In an earlier article entitled "Findings on the Role of Officer Gender in Violent Encounters with Citizens," Grennan writes:

Police officials and the public have speculated that because women lacked the physical stature and body strength of male officers a female officer may be more inclined to use a firearm than her male counterpart. This research indicates that this belief is incorrect. Women police officers ... lack a need to project the "macho" image that seems to be inherent in the personality of most male officers. The female officer, with her less aggressive personality, is more likely to calm a potentially violent situation and avoid injury to all of the participants. [emphasis added] (4)

Studies show that because of their less authoritarian personalities, there is less likelihood of escalation of potentially violent situations with women police officers than with men. Researcher Carol Ann Martin found that "Women have proven that they have excellent communication skills which can be extremely helpful in police-citizen encounters where there may be potential violence. Quite often if the male officer is of the John Wayne-type he will provoke a fight or violence, instead of calming down the situation" (5).

In an extensive review of the research on women in policing, Joseph Balkin reports that "policemen see police work as involving control through authority, while policewomen see it as a public service. The women's orientation is more likely to result in better relations with the public and a better image of police department" (6). Balkin went on to suggest that "...in some respects at least, women are better suited for police work than men ... not all women are able to handle all police jobs - but neither are men" (7).

Katharine Van Wormer went even further in an article entitled "Are Males Suited to Police Patrol Work?". She found that the policeman's proclivity for violence and his resistance to women officers tends to make him counter-productive. His attitudes jeopardize bath community and inter-police relations and threaten his ability to effectively serve his community. Van Wormer concludes that policewomen meet the public better and are better at dealing with rape victims and domestic violence. To overcome the men's shortcomings, Van Wormer proposed police departments create "special" selection and training policies for male recruits.

More Women Officers Improves Police Response to Violence Against Women
The gross absence of women on the police force not only contributes to the problems of police violence, but violence against women is treated less seriously. Violence against women is a nationwide epidemic; yet the majority of violent crimes against women go unreported, uninvestigated, and unpunished.

Police departments have shown a lack of serious attention to domestic violence. As a result, women victims are reluctant to call the police because they believe the officers won't help or, worse yet, will side with the male perpetrator of violence. The views expressed by and reinforced within the male-dominated police department serve to obstruct justice for women victims. Jalna Hanmer and associates explain:

Research indicates that police attitudes towards crimes such as rape, sexual assault, and battering include assumptions about male rights and female blame. Police attitudes ... are likely to dissuade women from complaining about men's violence. (8)

Victims of rape and domestic violence often report feeling humiliated, accused and alienated from the criminal justice system - the very system that is supposed to help them. One study found that in several cases the police officer who first reported to the scene of a rape actually look advantage of the victim's vulnerable situation to sexually assault her again (9).

In many instances, there is simply no response by the police to male violence against women. An internal investigation by the Oakland Police Department found that 90% of the sexual assault reports it ignored in 1989 and 1990 should have been investigated. According to The Los Angeles Times, "police administrators called for the investigation in January after The San Francisco Examiner revealed that nearly one in four women who reported a rape or an attempted rape were ignored" (10).