(Video/Audio) Domestic Violence Has No Age Limit. Neither Does the Fight Against It.
- Indivisible Boca Raton
- May 21
- 11 min read
From our youngest advocates to our most seasoned community members, this is everyone’s issue.
At a recent Indivisible Boca Raton protest, we were joined by Isadora from Youth Action Fund, an organization working to engage and empower young people on critical issues. She stopped by our protest and shared her perspective on why this work matters, why young people are stepping up to lead, and what it looks like when a community decides to show up together. Watch below.
What Isadora represents is something our community needs to see more of: the next generation refusing to be silent about a problem that has touched every age group, every neighborhood, and every kind of family. In the video, she speaks about something many people do not think of when they hear the words “domestic violence”: financial abuse, emotional control, and the quieter, less visible forms of coercion that can trap a person in a dangerous relationship just as effectively as physical force.
Domestic violence does not discriminate by age. It reaches the young and the old alike, and it takes forms that are often invisible to outsiders and sometimes unrecognizable to the people experiencing them. It demands that all of us pay attention.
The Death of Vice Mayor Nancy Metayer
On the morning of April 1, 2026, officers from the Coral Springs Police Department arrived at the home of Vice Mayor Nancy Metayer Bowen to conduct a wellness check. She hadn’t shown up for scheduled appointments. What they found inside was devastating: her body, wrapped in blankets and garbage bags in the master bedroom. Her husband, Stephen Bowen, had allegedly shot her three times with a shotgun the night before and then slept downstairs in the same house.
Nancy Metayer Bowen was not a statistic. She was a groundbreaking public servant, the first Black and Haitian American woman elected to the Coral Springs City Commission. She was an environmental scientist, a community advocate, and a rising force in Florida Democratic politics. She had been appointed vice mayor in 2025, had helped lead voter mobilization efforts for the Kamala Harris presidential campaign, and was being discussed as a potential congressional candidate. She was, by all accounts, the light in every room she entered.
She was also a woman killed in her own home by her own husband.
That is the cruel, clarifying fact that domestic violence forces us to face: there is no profile that exempts you. Not your title, your education, your community standing or your strength. Domestic violence crosses every boundary of race, class, profession, and circumstance. When it reaches its most lethal form, it reaches it in places that are supposed to feel safe: at home, behind closed doors, in a marriage.
A Florida vice mayor seen as a rising political star was found dead at her home and her husband was arrested on suspicion of premeditated murder, authorities said. NBC News
The Scope of the Problem
The numbers are staggering and they should stop us cold: nationally, more than 10 million adults experience domestic violence every year. One in four women and one in ten men will experience sexual violence, physical violence, or stalking by an intimate partner during their lifetime. According to the CDC, over half of all female homicide victims are killed by a current or former male intimate partner. Female homicide victims are twice as likely as male victims to be killed by an intimate partner.
What those numbers don’t fully capture is how much abuse never involves a raised fist. Research estimates that economic abuse is present in roughly 95% of domestic violence cases. For many victims, it’ s not physical danger that keeps them trapped. It is the fact that their partner controls every dollar, has destroyed their credit, or has left them with no financial footing to leave. Physical violence is the form of abuse that gets reported. Financial abuse, emotional manipulation, and coercive control are the forms that keep people from ever making that call.
In Florida, the picture is no less alarming. In 2020 alone, more than 106,000 crimes of domestic violence were reported to Florida law enforcement, resulting in over 63,000 arrests. And those are only the reported cases. Research consistently shows that only about one in seven domestic violence incidents is ever brought to the attention of law enforcement. The true scale of what is happening in our neighborhoods, in our apartment complexes, in our quiet suburban streets is almost certainly far worse than any official count captures .
Here in South Florida and Palm Beach County, the crisis is real and it’s close. Aid to Victims of Domestic Abuse or AVDA, the organization serving domestic violence survivors in our area, sheltered thousands of survivors and their children in recent years, logging tens of thousands of hotline calls and providing hundreds of thousands of advocacy hours. That volume of need does not happen in the abstract. It happens in houses and apartments near you and me, to people we may know.
Syrnerica Pugh is comforted while grieving the death of her nieces and nephews in Shreveport, Lousiana, on Sunday, April 19, 2026. A man shot eight children dead, seven of them his own, and injured several other people, according to local authorities. Brandon Bell/Getty Images
Abuse Does Not Always Leave a Mark
One of the most important things Isadora raises in her remarks is the gap between how most people picture domestic violence and what it actually looks like in practice. The image most of us carry is physical: a bruise, an injury, a visible sign of force. The reality is that the most effective tools of abuse often leave no physical mark at all.
