Does the 'Family Factor' Really Matter? Sentencing Offenders in Domestic and Non-Domestic Violence Cases in Russia

Abstract

While research on criminal sentencing has been an active field of inquiry for decades, social disparities in sentencing of domestic and non-domestic violent offenders remain understudied. Using court data on defendants persecuted in Russia in 2010-2013 enriched with information from verdict texts, we examine the effects of diverse socio-demographic characteristics and victim-offender relationship on both incarceration and sentence length decisions in violent cases, controlling for a range of legal factors. Gender, marital, parental, and employment statuses, educational background, criminal record and some other social characteristics differ significantly among offenders convicted of intimate partner violence, child-parent abuse, or non-domestic violence. Offenders sentenced for child-parent violence have a higher probability to be incarcerated than other violent offenders, while the probability of incarceration does not differ significantly for perpetrators of intimate partner violence compared to non-domestic violent offenders. Moreover, partner abusers receive even shorter sentences than non-domestic violent offenders. This effect sustains only for female offenders but not male offenders when the interaction of gender and the victim-offender relationship is included. Marriage usually decreases sentence severity. However, victim-offender relationship significantly moderates the effect. Partner abusers receive no discount in sentence length for being officially married than offenders in non-domestic violence cases.