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Every suicide in which the deceased had experienced domestic violence should be treated as a potential homicide, as per calls from advocates who seek to make perpetrators accountable for the devastating impact of their actions.

This move is necessary because law enforcement are not doing enough to bring perpetrators accountable in cases of suicide following family violence.

“In case after case, there is systemic and structural failure, particularly within the legal system, to scrutinise these fatalities with the seriousness they deserve,” remarked a leader of a advocacy organization during a significant meeting in London recently.

The meeting, arranged by a organization leading a “Suicide is Homicide” campaign to fight for change in the legal framework, united relatives who had suffered bereavement to suicide following domestic abuse.

Individual Accounts of Tragedy

One mother experienced the death of her child her 23-year-old daughter in March 2023. Before her death, the young woman had informed her former partner to police, providing a lengthy recorded statement as evidence against him.

After her death, the perpetrator was convicted of coercive and controlling behavior and jailed for over three years. He was later sentenced for an additional term after a second woman came forward to report that she had been in a harmful partnership with him.

After Chloe’s death, the parent decided to campaign for a new law to hold offenders to justice; yet she then discovered that laws were already in place, they just were rarely applied to secure prosecutions.

“I decided it was not a fresh legislation I required as existing laws were already there, and after finding out how much my child had been failed before her death by the police and numerous services, they had to do their job properly, and things needed to change,” she said.

“More than four dozen relatives have found me and only four of us have had a guilty verdict,” she added. “I was astonished to see so many families who have been battling the authorities and prosecution service for a long time and receiving no resolution for their child or sibling and could not speak out in case it affected investigations that were not progressing.”

Another Tragic Case

Saskia Lightburn Richie’s child her 30-year-old daughter 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 said. “She had great potential, and she was an exceptional, really loving 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 controlled and dismantled piece by piece until she was unable to envision a way forward. The man who did this to her went unpunished, 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. She was killed slowly and intentionally over a 24-month span, and when I went to the police, when I pleaded with them to look into what he had inflicted upon her, I was informed that there was nothing that they could do.

“There was no investigation into her death. The domestic violence fatality analysis, which I had to fight for, took five years and changed nothing. A lengthy coroner’s hearing determined self-inflicted death, notwithstanding huge evidence over a very traumatic four day period of family violence and failings by multiple services.”

The parent informed the gathering that for a decade she has “struggled against a system that ignores what is obvious”.

She emphasized the self-inflicted death is murder campaign was critical “since when someone dies by suicide after they’ve suffered domestic abuse, we have to examine it for what it really is, which is homicide.

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

“We have the laws. We need the will, we need law enforcement to investigate properly. We need the prosecution authority to prosecute. We need the judiciary to recognize that words and control can kill just as much as hands and weapons.”

Political Response

At a follow-up gathering in the House of Commons, led by a opposition politician, and including the safeguarding minister, the grieving families again told their stories.

A parliamentary under-secretary informed the assembly: “Such fatalities 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 are not isolated stories.”

“Our law is broken, we know that,” she said. “Particularly around homicide or manslaughter, it is piecemeal. It lacks statutory basis 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 will not claim that it’s going to be easy to resolve. It is extremely complicated and difficult, especially when you consider the matter of murder, but we acknowledge that it needs to be looked at.”

Legal Authority Comment

A representative for the legal body said: “Domestic abuse is a terrible offense and our prosecutors are actively advised to evaluate homicide allegations in self-inflicted death instances where there is a known context of domestic abuse 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 cases which are currently active.

“We are collaborating with police 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 crimes.”