Domestic violence is a pattern of abusive behaviors in any relationship, familiar, romantic or otherwise, that is used by one partner to gain or manipulate power over another partner. Intimate partner violence is a type of domestic violence that involves one intimate partner abusing the other.
Domestic violence can be physical, sexual, emotional, economic, psychological, or technological actions or threats of actions or other patterns of coercive behavior that influence another person within an intimate partner relationship. This includes any behaviors that intimidate, manipulate, humiliate, isolate, frighten, terrorize, coerce, threaten, blame, hurt, injure or wound someone.
Firearms can play a major role in domestic abuse, even if the trigger is never pulled. Abusers often use guns to intimidate, threaten, coerce and control victims. Over half of all intimate partner homicides involve a firearm, according to the Educational Fund to Stop Gun Violence. Domestic violence is also a driver of violent crime in general, especially shootings. More than one in four homicides in the United States are related to domestic violence.