Amber Culley and Mimi Kates were murdered on July 21, 2022 by Eric Shestalo, a man who was facing criminal charges including assault and uttering threats. These charges included strangulation.  The criminal justice system needs better protection in place to protect women like Amber and Mimi from violent offenders.  Intimate partner violence has resulted in women and children dying at the hands of a violent partner.  Men who strangle their partners are more likely to kill their partners. According to Joni E. Johnston, Psy. D, “Batterers who strangle their victim are more likely to engage in other extreme acts of violence; it’s a message that there are no limits to which he won’t go. The odds are, he’s willing to kill,.”  And in the case of Amber and Mimi he did kill. Women who are strangled are eight times more likely to subsequently be killed by their partners than victims who were not strangled, studies have shown, and the more times they are strangled, the greater the odds that things will turn lethal.

The criminal justice system needs to change to protect women.  I am calling for a new law titled Amber and Mimi’s law.  This law will specifically state that any person facing criminal charges of strangulation will be held in custody until the trial is finished.  

Please sign this petition in an effort to demand the legal system to change so we can save the lives of women in the future.