Domestic violence (also known as intimate partner violence, battering, or spouse abuse) is a pattern of abusive behavior used in a relationship to gain control and power over an intimate partner.
It happens to everyone across race, gender, socioeconomic status, education, and sexual orientation. According to a report by the United Nations, approximately 51,100 women were killed worldwide by an intimate partner or family member in 2023
Every year in the United States, more than 10 million men and women become victims of domestic violence, and more women lose their lives to intimate partner violence than any other means.
In the U.S. alone in 2024, more than one third of murdered women were killed in relation to intimate partner violence, and nearly 76 percent of intimate partner homicide victims are women.
Unfortunately for Washington State resident, Gloria Choi, a single mom of a 9 year old son, she became another domestic violence victim included in the more than one third of murdered women statistics who were killed in relation to intimate partner violence.
Because on January 2, 2022, William (Billy) Rickman, her ex-boyfriend, drove Gloria off the road and proceeded to shoot her 14 times while she was on the phone with 911.
Today our news team sits down Meaghan M. Driscoll and Matt Wurdeman, of the Connelly Law Offices in Tacoma Washington who represent the Choi’s family to discuss how the Lakeland, Washington police department, failed to protect Gloria after she had notified them 4 separate times of Rickman’s 4 separate violations of a “Domestic Violence – No Contact Order “(DV NCO) which included a duty to locate and arrest Rickman after each individual violation.
Under Washington state’s Domestic Violence Protection Act, violation of a DV NCO triggers a mandatory arrest. All an officer needs is probable cause to believe that the DV NCO has been violated.
Meaghan and Matt will discuss the legal challenges posed by this case and how they intend to show the Appellate Court that the Domestic Violence Protection Act has been changed many times since 1992, offering more protection to domestic violence victims, and adding stalking and harassment to the forms of DV.
And that the 1992 Court of Appeals case, Donaldson v. City of Seattle, which held that officers responding to a domestic violence call did not have a duty to arrest the perpetrator if he was not present when they arrived.
They intend to prove that Lakewood PD had probable cause to believe that Rickman had violated the DV NCO. And that the Lakewood PD owed Gloria a duty to respond to her repeated reports of violation of the DV NCO in a non-negligent manner, a duty to act reasonably, and a duty to locate and effectuate a mandatory arrest of Rickman.
Tragically, had the Lakewood Police Dept not been negligent in their duties, Rickman would have been arrested on 12/30 or 12/31, and he would not have been able to murder Gloria on Jan. 2nd, and she’d be alive today.
To reach Matt Wuderman and Meaghan Driscoll, contact https://www.connelly-law.com/ or (253) 593-5100