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NY Times: Domestic Abuse Fraud: It’s Rarely Suspected and Rarely Detected

Submitted by anthony on Sun, 2009-11-01 20:19.

Article here. Excerpt:

'In the city’s rich history of fraud schemes, the cases described this week by the city’s Department of Investigation would not seem to rank up there with mortgage scams or fake Medicare patients: Six women were accused of posing as victims of domestic violence to gain subsidized housing.

Such cases are so rare, and the issue so sensitive, that city officials and advocates for domestic violence victims said that they are not usually on the lookout for fraud when people come forward with claims of abuse.
...
No documentation is required to prove abuse, said Barbara Brancaccio, a spokeswoman for the city’s Human Resources Administration, which operates domestic violence shelters.

At the shelters, employees occasionally discover that women have exaggerated their abuse, but they are not forced to leave the facilities, Ms. Brancaccio said.
...
That said, the system is not “set up to catch people,” she said, adding that she has never encountered a case of fraud.'

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Of course, if you never screen for false claims of abuse

Submitted by el cid on Mon, 2009-11-02 02:36.

--then how can you claim it's "rare"?

I once read about a DV shelter in Austin (Texas) that provided shelter, food, free job training and a number of other services, all in a brand-new building. It occurred to me then that a lot of women might claim to be abused simply to receive all the benefits. After all, if you're going to award women for being abused and never check the accuracy of their claims, you should expect false claims to be made. The women want the benefits.

Of course, when all these women show up seeking benefits, you can claim DV is rampant and you need more funding because the problem is so huge.

Psychologists discovered long ago that you can change the behavior of rats by giving them cheese. They considered this an amazing discovery. It always seemed rather obvious to me. But apparently it was amazing because of the number of people who believe giving people cheese (food, shelter, job training) does not affect their behavior.

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Huh?

Submitted by axolotl on Mon, 2009-11-02 05:02.

If they are not usually on the lookout for it, how do they know it's rare??

-ax

[edit:] okay, I guess I echoed el cid's concern.

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