Criminal Domestic Violence: A Survivor Speaks Up

Day by day, she’s rebuilding her life.

It has taken time, but slowly she is returning to the person that she once was — fun-loving, friendly, self-confident.

She’s a survivor of criminal domestic violence.

More than a year ago, Dee was pinned to the ground by her ex-husband with a pistol shoved into her mouth.

He pulled the trigger, but the gun jammed.

“It’s only by the grace of God, that I’m here,” Dee said.

She found the strength to push him off of her and again, he fired, missing her head by about 12 inches. Once again, he pointed the gun at her, but again, the gun jammed.

That was her wake-up call.

Dee met her ex-husband more than seven years ago. She said the first year the two were together, things were good — or so she thought. Then the verbal abuse started.

There was name-calling. He cursed her and then it progressively became more physical and more violent. He began hitting her, shoving her and pulling loaded weapons on her.

“I could tell by the look on his face,” Dee said. “Especially his eyes, they were just pure evil, black, cold.”

To avoid a confrontation, Dee started spending more time watching television in the bedroom of the couples’ home. But her quiet refuge would become her prison, her own personal hell.

On Jan. 1, 2011, Dee did something she had never done before. She called the police.

Dee said the abuse had happened on many occasions. She tried to hide the black eyes, the bruises and the busted lips. She started staying at home more often, even staying away from family members and her late mother, who was at the time dying of cancer.  

She said her friends grew tired of her decisions to stay or her reasons for going back to the man who was abusing her.

“We separated several times,” she said. “I’d go back. For two or three weeks, things would be great, but it would always start again.”

Dee said the physical abuse became more frequent and grew worse each time. She said of all the times her ex-husband had pointed a 12-gauge shotgun at her head or held a loaded pistol to her mouth, she never actually thought he would pull the trigger.

“He would ask me, ‘Do you believe in God?’” she said. “Then he’d tell me,  ‘Well you better start praying.’”

For weeks, Dee told that story to counselors, but only now has the healing begun.

Today, she’s strong enough to tell other women her story and to make a plea for those in abusive relationships to get out.

“No abuse is acceptable. Any whatsoever,” Dee said. “It happened to me, it happens to women of all ages and it doesn’t get better.”

Dee got out because she had a safe haven. It was a place like Mary’s House that helped her to find the woman who had been lost for far too long.

Mary’s House of Pickens County is a nonprofit, faith-based organization that provides emergency shelter and services to women and children who have been victims of domestic violence.

But it needs the help of the public to continue to operate.

“We need financial partners,” said Lisa Smith, executive director of Mary’s House.

Smith said the agency operates mainly through grant-funding and private donations, but they continually have to work to find ways to keep money flowing into the agency.

“We don’t want to take state funding,” Smith said. “If we do, then we can’t use the word of God to reach people who have turned to us for help.”

It was one of the reasons that Smith, with the help of Alvin Smith at A.R. Smith & Company, has put together an educational video to show people what Mary’s House is all about.

Currently, South Carolina is seventh in the nation for criminal domestic violence, according to State Sen. Larry Martin, R-Pickens.

Martin is a supporter and an advocate of the agency.

“Having this safe refuge for victims has helped law enforcement to better deal with situation they may not have been able to address as years go by,” Martin said.

Martin said that it is critical to provide support, promote awareness and provide resources to bring attention to the problem.

Martin said while he doesn’t believe it will ever go away, he is working to put laws on the book that will create changes and help to make it easier to prosecute those who have been charged with domestic violence.

Martin said the state should work to better educate magistrate judges.

“All too often law enforcement officers handle those basic offenses in magistrate’s court, because that’s where first offenses are handled, and the person charged with domestic violence comes in with a lawyer,” Martin said.

“It is very important that we have the prosecution side of this ably represented in magistrate’s court.”

Martin said that in order to get out of the top 10 nationally, there has to be a significant shift in societal attitude.

“We have to continue to focus in a way that it’s just not accepted,” Martin said. “We need to address it as a community and have clear penalties for those who violate the law. It’s not acceptable behavior.”

Smith said changing that behavior and attitude is part of the programs offered through Mary’s House. The organization has partnered with local schools to work with girls through a program called Healthy Ways. The program focuses on healthy relationships and in growing the self-esteem among young women through a girls’ circle that meets afterschool.

If you would like to help Mary’s House, please visit their website at or call (864) 855-1708.