Police departments have adopted more control interventions to deal with family violence, in part due to claims that police officers are indifferent to such violence. The Minneapolis Domestic Violence Experiment indicates that arrest procedures have a deterrent effect, while the Charlotte Spousal Abuse Experiment and other studies show that arrest alone may not deter domestic assault. Therefore, the author recommends that arrest be part of global community intervention projects (CIP's) designed to change the overall criminal justice system approach to wife assault. CIP's are often staffed by battered women's advocates and include arrest in the total approach. These projects also incorporate the prompt prosecution of perpetrators and the battered woman in the sentencing and investigation process. Latent effects of arrest and other control interventions are discussed, along with practical and policy implications of arrest research. 32 references and 2 notes