🔗 Share this article

Every suicide in which the victim had experienced domestic violence should be treated as a possible murder case, as per calls from campaigners who aim to make perpetrators accountable for the catastrophic consequences of their behavior.

This move is essential because police and prosecutors are not doing enough to hold offenders accountable in instances of self-inflicted death following domestic abuse.

“Time and again, there is systemic and structural failure, especially within the criminal justice system, to examine these fatalities with the gravity they warrant,” remarked a co-director of a advocacy organization at a landmark meeting in London earlier this week.

The meeting, organized by a organization running a “Suicide is Homicide” initiative to advocate for change in the criminal justice system, united families who had suffered bereavement to suicide after domestic abuse.

Individual Accounts of Tragedy

One mother lost her daughter her 23-year-old daughter in spring 2023. Prior to her passing, the young woman had informed her former partner to police, submitting a lengthy recorded statement as proof against him.

After her death, the individual was convicted of coercive and controlling behavior and jailed for 41 months. He was subsequently sentenced for three years and seven months after a another victim stepped up to report that she had been in a violent and abusive relationship with him.

In the wake of her loss, the parent decided to campaign for a new law to hold offenders accountable; yet she then discovered that regulations were already in place, they just weren’t often being used to achieve convictions.

“I concluded it wasn’t a fresh legislation I needed as current statutes were already there, and after finding out how much my daughter had been let down before her death by the police and many other agencies, they needed to fulfill their duties, and things needed to change,” she said.

“More than four dozen relatives have contacted me and just a handful of us have had a guilty verdict,” she added. “I was so shocked to see such a large number who have been battling the authorities and prosecution service for a long time and receiving no resolution for their child or brother or sister and could not speak out in case it affected inquiries that were not progressing.”

Further Heartbreaking Account

One mother’s child Hannah died in spring 2017, in what she described as “the ultimate abusive action” in a prolonged pattern of mistreatment.

“She was energetic, she was caring,” she said. “She was full of promise, and she was an amazing, deeply devoted mother to her two children, and she took her own life after two years in a relationship where she was methodically broken down by her companion,” she explained.

“She endured physical assaults, she was mentally tormented, she was dominated and broken down gradually until she could not see a path ahead. The individual who did this to her walked free, because we label it suicide, we conclude the case and we proceed.

“Yet I was unable to continue,” she remarked, “and I haven’t been able to move on. In truth, she didn’t just die by suicide. She was killed. Her death was gradual and deliberately over a two year period, and when I approached the authorities, when I begged them to investigate what he had done to her, I was told that there was no action that they could do.

“No inquiry was conducted into her passing. The domestic violence fatality analysis, which I had to struggle to obtain, required five years and had no impact. A lengthy coroner’s hearing found self-inflicted death, despite huge evidence over a extremely distressing multi-day session of family violence and shortcomings by multiple services.”

The parent informed the gathering that for eight years she has “been fighting a system that refuses to see what is right in front of it”.

She emphasized the suicide is homicide movement was critical “because when someone takes their own life after they’ve suffered family violence, we have to examine it for what it truly represents, which is homicide.

“We need to apply the laws we currently have effectively and it really isn’t happening at the moment, and we need to hold abusers accountable for driving their victims to death.

“We have the laws. We require determination, we need police to conduct thorough inquiries. We need the prosecution authority to prosecute. We need judges to understand that words and control can cause death just as much as physical force and arms.”

Political Response

At a follow-up gathering in the Parliament, led by a opposition politician, and attended by the government official, the grieving families again told their stories.

A parliamentary under-secretary informed the assembly: “These deaths are often dismissed as if they were their own choice, they chose to do this, when, in truth, these were the culmination of in fact, another person’s abuse, and these aren’t isolated stories.”

“Our law is broken, we know that,” she said. “Particularly around homicide or unlawful killing, it is fragmented. It lacks statutory basis anyway, it has been developed with traditional legal customs for centuries, and it is outdated, quite frankly, it’s the world we currently live in.

“I’m not going to pretend that it’s going to be simple to fix. It is extremely complicated and challenging, particularly when you look at the matter of murder, but we recognize that it needs to be looked at.”

Legal Authority Comment

A representative for the prosecution service commented: “Family violence is a heinous offense and our prosecutors are actively advised to consider murder and manslaughter charges in self-inflicted death instances where there is a established background of domestic abuse or other manipulative conduct.

“We have in the past prosecuted a several individuals for leading to the fatality of a companion they mistreated, encompassing in cases which are currently active.

“We are collaborating with law enforcement and other parties to ensure these kinds of offences are well-understood – so that we can bring perpetrators accountable for the complete scope of their wrongdoings.”