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Research ReportsRecommendation:All relevant agencies working with victims should use some risk assessment on a systematic and regular basis, at least as apart of a safety planning. Using a risk assessment tool is not enough! It should be imbedded in a risk management and safetymanagement approach. A misuse of a risk assessment instrument should be excluded. Risk factors for violence againstwomen should be addressed.Question 4:Are there are any multi-agency good practice models in protecting and supporting high risk victims?The MARAC system (with core goals such as developing and improving the coordination of services and information-sharingthrough protocols, interdisciplinary training and coordinating risk assessments, practices and operations among all criminaljustice personnel and victim services) used in England/Wales seems to be a very effective approach as a standard for protectionand safety for high risk victims in gender based intimate partner violence.One NGO in Austria started with this approach in 2009. As yet, the approach is still based on informal agreements. This shouldbe changed to binding protocols.Recommendation:The MARAC system as a good practice model should be introduced as a basic measure to identify and protect high riskvictims. It should be based on binding protocols and not on informal agreements. NGOs working for/with women should bean integral part.Question 5:Is there any systematic method of analysing homicides or attempted homicides, including homicides committed in the nameof ’honour’, in order to evaluate strengths and weaknesses in the prevention system?NO! NGOs are mostly the ones who scrutinise these cases when they occur. State agencies do not use this method to look atgaps in protecting women from serious crimes. It seems as if the individual agencies do such an analysis only to protect theirown organisations. Many respondents found this an interesting aspect of the multi-agency work.Recommendation:This method should be an integrated part of a multi-agency approach of looking at gaps in the prevention system.P 64 | PROTECT | Good practice in preventing serious violence, attempted homicides, including crimes in the name of honour, and in protecting high risk victims of gender based violence