New group will campaign against domestic violence
TOM MORTON Star-Tribune staff writer | Posted: Tuesday, February 5, 2008 12:00 am
Domestic violence has plagued Natrona County for years, but then it got personal for Dr. Jim Ripley.
"I didn't get mad until my patient died," Ripley said.
His patient, Jennifer Randel, was found beaten to death in the pickup truck of her boyfriend on Nov. 4.
After he got mad, he decided to get even.
"A bunch of us guys got together and said, 'The killing of women is over,'" said Ripley, an oral and maxillofacial - upper jaw and face - surgeon.
That bunch of guys invited legislators, Casper City Council members, social service workers, law enforcement personnel, lawyers, and Randel's friends to Sherrie's Place on Thursday to help organize the nonprofit Don'tTouch.US, Inc.
While many in the audience have done excellent work for years to counsel victims and prosecute perpetrators, Ripley and the organizers wanted a way to prevent the violence, he said. "We want to create a safer community in Natrona County."
For Ripley, that means confronting domestic violence in all forms, including men beating children.
"Bullying is the central thing," he said. "[It follows] from early childhood through life."
He and others acknowledged women commit acts of domestic violence on men, but, Ripley said, "the man-against-woman violence is a crisis."
Besides being Ripley's patient, Randel worked at Sherrie's Place, its owner Sherrie Lopez said.
Lopez served coffee and cookies while Ripley and others outlined their strategy through media and billboard campaigns, a "100 man march," bullying intervention, meeting with legislators, collaboration with law enforcement and the courts, and speaking to schools and social service organizations.
Don'tTouch.US also plans to assist, and if need be shame, bars and clubs where alcohol often fuels the violence. "We will end their problem or we will make them famous," Ripley said.
Some of the participants shared what their agencies do.
Victim advocate Lorrie Wnuk of the Natrona County Sheriff's Office said programs about teen dating violence have been successful, and programs have been started about violence against the elderly.
District Attorney Mike Blonigen said the community needs to quit excusing domestic violence as somebody else's problem.
The day before, Edward Taylor was sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole for murdering Mark Fisher with a 12-gauge shotgun on April 1 after Fisher had been intimate with Taylor's wife. Taylor and his wife were divorcing at the time.
His office is now dealing with Randel's alleged assailant Donald Rolle, who has been charged with first-degree murder and kidnapping charges. Rolle, 47, faces the possibility of life behind bars or death if convicted of the murder charge.
Blonigen hopes Don'tTouch.US will help encourage victims and witnesses of domestic violence to come forward, because a change in attitude and not laws alone will solve the problem.
"We have lots of laws," Blonigen said. "They know it's illegal, but don't think it's wrong."
Reach Tom Morton at (307) 266-0592, or at Tom.Morton@trib.com.
Last we knew: Jennifer Randel, 40, was killed on Nov.
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