Financial abuse is one of the most common and least recognized. It involves one partner using money and economic resources as instruments of control. This can mean preventing a partner from working or sabotaging their employment. It can mean taking complete control of bank accounts, demanding receipts for every purchase, and giving an allowance like a child. It can mean running up debt in a partner’s name, ruining their credit, or taking out loans without their knowledge. It can mean spending money the household needs for basic necessities, or forcing a partner to sign over assets. The goal in every case is the same: to create financial dependency so complete that leaving becomes practically impossible.
Emotional and psychological abuse follows a similar logic. Isolation from friends and family, relentless criticism, gaslighting, threats, and the systematic erosion of a person’s self-worth are all forms of control that can operate for years before, or entirely without, any physical violence. Because these forms of abuse do not produce visible injuries, they are harder to report, harder to prove, and easier for everyone around the survivor to dismiss or rationalize.
Digital abuse has added another layer. Monitoring a partner’s phone, tracking their location without consent, and using social media to harass or humiliate are now recognized extensions of domestic abuse. An estimated 70% of domestic violence survivors report being monitored through phones, GPS, or social media. Control does not stop at the front door.
Naming these forms of abuse matters. A person who has never been hit but lives in constant fear of their partner’s financial control, emotional cruelty, or digital surveillance is experiencing domestic violence. They deserve to be seen, believed, and supported the same way any survivor does.
This Is A Multi-generational Problem
One of the most important and underappreciated dimensions of domestic violence is how early it begins. Research shows that over 70% of women and over 60% of men who experienced intimate partner violence first experienced it before the age of 25. Young adults between 18 and 24 face the highest rates of intimate partner violence of any age group. About one in ten high school students reports experiencing dating violence in a given year, and that number almost certainly undercounts what is actually happening, for the same reasons adult abuse goes unreported: shame, fear, and the absence of anyone to tell.
Teen dating violence does not look exactly like what we picture when we think of domestic violence. It often starts digitally. Nearly one in ten teens in relationships reports having a partner tamper with their social media accounts. Jealous monitoring, coercive texting, and threats made online are frequently the first forms of control a young person experiences in a relationship. Because these behaviors can be invisible to parents and teachers, and because young people often lack the language to name what is happening to them, abuse in adolescent relationships is routinely dismissed or missed entirely.
This is precisely why the work of organizations like Youth Action Fund matters so much. The patterns that lead to intimate partner violence in adulthood are often established in the teenage years. When we invest in young people’s understanding of healthy relationships, consent, and their own right to safety, we are not just helping them now. We’re interrupting a cycle that would otherwise follow them, and potentially their future partners and children, for decades.
Isadora and the people she works with understand that young people are not just the leaders of tomorrow. They are the advocates, the witnesses, and sometimes the survivors of today. When they show up at a protest, they’re not observers. They are essential.
Elder Abuse: The Crisis Hiding in Plain Sight
For many of our readers, domestic violence may feel like something that happens to younger people in volatile relationships. The reality is more complicated and more personal than that. Elder abuse is one of the most underreported and least discussed forms of domestic violence in America, and Florida, with one of the largest senior populations in the country, faces this problem acutely.
Researchers estimate that only one in every 14 to 24 cases of elder abuse is ever reported to police. That staggering gap between what is happening and what gets reported exists for familiar reasons: shame, dependency on the abuser, fear of losing a home or caregiver, and sometimes cognitive decline that makes it harder to recognize or articulate what is happening. Older adults who depend on a caregiver for daily living activities, who live in long-term care facilities, or who have dementia or memory problems face heightened risk.
Financial exploitation is among the most prevalent forms of elder abuse, and it is worth naming specifically because it does not look like the domestic violence most people recognize. It can be a family member pressuring a senior to sign over a power of attorney. It can be a caregiver or a partner stealing from a bank account in small, incremental amounts that are easy to miss. It can be debt accumulated in a senior’s name without their knowledge, a home signed away under pressure, or a lifetime of savings drained by someone the victim trusted completely. Financial abuse of older adults costs Americans an estimated $2.6 billion to $36.5 billion annually, and that figure almost certainly undercounts what is actually happening.
Emotional abuse of older adults is equally common and equally invisible. An older person whose partner or caregiver belittles them, isolates them from friends and family, threatens to place them in a facility, or withholds care as a form of punishment is experiencing abuse. Neglect, whether by a partner or a paid caregiver, is also legally recognized as abuse in Florida.
Because older adults often grew up in an era when family matters were handled privately and kept out of public view, many older victims may not recognize what is happening to them as abuse, or may not believe that outside help is available or appropriate. It is. The law is on their side, and so is this community.
This is not a distant problem. It is happening in our own neighborhoods. Recognizing the signs in a neighbor, a friend, or even yourself, and knowing where to turn, can be the difference between continued suffering and a path toward safety.
