IN THE NAME OF LOVE?
A DOMESTIC VIOLENCE SURVIVOR'S STORY
 Documentary TV Series
Written and Directed by
Polly Pierce

The evening of October 23 2012 is one that would change Polly Harrison's life forever.

 

That evening, Polly's abusive fiancee, Mark-Alexander Hartwin, arrived home from his high-paying job at Pixar and unleashed the most ferocious of his regular violent outbursts against her; he confined her for 16 hours in their Vancouver apartment and stalked her within it's walls, screamed verbal abuse into her ears while physically restraining her and violently assaulted her by trying to suffocate her multiple times that evening while pinning her down to their bed and the floor and crushing her into the concrete walls of their apartment, all in an attempt to kill her.

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Despite surviving this vicious attack, and summoning the courage to file assault and confinement charges against her abusive ex-partner, Polly's biggest challenge was yet to arrive in the shape of the unsympathetic and cold BC Crown Counsellor, Snover Bains, and the BC Judicial System. Although Hartwin plead guilty to these charges, Crown Counsellor Bains handed down only a $500 CAD fine and a Peace Bond/ Protection Order, with charges expunged after a one year period, as punishment for the brutal violence he inflicted upon Polly that night.

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Was Polly Harrison's life, which she almost lost that fateful night, only worth $500? And why expunge the confinement and assault charges which Hartwin plead guilty to?

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This feature length documentary will use Polly Harrison's experience of facing the BC Crown Counsel and Judicial System to question their judgement and similar limp handling of other Domestic Violence cases within the Province and ask what needs to be done to adequately provide justice to victims of Domestic Violence, so they are not also victims of the System. 

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In recent years, with the notoriety surrounding sexual assault and domestic violence cases and the lenient punishments dolled out to the male perpetrators, such as with Brock Turner assaulting Chanel Miller, and more recently, with the Cornell 7 drugging and gang raping Jane Doe, this documentary is more relevant and timely than ever.​​​

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