Get rid of the description "domestic violence''. That is the opinion of the Women's Resource Centre which wants to see violence that occurs between a man and women who are or were involved in a relationship, to be treated as an assault and not a "domestic'' incident.

And they plan to continue their behind the scenes work to make "domestic violence'' a misnomer because they say an assault is an assault whether it occurs between men, a man and a woman who are lovers or former lovers.

WRC executive director Jo-Anne Curnow said she disagreed with the principle of a defence lawyer's submission that an assault that occurs between former lovers is less serious if they happen to have children.

Her comments came after The Royal Gazette last week released details of a sentencing where a man received a $750 fine after he pleaded guilty to using threatening words and assaulting his former girlfriend and causing her bodily harm.

Senior Magistrate Will Francis fined Charles Wilmot of Warwick Parish $750 after he said he considered the assault to be part of a "domestic'' dispute.

Wilmot's defence lawyer Myron Simmons pointed out that his client had relations with the complainant Donna Smith. He also pointed out that Wilmot was the step-father of her three children.

However Ms Smith told The Royal Gazette that Wilmot does not live in Smith's Parish as was reported in the article. She said he lives in Warwick and was not her boyfriend at the time of the dispute.

She said that Wilmont was never the step-father to her three children either which means that the assault was never of a "domestic'' nature.

Meanwhile, Ms Curnow said her organisation was worried about the whole idea of using the adjective "domestic'' to label any violence between lovers or former lovers.

She said that the WRC was not taking issue with the sentence, although she said it was inadequate.

Instead she said the WRC was concerned about the sentencing principle which said that violence that occurs between a man and a woman who were in a relationship whether or not children are produced during the union, was somehow less serious than that which occurs between strangers.

"As far as we are concerned an assault is an assault,'' she said. "It doesn't really matter if it is someone who is a stranger who commits the assault or whether it is two people who are (were) in a relationship.

"It doesn't matter if it is a boyfriend or a husband as far as we are concerned,'' she added. "An assault is an assault and deserves to be handled in the same way.

"Just because it is a domestic assault does not make it less violent or less important than any other kind of assault.'' Currently the issue of sensitivity training for lawyers and members of the judiciary is being discussed on a domestic violence and child abuse sub-committee that Pat Zonicle is heading. It is expected to have a report ready within a year.

This committee is part of a larger task force that Women's Issues Minister Linda Milligan-Whyte set up to look at the plight of women in Bermuda.