plaintiff. Complaint ¶ 12. Plaintiff also alleges that the defendant forced her "to be a `slave' and perform all manual labor, including maintaining and laying out his clothes for his numerous dates with his many girlfriends and mistresses." Complaint ¶ 27. She claims extreme emotional distress, including battered women's syndrome, post-traumatic stress disorder, and depression. Complaint ¶ 34.

Defendant's motion to dismiss the complaint challenges the constitutionality of the Civil Rights Remedy provision of the VAWA, claiming that Congress lacked authority under either the Commerce Clause or the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution to enact this statutory scheme recognizing and enforcing a federal civil right to be free from gender-based violence. The Government intervened pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2403(a), and argues in support of the constitutionality of the VAWA. In addition, because the Act's constitutionality has not been previously considered, a group of non-profit organizations representing and advocating on behalf of women who have survived gender-motivated violence was granted leave to appear as amicus curiae in light of their knowledge and expertise about the social problems the Act addresses.²

After full review of the VAWA statutory language, legislative history, and briefing of the parties, this Court rules that defendant's claims of unconstitutionality are unfounded. A rational basis exists for concluding that gender-based violence, which the VAWA's Civil Rights Remedy regulates, is a national problem with substantial impact on interstate commerce and thus is a proper exercise of congressional power under the Commerce Clause. The Court further concludes that the VAWA, modelled after other traditional civil rights legislation, is narrowly tailored and reasonably adopted to accomplish a constitutionally permitted end.

I. Discussion

A. The Violence Against Women Act of 1994

In September 1994, Congress passed the Violence Against Women Act of 1994, a comprehensive statutory enactment designed to address "the escalating problem of violent crime against women," as part of the larger Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994, P.L. 103-322.³ S.Rep. 103-138, 103rd Cong., 1st Sess., Violence Against Women Act of 1993, 38 (Sept. 10, 1993). In considering whether a comprehensive federal approach was needed to address systematic, gender-based violent crime, Congress held numerous hearings over a four-year period and amassed substantial documentation on how gender-based violence impacts interstate commerce and interferes with women's ability to enjoy equal protection of the laws.⁴ Congressional committees heard testimony from law enforcement officials, anti-domestic violence organizations, rape crisis centers, psychiatrists, other mental health experts, physicians, law professors, staff attorneys from legal advocacy groups, state Attorneys General, and victims of domestic violence. Congress also reviewed U.S. Justice Department statistics and studies of gender bias in state courts commissioned by seventeen state supreme courts. See S.Rep. 138, at 49 n. 52.

After such consideration, the congressional committees found:

1. "Violence is the leading cause of injury to women ages 15-44, more common than automobile accidents, muggings, and cancer deaths combined." S.Rep. 138, at 38.

2. "In 1991, at least 21,000 domestic crimes were reported to the police every week; at least 1.1 million reported assaults — including aggravated assaults, rapes, and murders — were committed against women in their homes that year; unreported domestic crimes have been estimated to be more than three times this total." Id. at 37.

3. "Every week, during 1991, more than 2,000 women were raped and more than 90 women were murdered — 9 out of 10 by men." Id. at 38.

4. "An estimated 4 million American women are battered each year by their husbands or partners. Approximately 95% of all domestic violence victims are women. About 35% of women visiting hospital emergency rooms are due to injuries sustained as a result of domestic violence. One study of battered women found that 63 percent of the victims had been beaten while they were pregnant." H.R.Rep. 95, 103d Cong., 1st Sess., Violence Against Women Act of 1993, 26 (Nov. 20, 1993).

As part of the VAWA, Congress established a new federal civil right and remedy for victims of gender-based violent crimes. The Act declares that "all persons within the United States shall have the right to be free from crimes of violence motivated by gender." 42 U.S.C. § 13981. As remedy for violation of this new civil right, the Act provides for compensatory and punitive damages awards and injunctive relief:

A person (including a person who acts under color of any statute, ordinance, regulation, custom, or usage of any State) who commits a crime of violence motivated by gender and thus deprives another of the right declared in subsection (b) of this section shall be liable to the party injured, in an action for the recovery of compensatory and punitive damages, injunctive and declaratory relief, and such other relief as a court may deem appropriate.

Id. at § 13981(c). The term "crime of violence motivated by gender" is defined as "a crime of violence committed because of gender or on the basis of gender, and due, at least in part, to an animus based on the victim's gender." Id. at § 13981(d)(1). The statute does not require a prior criminal complaint, prosecution, or conviction to establish the elements of the cause of action. Id. at § 13981(e)(2).

Congressional authority to enact the civil rights remedy was asserted as an exercise of the "affirmative power of Congress" under both the Fourteenth Amendment, section 5 and the Commerce Clause, section 8 of Article I of the U.S. Constitution. Id. at 13981(a). Defendant argues, however, that Congress exceeded its powers in enacting VAWA under both the Commerce Clause and the Fourteenth Amendment,⁵ claiming that VAWA creates a "plenary federal police power," outside the Constitution's rubric which "creates a Federal Government of enumerated powers," United States v. Lopez, ___ U.S. ___, ___, 115 S.Ct. 1624, 1626, 131 L.Ed.2d 626 (1995), and impermissibly encroaches on the states' separate and distinct powers under the Tenth Amendment. See Id. (citing The Federalist No. 45, pp. 292-293 (C. Rossiter ed. 1961)).

B. The VAWA's Civil Rights Remedy and the Constitution's Commerce Clause.

Under the Commerce Clause, the Constitution grants to Congress three broad categories of activity which it has the power to regulate: (1) the use of channels of interstate commerce, (2) the instrumentalities of interstate commerce, or persons or things in interstate commerce, and (3) those activities that substantially affect interstate commerce. Lopez, ___ U.S. at ___ - ___, 115 S.Ct. at 1629-30 (citations omitted). The Court's analysis is limited to this third area of regulatory activity in light of the Supreme Court's attention to this prong in Lopez on which defendant relies.

In reviewing the constitutionality of a statute under the third prong of permissible regulation under the Commerce Clause, granting Congress power "to regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several states," U.S. Const. art. 1, § 8, cl. 3, "the task of a court that is asked to determine whether a particular exercise of congressional power under the Commerce Clause is relatively narrow," Hodel v. Virginia Surface Mining & Reclamation Ass'n, Inc., 452 U.S. 264, 276, 101 S.Ct. 2352, 2360, 69 L.Ed.2d 1 (1981), and this Court's standard of review is limited to whether a rational basis existed for concluding that a regulated activity sufficiently affected interstate commerce. Id. While the Court's inquiry is an independent one, it will consider congressional findings, including congressional committee findings. Lopez, ___ U.S. at ___, 115 S.Ct. at 1631. If the court concludes that Congress had a rational basis for enacting the statutory provision at issue, then the remaining question is whether the means chosen by Congress are "`reasonably adapted to the end permitted by the Constitution.'" Hodel, 452 U.S. at 276, 101 S.Ct. at 2360 (quoting Heart of Atlanta Motel, Inc. v. United States, 379 U.S. 241, 262, 85 S.Ct. 348, 360, 13 L.Ed.2d 258 (1964)).

In United States v. Lopez, supra, on which defendant principally relies, the Supreme Court struck down, as violative of the Commerce Clause, the Gun-Free School Zones Act of 1990 (18 U.S.C. § 922(a)(1)(A),) which federalized the offense of possession of a firearm within 1,000 feet of a school. Id., at ___, 115 S.Ct. at 1629. In Lopez, despite the absence of any Congressional findings for the...