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Every suicide in which the deceased had endured abuse at home must be considered a possible homicide, as per demands from advocates who seek to make perpetrators responsible for the catastrophic consequences of their behavior.

This move is necessary because police and prosecutors are failing to hold offenders accountable in instances of suicide following domestic abuse.

“Time and again, there is widespread breakdown, especially within the criminal justice system, to scrutinise these deaths with the gravity they warrant,” remarked a co-director of a campaign group at a landmark gathering in London recently.

The assembly, organized by a organization leading a “Suicide is Homicide” initiative to fight for reform in the legal framework, brought together families who had lost loved ones to self-inflicted death after family violence.

Individual Accounts 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, providing a lengthy recorded statement as proof against him.

Following her passing, the perpetrator was convicted of coercive and controlling behavior and jailed for 41 months. He was later sentenced for an additional term after a another victim came forward to disclose that she had been in a harmful partnership with him.

After Chloe’s death, the parent decided to campaign for a legal change to hold offenders accountable; however she then realized that regulations were existing, they just were rarely applied to achieve convictions.

“I decided it was not a new law I required as current statutes were already there, and after finding out how much my child had been let down previous to her death by the police and numerous services, they had to fulfill their duties, and things required reform,” she said.

“Over 47 families have found me and just a handful of us have had a conviction,” she continued. “I was so shocked to see so many families who have been fighting the police and CPS for years and receiving no resolution for their child or brother or sister and didn’t have a voice in case it affected inquiries that were not progressing.”

Further Heartbreaking Account

Saskia Lightburn Richie’s daughter her 30-year-old daughter died 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 mum to her kids, and she died by suicide after 24 months in a partnership where she was systematically destroyed by her partner,” she said.

“She was physically beaten, she was mentally tormented, she was dominated and broken down piece by piece until she could not see a way forward. The individual who caused this walked free, because we label it self-inflicted death, we conclude the case and we proceed.

“But I could not move on,” she said, “and I have not managed to let go. Honestly, she 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 begged them to investigate what he had done to her, I was told that there was no action that they were able to take.

“There was no investigation into her passing. The domestic homicide review, which I had to struggle to obtain, required five years and had no impact. A lengthy coroner’s hearing found death by suicide, notwithstanding huge evidence over a very traumatic multi-day session of domestic abuse and shortcomings by various agencies.”

The parent informed the gathering that for a decade she has “struggled against a establishment that ignores what is right in front of it”.

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

“We must use the legislation we already possess effectively and it really isn’t happening at the present, and we need to make perpetrators responsible for driving their victims to death.

“We have the laws. We need the will, we need law enforcement to conduct thorough inquiries. We need the prosecution authority to take legal action. We need judges to understand that verbal abuse and manipulation can kill equally to physical force and arms.”

Political Response

At a follow-up gathering in the Parliament, chaired by a opposition politician, and attended by the government official, 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 result of in fact, somebody else’s violence, and these aren’t rare incidents.”

“Our law is broken, we know that,” she said. “Especially around murder or unlawful killing, it is piecemeal. It’s not written in statute anyway, it has been shaped with traditional legal customs for generations, and it is no longer fit for purpose, quite frankly, it’s the world we inhabit today.

“I will not claim that it’s going to be easy to fix. It is incredibly complex and challenging, particularly when you look at the issue of homicide, but we acknowledge that it needs to be looked at.”

Prosecution Service Statement

A spokesperson for the legal body said: “Domestic abuse is a heinous crime and our legal officers are actively advised to consider murder and manslaughter charges in self-inflicted death instances where there is a known context of family violence or other controlling or coercive behavior.

“We have previously charged a number of defendants for leading to the fatality of a companion they mistreated, encompassing in proceedings 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 full extent of their crimes.”