Given the choice, most people would rather avert their gaze from the reality of domestic violence. It's an ugly sight.

"Crossing the Line," a week-long series by The Advertiser's Rob Perez, Kevin Dayton and Jeff Widener that ends tomorrow, brought the problem out of the shadows.

The compelling nature of the stories — especially when told through the diary of Daysha Aiona-Aka, a young mother murdered by an ex-boyfriend — reveals how domination and abuse have persisted, sickening our society at its core: the family.

The suffering of the victims is heartbreaking to loved ones.

But more disturbing are the effects on the children of victims. It's likely they have learned patterns of violence in family relationships, and that forces the chilling expectation that the same patterns will reappear, generation after generation.

It's time to squarely confront this problem rather than avert our gaze. More focused efforts to change this pattern and deliver more effective help to victims are needed. That's needed at every level, but especially among the leaders who govern the criminal justice and social-service systems that intervene.

Too often, women despair at finding help. Charting a course to safety is difficult, when the numerous shelters and social-service agencies are hard to navigate, require separate appointments and aren't always giving cohesive, consistent advice.

There are better ways to address the problems these women face. San Diego is famous for its Family Justice Center, which rounds up support services in a one-stop, accessible environment.

Establishing such a center during a budgetary crisis is unrealistic, but there are approaches to intervention, centered on protecting the victim and coordinating how advocates and other professionals are trained, that can be better applied in Family Court and in other existing settings. Such a model of intervention was pioneered in Duluth, Minn. (www.theduluthmodel.org). That model merits study here.

But for that to happen, leaders need to acknowledge that Hawai'i has fallen far short of its obligations to curb domestic violence. Here, such sustained leadership and advocacy for new ideas has been sorely lacking.

Regarding the criminal-justic system, for example, past efforts have produced the legal mechanism for punishing offenders and protecting victims, but that mechanism has all but broken down.

The statistic that most painfully points to the breakdown: Only about 10 percent of the misdemeanor domestic-abuse cases that go to O'ahu prosecutors annually typically go to trial, and few of those lead to convictions.

Yes, they're misdemeanors, but the violence can escalate and the injuries become more severe.

The dynamic of the abusive relationship is not well understood by juries, who too often acquit. Prosecutors may reduce the charge through a plea bargain to secure at least some penalty, but often the offender is free to continue the cycle.

The victim may feel worn down by a sense of futility and back away from seeking safety and justice.

The sum is that the system is not communicating the right message, which is: Violence will not be tolerated and victims will be cared for.

Hawai'i needs to recommit itself to the quest for improvements, a commitment that has ebbed in recent years. The Violence Against Women Act, reauthorized in 2000, provides funds to enhance prosecution, but the state's advisory committee that's meant to carry out the enhancements has not been active.

The Domestic Violence Clearinghouse is trying to organize a task force on each island to review the system, and that should be encouraged.

Despite efforts to marginalize the issue, domestic violence is a problem that threatens every social sector. The community, and its leaders, need to answer that call.