Category Archives: American Association of Workplace Violence Prevention

3 Cleveland Women -The New Front Line of the War on Women

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For the past 4 days, media attention has been focused on the three Cleveland girls who were abducted close to their homes and kept as prisoners in an old run-down house with neighbors on all sides.

NOW, neighbors tell how they broke down the door to free the women, the little 6-year old girl who came out with them, presumably the child of their abductor, and stories of screams coming from the house over the LAST TEN YEARS.

Besides the obvious curiosity about how they are, how this happened, how they were subdued for so long, and all the salient details, my question is WHY DID THIS HAPPEN, AND WHAT DO WE NEED TO CHANGE TO MAKE SURE IT NEVER HAPPENS AGAIN!

As a security analyst, I have to place some of the blame at the door of the Cleveland police, not that they are different from any other police department in the U.S.  Police are trained to catch criminals – that is their reason for being.   But it seems that, increasingly, in crimes where women go missing, even a 16-year-old, the search for them never really gets underway.  With no speeding car to chase, no easy suspicious person to detain, they stop looking.

Statistics say that about 2300 people go missing every day, over half are men, so that
leaves about 1000 females, and of these, about 70% are young women. so that easy math – about 700 A DAY! or 255,500 EVERY YEAR!

My point is just that the Cleveland Triple Abduction should be a wake up call for parents, citizens AND law enforcement to find a better way to search for these missing girls.

The world has changed – we have cameras, social media, facebook pages, and we need for all of these to be routinely used to find missing girls before we see another case exactly like this one.

 

 

NRA Promotes Guns as Retail Therapy…

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Have you ever seen someone who just ordered a new gun over the web?  I did recently, and it reminded me of how I act when I get a new sweater from Amazon delivered to my house.

They carefully, even reverently, unwrap the new gun, they touch the barrel, inspect the handle for scratches, and read the info that came with it… then they put it away in their idea of a safe place, to be brought out and enjoyed almost like an object of art.

Many of these people never shoot, only hunt in the meat aisle of the local Giant store, and would never shoot anyone, but the NRA has done a great job of SELLING GUNS, and like me having too many sweaters, these people have too many guns.

These are the guns that kill the little boys playing in daddy’s bedroom.  These are the guns that the one little girl accidentally fires and shoots her brother in the leg.  These are the guns found by criminals during a robbery and uses them to rob a 7-11 store.

These are the guns that Adam Lanza collected with his mommy and used to kill the little children at Sandy Hook elementary school.

And this idea of gun ‘collecting’ and gun ‘worship’ is something the NRA has created, promoted and continues to encourage – hence the fear of any kinds of limits on their ‘collections’.

Can’t we get these people to collect actual ART, cashmere sweaters, fancy belt buckles or anything else instead of these lethal weapons disguised as ‘collectables”?

 

Why Giving Oscar Pistorius Bail Today in a South African Court is another blow against Women

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Violence, assault, battery, and homicide is always more of a problem for women than for men.

Statistics show that men are more likely to BE VIOLENT, and more apt to be aggressive toward women.  Because men are the world’s power brokers, and sometimes they try to use that power to dominate the women that they imagine they should be able to control.

The term War On Women is accurate, if you review the facts, and also the sensational details. The Scott Peterson’s murder of his 9-month pregnant wife carrying his unborn son, Connor, and just yesterday, Drew Peterson sentenced for murder of his 3rd wife, while wife number 4, Stacy, has been missing since 2007.

Remember  Josh and Susan Powell?   Josh, who killed both his young sons and himself, even though he was never convicted of Susan’s disappearance.  And the terrible thing about these high profile crimes is these women were attacked and killed at their most vulnerable, by someone who, at least, initially, loved them.

Even worse, in countries like South Africa, or India, rape is something that happens many times every day.  And the rich white guys aren’t the only perps.  It’s angry people — no matter how much money they have, where they live, or what their backgrounds are, or their education level.

Certain men seem to regard women as their possessions, like their dogs, or their household help, and so they feel free to abuse them, kick them, break their arms, intimidate them, control them, and if the woman tries to fight back, she is often killed.

No matter how rich Oscar Pistorius is, how great he is for overcoming such a profound handicap, how many medals he won, he, like OJ Simpson, will now be judged for losing his temper and murdering a beautiful young model – who loved him!

And obviously, the Magistrate didn’t agree, because if he did – he would never have granted him bail.

 

After The Surgeon Kills Girlfriend at the Hospital – what next?

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Time for a Workplace Violence Assessment? You think?

The shooting death of 33-year-old Jacqueline Wisniewski at Erie County Medical Center left the community in shock last week, especially since the shooter was a surgeon!

The surgeon’s body was found Friday, near his home, with a self-inflicted gunshot to the head. And this tragedy illustrates why EVERY hospital and medical center should be required to do a Baseline Workplace Violence Assessment.

The warning signs were there, the surgeon had lost weight, had become moody and distant, and also had advanced special forces weapons training in his background.

That’s exactly why he passed a background check, but after that initial check, his blatant symptoms of personal problems were ignored, even by the very people who observed them.

Now the hospital staff is traumatized, a beautiful young nurse is dead, the Eric County Medical Center administrators can look forward to an in-depth OSHA investigation, with possible fines and even more disruption.

Don’t let your hospital be a victim of this kind of incident. A Workplace Violence Assessment can be completed in just 5 days, and will reduce the chance of a potential violent incident by over 75%.

Email me directly to get the new white paper on how to prevent workplace violence incidents at caroline-hamilton@att.net.

How long does it take for OSHA to develop standards – like for Workplace Violence?

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Why OSHA standards take so long to develop

The Government Accountability office reports to Congress on items of interest to Congress and their constituents.  One area that was recently examined was how long it takes OSHA to update standards, or develop new standards.  Here’s a look at the results:

By: David LaHoda, April 30th, 2012

A report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) on why OSHA standards take, on average, more than seven years to complete found that “increased procedural requirements, shifting priorities, and a rigorous standard of judicial review” contributed to the lengthy time frame.

In responding to the GAO report, Randy Rabinowitz, OMB Watch’s director of regulatory policy said: “In the years since its creation, OSHA’s charge to protect workers from harm has been undermined by Kafkaesque demands for additional reviews of existing rules mandated by new statutes and executive orders,” according to The Hill. While OSHA’s internal inability to remain focused on priorities and regulatory follow-through was the counter argument presented by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

“While some of the changes, such as improving coordination with other agencies to leverage expertise, are within OSHA’s authority, others call for significant procedural changes that would require amending existing laws,” according tot he GAO report.

The GAO report recommended that that OSHA and NIOSH improve collaboration on researching occupational hazards. In that way OSHA could better “leverage NIOSH expertise in determining the needs for new standards and developing them.”

For the entire 55-page report go to http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-12-330

April is Workplace Violence Awareness Month

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The American Association of Workplace Violence Prevention (www.aawvp.org) has designated April 2012 as official Workplace Violence Awareness Month!

You can celebrate in your office by suggesting ways to reduce workplace violence in your own environment.  At AAWVP, they stress that workplace violence also happens to you, not just at work, but at the late-night grocery store or convenience store, in the hospital where you’re visiting your father, and even in your own home.

As part of the awareness raising event, the Association has invited me to participate in a special webinars about workplace violence at 2:00 pm Eastern Time, on April 18th.

You can join us by registering at http://tinyurl.com/85e33h8