The Washington State Coalition Against Domestic Violence recommended against the domestic violence registry included in "Tina's Law," testimony which ultimately prevented the bill from seeing a vote.

SPOKANE, Wash. — Tina's Law is a proposal to create a registry of domestic violence offenders. It's named after Spokane woman Tina Stewart, who was killed by her boyfriend, and its primary promoter is Tina's uncle Don Estes.

This year, two bills were proposed in the Washington legislature. Neither made it out of committee or even saw a vote.

"I think they should have at least took it to a vote and I think that we got blindsided by the Washington Coalition Against Domestic Violence," Estes said.

Estes and the lawmakers who sponsored the bills attribute the failure this year to the testimony of that coalition. At the House hearing, the coalition recommended against the bill, effectively killing its momentum.

Their argument: creating a registry creates privacy problems for victims of abuse.

"When you look at publishing the abuser's name, in many many cases that would mean that people could identify the victim as well,” Kelly Starr, a spokeswoman for the coalition, said in an interview. “And that can lead them to make a decision to not reach out for help. And whenever we have a situation where people feel like they can't reach out for help, or pause because they're concerned about what this might lead to, that makes them less safe. And that's where our concerns are rooted."

But Estes argues there isn't evidence a registry would actually suppress reporting.

"There's no proof it won't work, because no state has done this before,” he said. “So if no state's done it, why shouldn't Washington be the first state to do it?"

Starr says while she hasn't seen a similar law enacted before, research suggests any threat to victim privacy can be a problem.

"I believe it was 60 percent of the people said they didn't reach out to the police because they had concerns about what would happen if they did and they had privacy concerns that led them to only wanting to reach out anonymously to a hotline," she said.

Estes also had problems with the process, saying the coalition blindsided him and the bill's sponsors.

"They have refused to talk to me, and still to this day they have refused to talk to me," he said.

But Starr says the coalition’s position was well-known prior to the hearing.

"We are always in conversation with lawmakers before an actual hearing. And we had done interviews with national media earlier this year, earlier in January, about our position and our concerns about privacy and how that impacts safety,” she said. "We have been talking for a long time about our concerns with this bill."

Estes says that even though the bill failed in Washington this year, he'll try again next year and is currently working on similar bills across the country.