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Each self-inflicted death where the deceased had experienced domestic violence must be considered a potential murder case, as per demands from advocates who aim to hold abusers responsible for the devastating impact of their behavior.

This move is necessary because police and prosecutors are not doing enough to hold offenders accountable in instances of suicide following domestic abuse.

“In case after case, there is systemic and structural failure, particularly within the criminal justice system, to scrutinise these deaths with the seriousness they deserve,” remarked a co-director of a campaign group at a significant gathering in London recently.

The assembly, organized by a organization leading a “Suicide is Homicide” campaign to advocate for change in the criminal justice system, united families who had suffered bereavement to self-inflicted death following domestic abuse.

Individual Accounts of Loss

Sharon Holland experienced the death of her child her 23-year-old daughter in March 2023. Prior to her passing, the young woman had reported her ex-boyfriend to authorities, submitting a lengthy recorded statement as proof against him.

After her death, the perpetrator was found guilty of manipulative and domineering conduct and imprisoned for 41 months. He was later sentenced for three years and seven months after a second woman came forward to disclose that she had been in a harmful partnership with him.

After Chloe’s death, the mother chose to advocate for a legal change to bring perpetrators accountable; yet she then discovered that regulations were existing, they just weren’t often being used to secure prosecutions.

“I decided it was not a fresh legislation I needed as current statutes were in place, and after learning how much my daughter had been let down previous to her death by the police and numerous services, they needed to do their job properly, and practices required reform,” she said.

“More than four dozen relatives have contacted me and just a handful 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 a long time and getting no justice for their child or brother or sister and could not speak out in case it affected inquiries that were not progressing.”

Another Tragic Case

One mother’s child Hannah died in spring 2017, in what she called “the final act of violence” in a prolonged pattern of mistreatment.

“She was vibrant, she was loving,” she stated. “She was full of promise, and she was an amazing, really loving mum to her two children, and she died by suicide after two years in a partnership where she was systematically destroyed by her companion,” she explained.

“She was physically beaten, she was psychologically tortured, she was controlled and dismantled piece by piece until she was unable to envision a path ahead. The man who did this to her walked free, because we call it self-inflicted death, we close the file and we proceed.

“Yet I was unable to continue,” she remarked, “and I haven’t been able to move on. In truth, Hannah didn’t just die by suicide. She was murdered. She was killed slowly and deliberately over a two year period, and when I approached the authorities, when I begged them to look into what he had done to her, I was told that there was nothing that they were able to take.

“There was no investigation into her passing. The domestic homicide review, which I had to fight for, took five years and changed nothing. A four day inquest determined self-inflicted death, despite huge evidence over a extremely distressing four day period of family violence and shortcomings by various agencies.”

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

She emphasized the suicide is homicide campaign was vital “because when an individual dies by suicide after they’ve suffered family violence, we have to examine it for what it truly represents, which is homicide.

“We need to use the legislation we already possess properly and it really isn’t happening at the moment, and we need to make perpetrators responsible for driving their victims to death.

“The statutes exist. We require determination, we need law enforcement to investigate properly. We need the prosecution authority to prosecute. We need judges to recognize that words and control can kill equally to physical force and arms.”

Political Response

At a second meeting in the House of Commons, chaired 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 dismissed as if they were their decision, they opted for this, when, reality, these were the result of in fact, somebody else’s violence, and these are not isolated stories.”

“Our law is broken, we are aware,” she stated. “Especially around homicide or unlawful killing, it is fragmented. It lacks statutory basis regardless, it has been shaped with traditional legal customs for generations, and it is outdated, honestly, given the society we currently live in.

“I’m not going to pretend that it’s going to be simple to resolve. It is extremely complicated and difficult, particularly when you consider the matter of homicide, but we recognize that it requires examination.”

Prosecution Service Statement

A spokesperson for the legal body commented: “Domestic abuse is a terrible offense and our legal officers 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 previously charged a number of defendants for leading to the fatality of a companion they abused, including in proceedings which are ongoing.

“We are also working with police and other parties to ensure these types of crimes are well-understood – so that we can bring perpetrators to justice for the full extent of their crimes.”