Rethinking Domestic Violence - Essay Example

Henry went to jail due to possession of Marijuana, and it is after his release that the incident happened. From a personal perspective, the fire seemed to be intentional as the Zephyrhills man refused to rescue his live-in girlfriend even though he had the opportunity to do so (Dutton, 2010).

A family constitutes all the requirements in life, as there is togetherness, love, and care for each other. As a family man, Christopher Henry lived with his girlfriend and several children including a 1- year old baby who was with their relatives during the time of the incident (Dutton, 2010). Their wife's battery and possession of marijuana made him serve a sentence in jail. Children in most cases learn from the behaviors of their parents and this affects them either positively or negatively (Kinsler, 2014). Henry’s children may suffer emotional depression after learning about the death of their mother. A person dealing with drugs is incapable of looking after his children as their mother could. Even though the children may need at least one of their parents, Christopher should go back to jail.   

Christopher Henry, the boyfriend, tells the investigators that he had tried to wake Lorraine up after the smell of smoke but she did not respond. Lorraine was just close to the entrance lying in bed (Dutton, 2010). The duplex apartment was consumed by flames upon the arrival of firefighters. The fire was intentional because Christopher could rescue the girlfriend since she was two feet from the entrance but he instead called her to come out. Lorraine maybe suffered from suffocation and was unable to rescue herself. I disagree with Christopher’s statement about calling his girlfriend to escape from the fire (Kinsler, 2014).

A neighbor witnessed the whole incident and that Henry did not intend to go back to the duplex to rescue his girlfriend (Johnson, 2010). This made the neighbor beat Henry up and his face filled with bruises. The neighbor said that they had resolved a domestic disturbance before. This indicates that Henry’s family was unstable since there were many disagreements between the two couples. Failure to rescue his live-in girlfriend shows that he did not intend to settle disputes with his girlfriend and he would rather let her die. Henry violated his pretrial condition of staying away from Lorraine after his release from jail.

The reader might oppose the ideas in trying to analyze the death of the 26-year-old mother who died after the duplex apartment she lived in caught fire. The investigations show that both occupants were smokers and maybe an accelerant caused the fire. The reader should consider the fire as intentional or accidental though there is clear evidence the fire could be intentional (Johnson, 2010). There was no obvious trauma in her body so they had to wait for autopsy results.

Domestic violence leads to the destruction of a family since there are no good relations between the couples. The article shows clearly that both Lorraine and Henry had had regular disagreements that ended with wife battery. Henry’s failure to rescue Lorraine showed a lack of care and togetherness (Kinsler, 2014). Lorraine deserved a rescue from her boyfriend after tolerating his behavior towards her for the period they were together (Johnson, 2010).