[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 160 (2014), Part 5]
[Senate]
[Pages 6987-6988]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                         HONORING LORI GELLATLY

  Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I am tremendously honored to follow my 
colleague from Massachusetts, Senator Warren, who has so zealously and 
thoughtfully developed a program that deals with the breaking, 
calamitous burden of student debt which affects so many of our young 
people across this country, including my State of Connecticut, and I 
thank her for her great work.
  I wish to talk about that issue following the very eloquent remarks 
of my colleagues, Senators Durbin, Reid, Brown, as well as Schumer and 
Senator Warren, to be followed by Senator Baldwin. But first I wish to 
take a moment or two to express my deepest condolences for the family 
of Lori Gellatly, who was shot and killed today in Oxford, CT. This 
tragedy is not only saddening but shocking because Lori is dead and her 
mother is seriously wounded and in very dire condition. They were shot 
by her estranged husband who was under an ex parte restraining order 
from a judge and who is suspected. All we have right now are 
allegations of his committing this atrocious crime. My heart goes out 
to their family and to their children. She left two children behind.
  There will be time to talk about the lessons we can learn from 
domestic violence like this shocking infamy. In her application for the 
restraining order she described a violent altercation with her 
estranged husband which made her ``afraid for her kids and herself.'' 
She was granted an ex parte order but it was only temporary. A hearing 
to consider a permanent restraining order was scheduled to take place 
literally tomorrow. Connecticut law prohibits anybody who is the 
subject of a full 1-year restraining order from possessing a firearm. 
Federal law has applications as well to individuals under a permanent 
restraining order, but this prohibition does not extend under 
Connecticut law to an individual who is subject to an ex parte order.
  I recently met with Representative Gabby Giffords to discuss the 
nexus and close connection between the issue of domestic violence and 
gun violence. Together with my colleagues Senators Murphy and Durbin we 
discussed this problem and potential remedies. In this calendar year 
alone five other homicides have taken place stemming from intimate 
partner violence in Connecticut alone. So the issue of temporary 
restraining orders is an even more acute aspect of this problem. 
According to the Domestic Violence

[[Page 6988]]

Intervention Program, women in abusive relationships are more than 7 
times more likely to be killed by an intimate partner after 2 weeks of 
leaving the relationship than at any other time. We ought to do much 
more to protect victims of domestic violence during this extremely 
vulnerable time--indeed a time when they are most vulnerable.
  While we will have time in the future to discuss this tragedy, right 
now my heart, my prayers, and my family's thoughts go out to Mary 
Jackson, Lori's mom, as well as Lori's two children and all of the 
family, and my thoughts and prayers are with them.

                          ____________________