🔗 Share this article

Every suicide where the victim had experienced domestic violence must be considered a possible murder case, as per demands from advocates who aim to hold abusers accountable for the catastrophic impact of their actions.

This move is necessary because police and prosecutors are failing to bring perpetrators to justice in instances of suicide following family violence.

“Time and again, there is widespread breakdown, particularly within the criminal justice system, to examine these deaths with the seriousness they warrant,” stated a leader of a advocacy organization at a significant meeting in Westminster recently.

The assembly, arranged by a group running a “Self-Inflicted Death is Murder” initiative to advocate for change in the legal framework, united relatives who had lost loved ones to self-inflicted death following family violence.

Individual Accounts of Loss

Sharon Holland experienced the death of her child her 23-year-old daughter in March 2023. Prior to her passing, Chloe had informed her ex-boyfriend to authorities, submitting a two-hour video interview as proof against him.

Following her passing, the perpetrator was found guilty of coercive and controlling behavior and imprisoned for 41 months. He was later sentenced for three years and seven months after a second woman stepped up to disclose that she had been in a violent and abusive relationship with him.

In the wake of her loss, the parent chose to advocate for a legal change to hold offenders to justice; yet she then realized that laws were already in place, they just were rarely applied to secure prosecutions.

“I decided it wasn’t a fresh legislation I needed as current statutes were in place, and after finding out how much my child had been failed previous to her death by the police and many other agencies, they needed to fulfill their duties, and things needed to change,” she explained.

“Over 47 families have found me and only four of us have had a conviction,” she added. “I was so shocked to see such a large number who have been fighting the authorities and CPS for years 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.”

Another Tragic Case

Saskia Lightburn Richie’s daughter Hannah died in spring 2017, in what she described as “the final act of violence” in a campaign of abuse.

“Hannah was vibrant, she was loving,” she stated. “She had great potential, and she was an amazing, deeply devoted mother to her kids, and she died by suicide after two years in a partnership where she was methodically broken down by her companion,” she said.

“She was physically beaten, she was psychologically tortured, she was controlled and broken down gradually until she was unable to envision a way forward. The individual who caused this went unpunished, because we label it self-inflicted death, we conclude the case and we proceed.

“Yet I was unable to continue,” she remarked, “and I have not managed to move on. In truth, Hannah did not merely take her own life. She was murdered. Her death was gradual and intentionally 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 were able to take.

“No inquiry was conducted into her death. The domestic violence fatality analysis, which I had to fight for, took five years and had no impact. A four day inquest found death by suicide, notwithstanding substantial proof over a extremely distressing multi-day session of domestic abuse and failings by multiple services.”

The mother informed the gathering that for eight years she has “been fighting a establishment that ignores what is right in front of it”.

She said the suicide is homicide campaign was critical “since when someone dies by suicide after they’ve suffered domestic abuse, we have to investigate it for what it truly represents, which is murder.

“We need to use the legislation we currently have properly and it is not occurring at the moment, and we need to make perpetrators responsible for pushing their targets to suicide.

“The statutes exist. We need the will, we need police to investigate properly. We need the Crown Prosecution Service to prosecute. We need the judiciary to recognize that words and control can cause death equally to physical force and arms.”

Government Reaction

At a follow-up gathering in the Parliament, led by a Labour MP, and attended by the safeguarding minister, the grieving families again shared their experiences.

A junior minister told the meeting: “Such fatalities are often written off as if they were their decision, they opted for this, when, reality, these were the culmination of actually, somebody else’s violence, and these are not rare incidents.”

“The legal system is flawed, we know that,” she said. “Particularly around homicide or manslaughter, it is fragmented. It’s not written in statute regardless, it has been shaped with common law practices for centuries, and it is no longer fit for purpose, 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, especially when you consider the issue of murder, but we recognize that it requires examination.”

Prosecution Service Statement

A spokesperson for the legal body commented: “Family violence is a terrible offense and our legal officers are actively advised to consider homicide allegations in suicide cases where there is a established background of family violence or other controlling or coercive behavior.

“We have previously charged a several individuals for leading to the fatality of a partner they abused, including in proceedings which are ongoing.

“We are also working with police and other stakeholders to ensure these kinds of offences are clearly recognized – so that we can bring perpetrators accountable for the full extent of their crimes.”