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Each self-inflicted death where the deceased had endured abuse at home should be considered a potential homicide, as per calls from advocates who aim to make perpetrators responsible for the devastating consequences of their behavior.

This move is necessary because law enforcement are not doing enough to hold offenders to justice in cases of suicide after family violence.

“Time and again, there is systemic and structural failure, particularly within the criminal justice system, to scrutinise these deaths with the gravity they warrant,” stated a co-director of a campaign group at a landmark meeting in Westminster recently.

The assembly, organized by a organization leading a “Suicide is Homicide” initiative to advocate for change in the legal framework, united relatives who had suffered bereavement to suicide after family violence.

Individual Accounts of Loss

Sharon Holland lost her daughter her 23-year-old daughter in March 2023. Prior to her passing, Chloe had reported her ex-boyfriend to police, providing a lengthy recorded statement as proof against him.

After her death, the individual was found guilty 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 mother decided to campaign for a legal change to bring perpetrators to justice; yet she then discovered that regulations were already in place, they just weren’t often being used to secure prosecutions.

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

“Over 47 families have contacted me and just a handful of us have had a conviction,” she added. “I was astonished to see such a large number 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 investigations that were not progressing.”

Further Heartbreaking Account

One mother’s daughter her 30-year-old daughter died in spring 2017, in what she called “the ultimate abusive action” in a campaign of abuse.

“Hannah was vibrant, she was caring,” she said. “She was full of promise, and she was an amazing, really loving mother to her kids, and she died by suicide after 24 months in a partnership where she was methodically broken down by her companion,” she explained.

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

“But I could not move on,” she remarked, “and I have not managed to let go. Honestly, Hannah didn’t just die by suicide. She was murdered. She was killed slowly and intentionally over a 24-month span, and when I went to the police, when I begged 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 homicide review, which I had to struggle to obtain, took five years and had no impact. A four day inquest determined death by suicide, notwithstanding substantial proof over a extremely distressing four day period of family violence and shortcomings by multiple services.”

The mother informed the gathering that for eight years she has “been fighting a system that ignores what is right in front of it”.

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

“We need to apply the laws we already possess properly and it really isn’t happening at the moment, and we need to hold abusers accountable for driving their victims to death.

“We have the laws. We require determination, we need law enforcement to investigate properly. We need the prosecution authority to prosecute. We need the judiciary to understand 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 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 written off as if they were their decision, they chose to do this, when, reality, these were the culmination of in fact, somebody else’s violence, and these are not rare incidents.”

“Our law is broken, we know that,” she said. “Particularly around homicide 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, honestly, it’s the world we currently live in.

“I will not claim that it’s going to be easy to resolve. It is extremely complicated and challenging, especially when you look at the issue of murder, but we acknowledge that it requires examination.”

Legal Authority Comment

A representative for the legal body commented: “Family violence is a terrible crime and our prosecutors are actively advised 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 several individuals for causing the death of a partner they abused, including in cases 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 hold offenders to justice for the full extent of their crimes.”