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Every suicide where the victim had endured domestic violence must be treated as a possible murder case, according to calls from advocates who aim to make perpetrators accountable for the devastating impact of their actions.

This move is essential because law enforcement are not doing enough to hold offenders accountable in cases of self-inflicted death following domestic abuse.

“In case after case, there is widespread breakdown, particularly within the criminal justice system, to scrutinise these fatalities with the seriousness they warrant,” stated a leader of a advocacy organization at a landmark gathering in Westminster earlier this week.

The meeting, organized by a group running a “Self-Inflicted Death is Murder” campaign to advocate for reform in the legal framework, united families who had suffered bereavement to self-inflicted death following domestic abuse.

Individual Accounts of Loss

One mother lost her daughter her 23-year-old daughter in spring 2023. Prior to her passing, the young woman had reported her former partner to authorities, submitting a lengthy recorded statement as evidence against him.

Following her passing, the perpetrator was convicted of manipulative and domineering conduct and imprisoned for over three years. He was subsequently 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; yet she then discovered that laws were already in place, they just were rarely applied to secure prosecutions.

“I concluded it wasn’t a new law I needed as existing laws were already there, and after finding out how much my daughter had been let down previous to her death by the authorities and numerous services, they needed to do their job properly, and practices needed to change,” she said.

“More than four dozen relatives 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 battling the police and CPS for years and getting no justice for their child or brother or sister and didn’t have a voice in case it affected inquiries that were not progressing.”

Another Tragic Case

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

“She was energetic, she was loving,” she stated. “She was full of promise, and she was an exceptional, really loving mother to her two children, and she died by suicide after two years in a partnership where she was methodically broken down by her partner,” she explained.

“She endured physical assaults, she was mentally tormented, she was dominated and broken down gradually until she could not see a way forward. The man who caused this went unpunished, because we label it self-inflicted death, we close the file and we move on.

“Yet I was unable to continue,” she said, “and I haven’t been able to let go. Honestly, she didn’t just die by suicide. She was murdered. She was killed slowly and deliberately over a two year period, and when I went to the police, when I pleaded with them to investigate what he had inflicted upon her, I was told that there was nothing that they were able to take.

“No inquiry was conducted into her death. The domestic violence fatality analysis, which I had to struggle to obtain, took five years and had no impact. A four day inquest found self-inflicted death, despite huge evidence over a very traumatic multi-day session of family violence and failings by multiple services.”

The mother told the meeting that for eight years she has “struggled against a establishment that ignores what is obvious”.

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

“We need to apply the laws we currently have properly and it is not occurring at the moment, and we need to make perpetrators responsible for driving their victims to death.

“We have the laws. We require determination, we need police to investigate properly. We need the Crown Prosecution Service to take legal action. We need the judiciary to understand that words and control can cause death just as much as physical force and arms.”

Political Response

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

A junior minister told the meeting: “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 actually, another person’s abuse, and these aren’t isolated stories.”

“Our law is broken, we know that,” she said. “Especially around homicide or manslaughter, it is piecemeal. It lacks statutory basis anyway, it has been shaped with traditional legal customs for generations, and it is no longer fit for purpose, honestly, it’s the world we inhabit today.

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

Legal Authority Comment

A representative for the prosecution service said: “Domestic abuse is a heinous crime and our prosecutors are actively advised to evaluate murder and manslaughter charges in suicide cases where there is a established background of domestic abuse or other manipulative conduct.

“We have in the past prosecuted a several individuals for causing the death of a partner they mistreated, including in proceedings which are currently active.

“We are collaborating with law enforcement and other parties to guarantee these kinds of offences are well-understood – so that we can bring perpetrators accountable for the full extent of their wrongdoings.”