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Each self-inflicted death where the deceased had endured domestic violence must be treated as a potential homicide, according to demands from campaigners who aim to make perpetrators accountable for the devastating impact of their actions.

This move is essential because police and prosecutors are failing to hold offenders to justice in instances of self-inflicted death following domestic abuse.

“In case after case, there is widespread breakdown, particularly within the criminal justice system, to examine these deaths with the gravity they deserve,” stated a co-director of a campaign group during a significant gathering in London recently.

The meeting, arranged by a organization running a “Self-Inflicted Death is Murder” initiative to advocate for reform in the criminal justice system, brought together families who had suffered bereavement to self-inflicted death after domestic abuse.

Individual Accounts of Loss

Sharon Holland experienced the death of her child her 23-year-old daughter in spring 2023. Before her death, the young woman had informed her ex-boyfriend to police, submitting a lengthy recorded statement as evidence against him.

After her death, the individual was convicted of coercive and controlling behavior and imprisoned for over three years. He was later jailed for three years and seven months after a second woman came forward to report that she had been in a violent and abusive relationship with him.

After Chloe’s death, the mother decided to campaign for a legal change to bring perpetrators to justice; however she then discovered that regulations were already in place, they just were rarely applied to secure prosecutions.

“I decided it wasn’t a new law I required as existing laws were in place, and after learning how much my child had been let down before her taking her life by the police and many other agencies, they needed to do their job properly, and things needed to change,” she said.

“More than four dozen relatives have contacted me and only four of us have had a guilty verdict,” she added. “I was astonished to see such a large number who have been fighting the authorities and CPS for a long time and getting no justice for their offspring or brother or sister and didn’t have a voice in case it affected inquiries that were not progressing.”

Another Tragic Case

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

“She was energetic, she was loving,” she said. “She had great potential, and she was an exceptional, really loving mother to her kids, and she died by suicide after 24 months in a partnership where she was methodically broken down by her companion,” she said.

“She was physically beaten, she was psychologically tortured, she was dominated and broken down gradually until she was unable to envision a way forward. The individual who did this to her went unpunished, because we call it self-inflicted death, we close the file and we move on.

“Yet I was unable to continue,” she remarked, “and I have not managed to move on. Honestly, Hannah didn’t just die by suicide. She was murdered. Her death was gradual and deliberately over a two year period, and when I went to the police, when I pleaded with them to investigate 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 death. The domestic violence fatality analysis, which I had to struggle to obtain, took five years and had no impact. A lengthy coroner’s hearing determined self-inflicted death, despite huge evidence over a extremely distressing multi-day session of family violence and failings by multiple services.”

The parent told the meeting that for eight years she has “struggled against 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 domestic abuse, we have to investigate it for what it really is, which is homicide.

“We must use the legislation we currently have effectively and it is not occurring at the moment, and we need to hold abusers accountable for driving their victims to death.

“The statutes exist. We need the will, we need law enforcement to investigate properly. We need the Crown Prosecution Service to take legal action. We need the judiciary to recognize that words and control can kill just as much as hands and weapons.”

Political Response

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

A junior minister informed the assembly: “These deaths are often written off as if they were their own choice, they opted for this, when, reality, these were the result of in fact, another person’s abuse, and these are not rare incidents.”

“Our law is broken, we know that,” she said. “Particularly around murder or unlawful killing, it is fragmented. It lacks statutory basis anyway, it has been developed with traditional legal customs for generations, and it is no longer fit for purpose, honestly, it’s the world we inhabit today.

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

Legal Authority Comment

A spokesperson for the prosecution service said: “Family violence is a heinous offense and our legal officers are regularly instructed to evaluate murder and manslaughter charges in suicide cases where there is a established background of domestic abuse or other controlling or coercive behavior.

“We have previously charged a number of defendants for causing the death of a partner they mistreated, encompassing in proceedings which are currently active.

“We are also working with law enforcement and other parties to ensure these kinds of offences are clearly recognized – so that we can hold offenders accountable for the full extent of their wrongdoings.”