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Every suicide where the victim had experienced domestic violence should be considered a possible homicide, as per calls from campaigners who seek to make perpetrators accountable for the devastating consequences of their behavior.

This step is necessary because law enforcement are failing to hold offenders accountable in instances of suicide following domestic abuse.

“Time and again, there is systemic and structural failure, particularly within the criminal justice system, to scrutinise these fatalities with the gravity they warrant,” stated a leader of a advocacy organization during a landmark gathering in Westminster earlier this week.

The meeting, organized by a group leading a “Self-Inflicted Death is Murder” initiative to fight for change in the legal framework, united families who had suffered bereavement to self-inflicted death after family violence.

Personal Stories of Tragedy

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

Following her passing, the individual was found guilty of coercive and controlling behavior and imprisoned for over three years. He was later sentenced for three years and seven months after a another victim came forward to report that she had been in a harmful partnership with him.

After Chloe’s death, the mother chose to advocate for a new law to bring perpetrators accountable; however she then discovered that laws were existing, they just were rarely applied to secure prosecutions.

“I decided it was not a new law I required as existing laws were in place, and after learning how much my child had been let down before her death by the authorities and numerous services, they needed to do their job properly, and practices required reform,” she explained.

“Over 47 families have contacted me and only four of us have had a guilty verdict,” she continued. “I was astonished to see such a large number who have been battling the authorities and CPS for a long time and getting no justice for their child or brother or sister and didn’t have a voice in case it affected investigations that weren’t possibly going anywhere.”

Another Tragic Case

One mother’s child Hannah passed away in May 2017, in what she described as “the ultimate abusive action” in a campaign of abuse.

“She was energetic, she was caring,” she stated. “She was full of promise, and she was an exceptional, really loving mum to her two children, and she took her own life after 24 months in a partnership where she was methodically broken down by her companion,” she said.

“She endured physical assaults, she was mentally tormented, she was controlled and broken down piece by piece until she could not see a way forward. The man who did this to her went unpunished, because we label it suicide, we close the file and we proceed.

“Yet I was unable to continue,” she remarked, “and I have not managed to let go. In truth, Hannah did not merely take her own life. She was killed. She was killed slowly 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 informed that there was nothing that they were able to take.

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

The mother informed the gathering that for a decade she has “struggled against a establishment that refuses to see what is obvious”.

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 murder.

“We must apply the laws we currently have properly and it really isn’t happening at the present, and we need to make perpetrators responsible for pushing their targets to suicide.

“The statutes exist. We require determination, we need police to conduct thorough inquiries. We need the prosecution authority to take legal action. We need judges to recognize that verbal abuse and manipulation can cause death just as much as hands and weapons.”

Government Reaction

At a second meeting in the House of Commons, led by a Labour MP, and attended by the safeguarding minister, the bereaved relatives again shared their experiences.

A junior minister informed the assembly: “Such fatalities are often dismissed as if they were their decision, they chose to do this, when, reality, these were the result of in fact, somebody else’s violence, and these are not rare incidents.”

“The legal system is flawed, we know that,” she stated. “Particularly around murder or unlawful killing, it is piecemeal. It lacks statutory basis regardless, it has been shaped with common law practices for generations, and it is outdated, honestly, it’s the world we currently live in.

“I’m not going to pretend that it’s going to be easy to fix. It is extremely complicated and difficult, especially when you look at the issue of homicide, but we acknowledge that it requires examination.”

Legal Authority Comment

A spokesperson for the prosecution service said: “Family violence is a terrible crime and our prosecutors are actively advised to consider homicide allegations in suicide cases where there is a known context of domestic abuse or other manipulative conduct.

“We have in the past prosecuted a number of defendants for leading to the fatality of a companion they abused, including in cases which are currently active.

“We are collaborating with police and other stakeholders to guarantee these types of crimes are well-understood – so that we can hold offenders to justice for the full extent of their crimes.”