The Warning We Keep Missing
One of the most painful truths about intimate partner homicide is that it rarely comes without warning signs, signs that may be invisible to the outside world, or dismissed, or rationalized away. A home where any family fight has turned physical is approximately five times more likely to become the scene of a homicide. Victims who are ultimately killed by a partner often carry the weight of a long pattern of abuse, coercive control, and escalating danger.
The Metayer Bowen case is still being investigated, and the full picture of what happened inside that marriage is not yet public. What we do know is that Stephen Bowen told a family member he “couldn’t take it anymore,” and that he made that statement as an explanation for murder. Those words highlight something important: the normalization of grievance, the privatization of violence, the belief that intimate partners can be controlled, punished, or silenced when they no longer comply with what a partner demands.
We cannot wait for tragedy to take notice. We have to build communities where survivors can speak before it is too late, and where the people around them know how to respond.
Youth Action Fund
Youth Action Fund breaks down barriers to organizing for young Floridians across the state with coaching, tools, and funding.
Website: https://www.youthactionfund.org/
Social Media: https://tr.ee/-WLGWXXfUQ
If You or Someone You Know Needs Help
If you are experiencing a crisis right now, please reach out. AVDA’s 24-hour hotline is 1-800-355-8547. For elder abuse, call the Florida Abuse Hotline at 1-800-962-2873. The National Domestic Violence Hotline is 1-800-799-7233. You are not alone.
If you are in the Boca Raton or Palm Beach County area and need help, these resources are available:
Florida Abuse Hotline (Elder Abuse) Florida law requires reporting of known or suspected abuse, neglect, or exploitation of vulnerable adults. Reports are accepted 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
1-800-96-ABUSE (1-800-962-2873), press 2
TTY: 1-800-955-8771
Report online at myflfamilies.com
Area Agency on Aging of Palm Beach/Treasure Coast Local elder rights resources, fraud and abuse prevention, and referrals for Palm Beach County seniors.
561-684-5885 (select option 3 for Elder Rights)
Long-Term Care Ombudsman: 1-888-831-0404
Senior Legal Helpline: 1-888-895-7873
AVDA (Aid to Victims of Domestic Abuse) The primary certified domestic violence center serving Palm Beach County, including Boca Raton. AVDA provides emergency shelter (64-bed facility), transitional housing, hotline services, legal advocacy, safety planning, and community outreach. Services are available in English, Spanish, and Creole.
24-Hour Hotline: 1-800-355-8547 or 561-265-2900
Administrative Office: 561-982-8960
Address: 7700 Congress Ave., Suite 3115, Boca Raton, FL 33487
Website: avdaonline.org
AVDA’s emergency shelter is free of charge. Service animals, emotional support animals, and pets are welcome. No one is turned away based on ability to pay.
Palm Beach County 24-Hour Crisis Hotline
866-891-7273
Florida Domestic Violence Hotline Available statewide, 24 hours a day, with multilingual support.
1-800-500-1119
National Teen Dating Abuse Helpline For young people experiencing abuse or seeking information about healthy relationships.
866-331-9474
Text LOVEIS to 22522
loveisrespect.org (includes live chat)
National Domestic Violence Hotline For anyone anywhere in the country.
1-800-799-SAFE (7233)
Text START to 88788
thehotline.org (includes live chat)
Boca Raton Police Department The BRPD works in coordination with AVDA and can assist with safety planning and restraining orders.
Non-emergency: 561-368-6201
Emergency: 911
Legal Protections in Florida Florida law allows any domestic violence survivor to petition for an injunction for protection (a restraining order) at the Clerk of Courts in their jurisdiction, at no cost. A judge can issue an order even in civil court, and violating the injunction is treated as a criminal act. Leaving an abusive home does not mean losing your rights to your property or affect your standing in divorce or custody proceedings.
Thanks for watching! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support our work.
More from Indivisible Boca Raton’s Media team:
Links to all our social media:
Facebook: indivisiblebocaraton.org/facebook
Instagram: indivisiblebocaraton.org/instagram
Tik Tok: indivisiblebocaraton.org/tiktok
YouTube: indivisiblebocaraton.org/youtube
Bluesky: indivisiblebocaraton.org/bluesky
Threads: indivisiblebocaraton.org/threads
Upscrolled: indivisiblebocaraton.org/upscrolled
Volunteers:
Indivisible is a volunteer-lead organization, and we could use your help! If you want to volunteer occasionally to help us fight for democracy, please CLICK HERE to fill out the volunteer form.
Donations: We also are in need of any donations you can make towards Indivisible Boca Raton. Money is needed to be able to rent the Civic Center, serve refreshments, pay for postcards, office supplies, name tags, signs and other necessities to operate. This is a grassroots organization and any amount you can give would be extremely appreciated.
Click here to donate. It will take you directly to our Act Blue Page. Thank you!
Comments