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Each self-inflicted death in which the victim had experienced abuse at home should be treated as a potential homicide, as per demands from campaigners who seek to hold abusers responsible for the devastating consequences of their actions.

This move is essential because police and prosecutors are failing to hold offenders to justice in instances of self-inflicted death after family violence.

“Time and again, there is systemic and structural failure, especially within the legal system, to examine these fatalities with the gravity they deserve,” remarked a leader of a campaign group during a significant gathering in London earlier this week.

The assembly, arranged by a group running a “Self-Inflicted Death is Murder” campaign to advocate for reform in the criminal justice system, brought together families who had suffered bereavement to self-inflicted death following domestic abuse.

Individual Accounts of Tragedy

Sharon Holland experienced the death of her child her 23-year-old daughter in spring 2023. Prior to her passing, the young woman had reported her ex-boyfriend to police, submitting a lengthy recorded statement as evidence against him.

After her death, the perpetrator was convicted of coercive and controlling behavior and jailed for over three years. He was later jailed for an additional term after a second woman stepped up to report that she had been in a violent and abusive relationship with him.

In the wake of her loss, the parent decided to campaign for a legal change to hold offenders to justice; yet she then discovered 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 needed as current statutes were already there, and after finding out how much my child had been failed before her taking her life by the authorities and numerous services, they needed to fulfill their duties, and things needed to change,” she said.

“More than four dozen relatives have found me and just a handful of us have had a guilty verdict,” she added. “I was astonished to see so many families who have been fighting the police and CPS for a long time and getting no justice for their offspring or sibling and didn’t have a voice in case it affected inquiries that were not progressing.”

Another Tragic Case

Saskia Lightburn Richie’s child Hannah died in May 2017, in what she called “the ultimate abusive action” in a campaign of abuse.

“Hannah was energetic, she was caring,” she stated. “She had great potential, and she was an amazing, really loving mum to her two children, and she took her own life after two years in a partnership where she was methodically broken down by her partner,” she said.

“She was physically beaten, she was mentally tormented, she was dominated and dismantled gradually until she was unable to envision a way forward. The individual who did this to her went unpunished, because we call it suicide, we close the file and we proceed.

“Yet I was unable to continue,” she remarked, “and I have not managed to move on. In truth, she didn’t just die by suicide. She was murdered. Her death was gradual and intentionally over a 24-month span, and when I went to the police, when I begged them to look into what he had inflicted upon her, I was informed that there was nothing that they could do.

“No inquiry was conducted into her passing. The domestic violence fatality analysis, which I had to fight for, required five years and changed nothing. A lengthy coroner’s hearing found self-inflicted death, despite huge evidence over a extremely distressing four day period of domestic abuse and failings by various agencies.”

The parent told the meeting that for eight years she has “struggled against a system that ignores what is right in front of it”.

She said the suicide is homicide campaign was vital “because when someone takes their own life after they’ve endured family violence, we have to examine it for what it really is, which is homicide.

“We must use the legislation we already possess properly and it really isn’t happening at the present, and we need to hold abusers accountable for driving their victims to death.

“The statutes exist. We need the will, we need police to investigate properly. We need the prosecution authority to take legal action. We need judges to understand that words and control can kill 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 safeguarding minister, the grieving families again told their stories.

A junior minister told the meeting: “Such fatalities are often dismissed as if they were their decision, they chose to do this, when, reality, these were the culmination of actually, somebody else’s violence, and these aren’t rare incidents.”

“The legal system is flawed, we know that,” she stated. “Particularly around homicide or unlawful killing, it is fragmented. It’s not written in statute anyway, it has been developed with traditional legal customs for generations, and it is no longer fit for purpose, honestly, 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 consider the matter of murder, but we recognize that it needs to be looked at.”

Legal Authority Comment

A representative for the prosecution service 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 manipulative conduct.

“We have previously charged a several individuals for leading to the fatality of a companion they abused, encompassing in cases which are ongoing.

“We are also working with police and other parties to guarantee these kinds of offences are clearly recognized – so that we can bring perpetrators accountable for the full extent of their crimes.”