TILDEN LAW – Orlando Criminal Attorney

Daytona Beach authorities have received reports of 6 sexual assaults during the first week of Spring Break 2010. Detectives were called by a 37 year old woman to reported that she was grabbed by her hair by a unidentified male while walking to the restroom at the newly renovated Ocean Center and pulled into a men’s bathroom stall where she was sexually assaulted. The attack occurred sometime after 4:00 p.m. in broad daylight.

It is common for sexual assaults to increase during the Spring Break month of March. “All of last year we had a total of 41 sexual assaults,” Police Chief Mike Chitwood said Tuesday. “Here we have six in one week.”

In an unrelated incident, Daytona Beach police arrested a rape suspect in another incident that involved heavy drinking. The suspect is accused of raping a Spring Breaker at the Plaza Resort & Spa, on North Atlantic Ave. According to an arrest report, the suspect engaged in sex with a woman who was unconscious because she was drunk. The suspect admitted to investigators the woman was already drunk when he met her earlier in the day on March 14. He said he decided to buy her more booze and then had sex with her at least twice in two different hallways of the hotel, an arrest report states.

The other four rapes occurred at another hotel, behind a popular beachfront restaurant and one on the mainland after a woman met a man at a nightclub and invited him over, the chief said.

More facts on domestic violence from Women in Distress:

• 85 percent of domestic violence victims are women.

• One in every three women will experience domestic violence in her lifetime.

• Every day, four women die in this country as a result of domestic violence — that’s about 1,400 women a year.

• In 2008, there were 113,123 reported cases of domestic violence in Florida, according to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement. Of those, 7,475 were reported in Broward County.

• In 2007, females were the victims in 85 percent of domestic violence homicides in Florida.

• Pregnant women are twice as likely to experience domestic violence as women who are not pregnant.

• About 8.8 million children witness domestic violence each year.

• 30 percent to 60 percent of perpetrators of intimate-partner violence also abuse children in the household.

• Children who have witnessed violence at home are five times more likely to commit or suffer violence when they become adults.

• Nearly one in five teenage girls report that their boyfriend threatened violence or self-harm when presented with a breakup.

• One in five teens in a serious relationship report having been hit, slapped or pushed by a partner.

• Nearly half of all boys and girls say the abuse occurs in a school building or on school grounds.

 If you have been accused of domestic violence and are facing a criminal charge in Orange County or Seminole County, Florida, please call my office for a free case evaluation and learn how Tilden Law can defend your rights.