This one hits close to home, as it is the granddaughter of one of our EOP counselors at the university.
Jacque Villagomez was only 19. She was a track star at the local high school and lived most of her life with her grandmother after her mother died of cancer when she was very young. In her junior year of high school she moved down to the Los Angeles to persue an acting career like her mother. There she met John Needham, an Iraqi war vet who had been discharged due to head injuries. They started dating and moved in together and everything seemed to have been going fine until Tuesday.
Early Tuesday morning the police were called to the condo they shared with Needham's brother and father in San Clemente. Police found Needham naked and combative and had to be subdued with a taser. They found Jacque beaten to a pulp and she died shortly there after at the local hospital. Needham was arrested and arraigned Wednesday morning.
Though not reported on, what I have heard from those close to Jacque's family, Needham had been trying to get mental health services through the VA but had been put on a 'never ending' waitlist... I can't help but wonder if he had gotten the help he requested if things would have been different.
On a related note, I was happy to see our small-town twice-weekly paper cover the story promptly though without any contact with Jacque's family. Sadly though, the larger daily paper for our area hasn't covered it and nor has any of the local tv news stations. I've seen only one other article about her death though it paints Needham as some poor, unfortunate Iraqi vet and Jacque as a trouble-maker. Wonder if she was white if they would have painted a different story.
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Can someone point me to empirical studies about violence against women in the military?
I got into a discussion about rape in the military with a male friend, and I couldn't justify anything because I didn't have facts to quote. (Don't you hate that? "Ohh, well, because you have a vagina and can't quote me exact numbers, you must not know what you're talking about.")