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Each self-inflicted death where the victim had experienced abuse at home must be considered a potential homicide, according to demands from campaigners who aim to make perpetrators accountable for the devastating impact of their behavior.

This step is essential because police and prosecutors are failing to hold offenders accountable in cases of suicide following family violence.

“Time and again, there is systemic and structural failure, especially within the criminal justice system, to scrutinise these deaths with the gravity they deserve,” remarked a co-director of a advocacy organization during a landmark meeting in Westminster earlier this week.

The assembly, organized by a organization running a “Suicide is Homicide” campaign to advocate for change in the criminal justice system, brought together relatives who had suffered bereavement to self-inflicted death following family violence.

Personal Stories of Tragedy

Sharon Holland lost her daughter her 23-year-old daughter in March 2023. Before her death, the young woman had informed her former partner to police, submitting a lengthy recorded statement as evidence against him.

After her death, the individual was found guilty of coercive and controlling behavior and jailed for over three years. He was later sentenced for three years and seven months after a another victim stepped up to report that she had been in a violent and abusive relationship with him.

After Chloe’s death, the mother chose to advocate for a legal change to bring perpetrators accountable; yet she then discovered that laws were already in place, they just weren’t often being used to achieve convictions.

“I decided it was not a new law I needed as current statutes were already there, and after finding out how much my child had been let down previous to her taking her life by the authorities and many other agencies, they needed to do their job properly, and practices needed to change,” she said.

“More than four dozen relatives have found me and only four of us have had a conviction,” she added. “I was astonished to see such a large number who have been fighting the authorities and CPS for years and receiving no resolution for their offspring or sibling and could not speak out in case it impacted inquiries that were not progressing.”

Another Tragic Case

Saskia Lightburn Richie’s child Hannah passed away in spring 2017, in what she described as “the ultimate abusive action” in a campaign of abuse.

“Hannah was vibrant, she was caring,” she stated. “She was full of promise, and she was an amazing, deeply devoted mother to her kids, and she died by suicide after 24 months in a relationship where she was systematically destroyed by her partner,” she said.

“She endured physical assaults, she was psychologically tortured, she was controlled and broken down piece by piece until she could not see a way forward. The man who did this to her walked free, because we call it self-inflicted death, we conclude the case and we move on.

“Yet I was unable to continue,” she said, “and I have not managed to move on. Honestly, she did not merely take her own life. She was murdered. She was killed slowly 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 passing. The domestic homicide review, which I had to fight for, required five years and changed nothing. A four day inquest found death by suicide, 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 a decade she has “been fighting a establishment that refuses to see what is obvious”.

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

“We need to use the legislation we currently have properly and it really isn’t happening at the moment, and we need to make perpetrators responsible 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 take legal action. We need the judiciary to recognize that words and control can cause death just as much as physical force and arms.”

Government Reaction

At a follow-up gathering in the Parliament, led by a Labour MP, and attended by 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, reality, these were the culmination of actually, another person’s abuse, and these aren’t isolated stories.”

“Our law is broken, we know that,” she said. “Particularly around murder or manslaughter, it is fragmented. It’s not written in statute regardless, it has been shaped with common law practices for centuries, 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 resolve. It is extremely complicated and difficult, especially when you consider the matter of homicide, but we acknowledge that it needs to be looked at.”

Prosecution Service Statement

A representative for the legal body commented: “Family violence 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 domestic abuse or other manipulative conduct.

“We have previously charged a number of defendants for leading to the fatality of a partner they mistreated, encompassing in proceedings which are currently active.

“We are collaborating with police and other stakeholders to ensure these kinds of offences are clearly recognized – so that we can bring perpetrators accountable for the full extent of their wrongdoings.”