Help for domestic violence victims

TAMPA - It has been an extremely violent few months for women in the Bay Area, with a number of domestic violence cases that have been very public, including the shooting yesterday at the south Sarasota County courthouse.

Investigators say 69-year-old Carolyn Provencal's husband Alan shot her to death outside the south Sarasota County courthouse. She was on her way to a hearing on their pending divorce.

Later, neighbors watched as deputies surrounded the couple's house, and deputies say they had to shoot Alan Provencal, because he raised his gun towards them.

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"If you are afraid, trust that fear and act on that fear," said Linda Osmundson, with CASA, a support center for victims of domestic violence. She warns that with abusers, it's all about power, and when a woman decides to leave, that is when she is in the most danger.

"When she leaves, that's when he's lost control. So that's when the violence can be escalated," Osmundson said.

FOX 13 spoke with a woman who recently left her abuser, and did not want to be identified. She believes most women think they can leave whenever they want, but she cautions that it is not so easy.

"The fear is always there. It's hard to get a hold of the fear," she said. "I came to the point where I said 'I got to get out. I got to, for my mind and if I want to live and stay strong, I have to leave now,'" she recalled.

She called for help and made a plan, but she still worries.

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Friends of the Provencals say they were involved in a messy divorce, and Alan had increasingly become agitated.

Osmundson hopes these recent cases won't discourage women from getting out. She says to them, just get help first.

"When we say to a battered woman, 'why don't you just leave,' for some battered women, we're saying 'why don't you take your life in your hands? Why don't you risk your life. and the life of your children?' Not that she shouldn't leave, but that we need to protect her and her children, when she tries," Osmundson said.

Because as we've seen, the threat is very real.