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Each self-inflicted death in which the victim had endured domestic violence must be considered a potential homicide, according to demands from campaigners who aim to hold abusers responsible for the catastrophic consequences of their behavior.

This step is essential because police and prosecutors are failing to hold offenders accountable in instances of self-inflicted death following domestic abuse.

“In case after case, there is systemic and structural failure, especially within the legal system, to examine these fatalities with the seriousness they deserve,” remarked a leader of a advocacy organization during a landmark gathering in London earlier this week.

The meeting, arranged 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 suicide following family violence.

Personal Stories of Loss

One mother lost her daughter Chloe Holland in March 2023. Before her death, the young woman had informed her former partner to authorities, providing a lengthy recorded statement as evidence about his conduct.

After her death, the individual was convicted of manipulative and domineering conduct and jailed for 41 months. He was later sentenced for an additional term after a another victim came forward to report that she had been in a harmful partnership with him.

In the wake of her loss, the mother chose to advocate for a legal change to hold offenders accountable; yet she then realized that regulations were existing, they just were rarely applied to achieve convictions.

“I decided it wasn’t a new law I required as existing laws were in place, and after learning how much my child had been let down before her death by the authorities and many other agencies, they needed to fulfill their duties, and things needed to change,” she said.

“Over 47 families have contacted me and just a handful of us have had a guilty verdict,” she continued. “I was astonished to see so many families who have been battling the police and CPS for years and receiving no resolution for their offspring or sibling and could not speak out in case it impacted investigations that were not progressing.”

Another Tragic Case

Saskia Lightburn Richie’s daughter Hannah died in spring 2017, in what she described as “the final act of violence” in a prolonged pattern of mistreatment.

“She was energetic, she was caring,” she stated. “She had great potential, and she was an exceptional, deeply devoted mother to her two children, and she died by suicide after 24 months in a relationship where she was methodically broken down by her partner,” she explained.

“She endured physical assaults, she was mentally tormented, she was dominated and dismantled gradually until she could not see a way forward. The individual who did this to her went unpunished, because we call 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 killed. She was killed slowly and intentionally over a 24-month span, and when I approached the authorities, when I begged them to investigate what he had inflicted upon her, I was told that there was no action that they could do.

“There was no investigation into her death. The domestic violence fatality analysis, which I had to struggle to obtain, took five years and changed nothing. A four day inquest found death by suicide, notwithstanding substantial proof over a very traumatic four day period of domestic abuse and shortcomings by various agencies.”

The mother informed the gathering that for eight years she has “struggled against a establishment that refuses to see what is obvious”.

She emphasized the suicide is homicide movement was critical “because when someone takes their own life after they’ve suffered domestic abuse, we have to investigate it for what it truly represents, which is murder.

“We must apply the laws we currently have effectively and it really isn’t happening at the moment, and we need to make perpetrators responsible for pushing their targets to suicide.

“The statutes exist. We require determination, we need law enforcement to investigate properly. We need the prosecution authority to prosecute. We need judges to recognize that verbal abuse and manipulation can cause death equally to hands and weapons.”

Government Reaction

At a follow-up gathering in the House of Commons, led by a Labour MP, and attended by the government official, the bereaved relatives again told their stories.

A junior minister 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 result of in fact, another person’s abuse, and these are not rare incidents.”

“Our law is broken, we are aware,” she stated. “Particularly around murder or manslaughter, it is fragmented. 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, honestly, given the society we inhabit today.

“I will not claim that it’s going to be easy to fix. It is incredibly complex and difficult, especially when you consider the issue of murder, 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 legal officers are regularly instructed to consider homicide allegations in suicide cases where there is a established background of domestic abuse or other controlling or coercive behavior.

“We have previously charged a number of defendants for leading to the fatality of a partner they abused, 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 full extent of their wrongdoings.”