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Each self-inflicted death where the victim 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 consequences of their behavior.

This step is necessary because police and prosecutors are not doing enough to hold offenders to justice in cases of self-inflicted death following family violence.

“Time and again, there is widespread breakdown, particularly within the criminal justice system, to scrutinise these deaths with the seriousness they warrant,” remarked a leader of a advocacy organization during a significant meeting in London recently.

The assembly, organized by a organization leading a “Self-Inflicted Death is Murder” initiative to fight for reform in the criminal justice system, brought together relatives who had lost loved ones to self-inflicted death following family violence.

Individual Accounts of Tragedy

Sharon Holland experienced the death of her child Chloe Holland in March 2023. Prior to her passing, the young woman had reported her ex-boyfriend to police, providing a two-hour video interview as evidence about his conduct.

Following her passing, the individual was found guilty of coercive and controlling behavior and jailed for 41 months. He was subsequently jailed for three years and seven months after a another victim stepped up to report that she had been in a violent and abusive relationship with him.

After Chloe’s death, the mother chose to advocate for a legal change to hold offenders accountable; however she then realized that laws were existing, they just weren’t often being used to achieve convictions.

“I concluded it wasn’t a new law I required as existing laws were in place, and after finding out how much my child had been let down previous to her taking her life by the police and many other agencies, they needed to fulfill their duties, and things required reform,” she explained.

“More than four dozen relatives have found me and just a handful of us have had a guilty verdict,” she added. “I was so shocked to see such a large number who have been battling the police and CPS for a long time and getting no justice for their offspring or sibling and could not speak out in case it affected inquiries that weren’t possibly going anywhere.”

Further Heartbreaking Account

Saskia Lightburn Richie’s daughter her 30-year-old daughter died in May 2017, in what she described as “the final act of violence” in a prolonged pattern of mistreatment.

“She was energetic, she was caring,” she said. “She had great potential, and she was an amazing, really loving mum to her kids, and she died by suicide after two years in a partnership where she was systematically destroyed by her companion,” she said.

“She was physically beaten, she was psychologically tortured, she was controlled and dismantled piece by piece until she could not see a path ahead. The individual who caused this walked free, 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 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 done to her, I was informed that there was nothing that they could do.

“There was no investigation into her passing. The domestic violence fatality analysis, which I had to fight for, took five years and changed nothing. A four day inquest found death by suicide, notwithstanding huge evidence over a very traumatic multi-day session of family violence and failings by multiple services.”

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

She said the suicide is homicide campaign was critical “because when an individual takes their own life after they’ve endured domestic abuse, we have to investigate it for what it really is, which is murder.

“We must apply the laws we already possess properly and it is not occurring at the present, and we need to make perpetrators responsible for driving their victims to death.

“The statutes exist. We need the will, we need police to investigate properly. We need the Crown Prosecution Service to prosecute. We need judges to recognize that verbal abuse and manipulation can cause death just as much as physical force and arms.”

Government Reaction

At a follow-up gathering in the House of Commons, chaired by a Labour MP, and including the government official, the bereaved relatives again shared their experiences.

A parliamentary under-secretary 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 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 unlawful killing, it is piecemeal. It lacks statutory basis regardless, it has been developed with common law practices for centuries, 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, particularly when you consider the issue of homicide, but we acknowledge that it needs to be looked at.”

Prosecution Service Statement

A spokesperson for the prosecution service said: “Family violence is a terrible crime and our prosecutors are regularly instructed to consider homicide allegations in self-inflicted death instances where there is a established background of domestic abuse or other manipulative conduct.

“We have in the past prosecuted a number of defendants for causing the death of a partner they mistreated, including in cases which are ongoing.

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