‘Has he ever used a weapon against you or threatened you with a weapon?’
Canton police lacked a tool former Byram Police Chief Luke Thompson had used. At a conference on domestic violence a decade ago, he learned about the Danger Assessment, a one-page quiz developed for victims in 1985 by sociologist Jacqueline Campbell at Johns Hopkins.
Adding one new question, Thompson gave the sheet to his officers responding to calls about domestic violence: “Has he ever used a weapon against you or threatened you with a weapon?” If a victim answers “yes” to any of the first three questions, the officer hands the victim a cellphone with an advocate on the other end of the line.