“At a time when we know that a man is an aggressor and that there has been a complaint about him, we have to take all protective measures against these minors and the victim,” explained the Head of the Coordination Unit against Gender Violence of the Government Delegation, Laura Segura.
In an interview with COPE, he pointed out that the system has to protect the victim and act from all areas, specifically from the judiciary, while defending that the Comprehensive Monitoring System in cases of Gender Violence (VioGén System), is “a system that does not fail”. In this way, he has detailed that, when a woman complains, an assessment is made of the risk she has of being attacked again and based on this, a follow-up is offered of “unappreciated risk”, “low”, “medium”, “high” or “extreme”.
In the words of Segura, “this is pure mathematics”, although she has pointed out that it is essential to take into account the different types of perceptions at the time when a woman denounces. Therefore, it has highlighted that one of the last instructions of the system, the Zero Protocol, allows to obtain information of the environment, “because the victim sometimes does not perceive the situation of risk as the rest can perceive it”. “If the information comes only from her, maybe we have a skewed information,” he warned.
The Head of the Unit has revealed that there are currently 235 cases in Melilla with official protection within the VioGén system, including four minors as victims of gender violence. “We have had a significant evolution in the number of women we are monitoring, an increase that has to do with the latest system instructions that allow more women to be protected,” he said. “In 2019 we had an average of 190 women with police protection, today we have 235 cases in Melilla”, he compared.
Advance protection system
“Society fails and we all fail as a system at the moment when a woman denounces and the system has not been able to protect her,” he acknowledged. Referring to the number of cases of women killed, he said that in crisis cabinets they always value what has happened and what has failed. “In the last cases we have, most of the problems we have encountered have finally been either acquittals, or civil measures agreed with minors despite situations of violence, mutual agreements,” he explained. Thus, he has said that agreements cannot be allowed in situations of violence, “not even for civil measures.”
For this reason, Segura has made it clear that in Melilla they always value the risk of a woman being attacked again. “The system allows the person to increase the level of risk over the initial assessment to establish greater protective measures,” he said. “As far as we can, on the part of the people, we have to move beyond the system, because this is a step forward in protection,” he stressed.
Melilla facilitates coordination
“From Melilla, with 235 active cases, you can have a daily follow-up of each of the cases and see what is happening at each moment,” he said. In this regard, he stressed that “Melilla facilitates coordination” and defended that “the structure is well established”, with coordination tables, which are convened from the Unit, where are all the administrations and institutions that in some way are part of the structure of gender violence and of protection, follow-up, accompaniment to the victims.
Laura Segura has valued the table of associations, entities and organizations at the local level because it works with women who have not reported, women who are deciding whether or not to file a complaint or who consider that they are not going to report, but need an accompaniment. “In addition, they provide spaces for the detection and prevention of gender-based violence and offer all information about telephone services and victims’ rights,” he explained.