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World of Hurt

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"The majority of police commanders and the upper echelon of the police department seem to be very concerned about the liabilities [of domestic violence] -- they want to hold officers accountable, they want to take care of their department," Zagarri says. "There seems to be a real problem with the middle management and the street officers and their education. I know they have an enormous amount of domestic-violence training when they go through the academy -- I think the city academy was the second-highest in the nation a few years ago in terms of the hours spent on domestic violence -- but somehow it doesn't seem to be enough. And there's a lot of things we'd like to get out to police officers' families in case situations occur."

Not even the family of St. Louis police chief Joe Mokwa is immune to domestic violence, according to court records. Officer James Daniel Goodrich, Mokwa's 33-year-old son-in-law, was arrested two years ago on suspicion of assaulting his wife Aimie Mokwa, the chief's daughter. In petitions for protective orders, the parties have accused each other of physical abuse, death threats and drug abuse.

Goodrich was arrested for assault in 2002, but the St. Louis Circuit Attorney's Office dropped the charges. In a request for an ex parte order of protection filed this past summer, the 29-year-old Mokwa wrote that her injuries had required hospitalization. On another occasion in June 2003, Mokwa claimed, Goodrich choked her and hit one of the couple's three children. "He hits me in my head, face, spits in my face, forces me to have sex with him," Mokwa stated in her petition for a protective order. "He hits my son in the head, slaps [him] in the face, beats him until he has bruises on him." Wrote Mokwa of the man she'd married in 1995: "He said he would kill me."

Goodrich himself has twice filed for orders of protection against his wife, the first time shortly after his 2002 arrest. In a second petition for an ex parte order filed this past summer, he alleged that Mokwa had twice tried to shoot him in 2002 -- once on March 8 and again on March 23. Additionally, a police report the Riverfront Times obtained under the state public-records law describes yet another incident on March 15 of that same year, in which Mokwa was charged with illegal discharge of a firearm after firing four rounds from her husband's 9 mm Beretta in the kitchen of the couple's south St. Louis home, while Goodrich was in a bedroom. Associate city counselor David Miller says he gave Mokwa a choice: She could plead guilty to the charge and be placed on probation for a year, or she could plead guilty to a charge of peace disturbance and pay a $200 fine. She chose the latter. Miller says he offered the plea because Mokwa was a first-time offender and there was no evidence she'd aimed at anyone.

Ex parte orders usually remain in effect for fifteen days, or until a hearing can be held to determine the truth of accusations and whether they're serious enough to merit a full order of protection. Goodrich allowed his 2002 ex parte order to lapse; his second request last summer was denied by St. Louis Circuit Court Judge Michael Mullen. But with the consent of both parties, Mullen last year extended Mokwa's ex parte order against Goodrich four times based on the same allegations -- that he'd choked, hit and threatened to kill his wife. The order ended in November when Mokwa stopped pursuing the case.

Neil Bruntrager, Aimie Mokwa's attorney, wouldn't say why his client didn't press for a full order of protection, which lasts at least six months and can come with requirements such as counseling aimed at preventing someone from getting seriously hurt. He did, however, agree to speak in general terms about such situations. A petition for an ex parte order is filed under oath, Bruntrager points out. "It's certainly a substantive claim," he says. But in cases involving a police officer, a full order of protection, which includes an official finding that abuse has occurred, may cost a spouse his or her job, leaving the petitioner with no financial support. "Does that really deal with the root problem? I don't know," Bruntrager says. "They're willing to trade off a full order of protection if they can be confident they're safe. Does it work? I don't know, but I know that's the thought process."

Victims' advocate Rita Zagarri adds that police officers who are subject to full orders of protection aren't allowed to carry guns off-duty, which restricts potential income from security-guard jobs.

Goodrich also applied for a protective order this past summer against his estranged wife on behalf of the couple's three children. Mokwa, Goodrich alleged, was dependent on prescription drugs and had overdosed more than once, leaving the children unattended. Additionally, Goodrich cited an incident in July 2003 in which police were summoned to a Des Peres Walgreens store after Mokwa, who left her children in a car outside with a friend, allegedly attempted to obtain drugs without a valid prescription. According to the incident report, Des Peres police referred the matter to the St. Louis County Prosecutor's Office, classifying it as a felony case of obtaining prescription drugs by fraud. (Judge Mullen denied the request, according to court records, but he did appoint a guardian for the children and ultimately assigned custody to the paternal grandparents.) In his divorce petition, Goodrich repeats claims that his wife is a drug addict. Alan Weber, another of Mokwa's attorneys, disputes that, although he declined to comment in detail.

Aimie Mokwa also got into a scrape in September 2002, when she drove into two parked cars near the intersection of Tholozan and Macklind avenues. According to a report filed by St. Louis police, the impact flipped the Dodge Neon she was driving; the car came to rest on its roof in the roadway with its airbag deployed. Officers at the scene attributed the accident -- which took place at 12:30 a.m. on a clear night on a stretch of dry, well-lighted pavement -- to "inattention." But although Mokwa had no insurance and the out-of-state license plates on the Neon were expired, she received no citation. The couple that owned the two cars sued Mokwa, claiming $11,000 in damages. This past fall, she agreed to pay them $9,000 at the rate of $200 per month.

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