Centre for Policing and Criminal Justice Research

Useful, research supported strategies to manage trauma trigger reactions.

The new coercive and controlling criminal offence added to the Criminal Code of Canada takes effect later this month! Our Director was part of a group of various subject matter experts consulted on this legislation. A step toward criminalizing non-physical aspects of intimate partner violence that cause significant psychological harm to a current or former romantic partner. For more info on coercive control, check out Justice Canada's website.

www.justice.gc.ca

Read up on some of our latest research on intimate partner violence in Canada, interesting trends across three Canadian provinces (including data from the Maritimes).

The incidence of police contact for intimate partner violence in three Canadian regions | Journal of Community Safety and Well-Being The incidence of police contact for intimate partner violence in three Canadian regions Authors R. Karl Hanson Society for the Advancement of Actuarial Risk Needs Assessment, Kingston, ON, Canada; Department of Psychology, Carleton University, Ottawa, ON, Canada https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0920-884X...

False confessions are a real thing, emerging under psychologically coercive interrogation tactics. Trained investigators must be aware of this potential and rely on evidence informed investigative interviewing strategies instead that also elicit legit confessions with lower risk of false confessions.

In 2018, Tom Perez Jr. confessed to murdering his father after enduring a 17-hour police interrogation, despite the fact that his father was alive the entire time. 😳

The ordeal began when Perez contacted police in Fontana, California, to report his elderly father missing. Instead of treating him solely as a concerned family member, investigators quickly focused on him as a suspect and subjected him to an hours-long interrogation that stretched through the night. Exhausted, sleep-deprived, and under immense psychological pressure, Perez eventually broke down and gave a detailed confession claiming he had stabbed his father.

According to court filings and reports, investigators allegedly used a series of aggressive tactics during the interrogation. Perez later claimed police threatened to euthanize the family dog, suggested he may have suffered a blackout and forgotten committing the crime, and even involved his best friend in efforts to persuade him to confess. During the ordeal, Perez attempted su***de and was later hospitalized for psychiatric treatment.

The shocking twist was that there had never been a murder. Perez's father, known as "Papa Tom," had simply gone to visit friends without notifying family members. Authorities eventually located him alive and unharmed, but Perez says he was never informed of this fact while he was being interrogated and pressured into confessing.

The case became a widely cited example in debates about false confessions and interrogation practices in the United States. In 2024, the City of Fontana agreed to pay Perez $900,000 to settle a lawsuit related to the incident. The story continues to raise questions about how and why innocent people can sometimes be persuaded to confess to crimes that never even occurred. 🤯⚖️📖🚔💔

IMvisible Short Film The IMvisible GBV project is proud to launch a heartfelt short film...

The ODARA, the most widely used intimate partner violence risk assessment instrument in Canada, offers an easy to score and interpret experience.

This tool provides a score indicating how a domestic offender compares with other domestic offenders in terms of risk for re-offence.

To learn more and access FREE ODARA resources, visit SAARNA's website: https://saarna.org/

HOT OFF THE PRESS!

Serne, Braakman, and Vinkers (2026) explored existing research to provide an up-to-date overview of possible ethnic disparities in the predictive validity of forensic risk assessment instruments.

Across the YLS/CMI, SAVRY, and Static-99R (which met inclusion criteria), predictive accuracy was moderate across all ethnic groups. Static-99R, was lower in Indigenous and Hispanic compared to White and Black samples, however, this difference was not significant.

Want to read more? Open-access preprint here: https://tinyurl.com/2a4525a7

Intimate partner violence homicide and coercive control are being more directly integrated into the Criminal Code of Canada! https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1EQimvUjX9/

Bailey’s Law PASSES the Senate!

This may be the most significant change to the law of intimate partner violence in Canadian history.

I’m proud to stand with victims of IPV. It’s not the end. It’s the end of the beginning. And we will continue to press on in Bailey’s memory.

The Court previously dismissed the appeal in R. v. Berg. Today, it released its reasons, confirming that criminal convictions must be based on proof beyond a reasonable doubt, not simply on choosing one witness’s account over another. Read our plain-language summary: https://www.scc-csc.ca/judgments-jugements/cb/2026/41980.