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Each self-inflicted death where the victim had endured abuse at home should be treated as a potential homicide, according to demands from advocates who seek to make perpetrators responsible for the devastating consequences of their actions.

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

“In case after case, there is widespread breakdown, particularly within the legal system, to examine these fatalities with the gravity they deserve,” remarked a co-director of a advocacy organization at a significant meeting in London recently.

The meeting, organized by a organization running a “Suicide is Homicide” initiative to advocate for reform in the legal framework, brought together relatives who had lost loved ones to self-inflicted death following family violence.

Individual Accounts of Loss

Sharon Holland experienced the death of her child Chloe Holland in March 2023. Prior to her passing, the young woman had informed her ex-boyfriend to authorities, providing a lengthy recorded statement as evidence against him.

Following her passing, the individual was convicted of coercive and controlling behavior and imprisoned for over three years. He was subsequently jailed for three years and seven months after a second woman stepped up to report that she had been in a harmful partnership with him.

In the wake of her loss, the parent chose to advocate for a new law to hold offenders accountable; however she then realized that regulations were already in place, they just weren’t often being used to achieve convictions.

“I concluded it was not a new law I required as current statutes 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 required reform,” she explained.

“Over 47 families have contacted me and just a handful of us have had a guilty verdict,” she continued. “I was so shocked to see so many families who have been battling the police and CPS for a long time and receiving no resolution for their offspring or sibling and could not speak out in case it impacted inquiries that weren’t possibly going anywhere.”

Another Tragic Case

Saskia Lightburn Richie’s daughter her 30-year-old daughter passed away in spring 2017, in what she described as “the ultimate abusive action” in a campaign of abuse.

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

“She endured physical assaults, she was psychologically tortured, she was dominated and dismantled piece by piece until she was unable to envision a path ahead. The man who did this to her went unpunished, because we label it self-inflicted death, we conclude the case and we proceed.

“But I could not move on,” she remarked, “and I haven’t been able to let go. Honestly, she didn’t just die by suicide. She was killed. Her death was gradual and deliberately over a 24-month span, and when I approached the authorities, when I pleaded with them to look into what he had inflicted upon her, I was told that there was nothing that they were able to take.

“There was no investigation into her death. The domestic homicide review, which I had to fight for, required five years and changed nothing. A lengthy coroner’s hearing determined self-inflicted death, despite substantial proof over a very traumatic multi-day session of family violence and failings by various agencies.”

The parent told the meeting that for a decade she has “been fighting a establishment that ignores what is right in front of it”.

She emphasized the self-inflicted death is murder campaign was critical “because when someone takes their own life after they’ve endured family violence, we have to examine it for what it truly represents, which is homicide.

“We must apply the laws we already possess effectively 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 law enforcement to investigate properly. We need the prosecution authority to take legal action. We need the judiciary to recognize that verbal abuse and manipulation can kill equally to hands and weapons.”

Political Response

At a second meeting in the House of Commons, chaired by a Labour MP, and including the government official, the bereaved relatives again told their stories.

A parliamentary under-secretary informed the assembly: “These deaths 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 are not rare incidents.”

“Our law is broken, we are aware,” she said. “Particularly around murder or manslaughter, it is piecemeal. It lacks statutory basis regardless, it has been developed with common law practices for generations, and it is outdated, quite frankly, given the society we currently live in.

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

Legal Authority Comment

A spokesperson for the prosecution service commented: “Domestic abuse is a terrible 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 in the past prosecuted a several individuals for causing the death of a companion they abused, encompassing in cases which are ongoing.

“We are collaborating with police and other stakeholders to guarantee these types of crimes are clearly recognized – so that we can hold offenders to justice for the complete scope of their crimes.”