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Every suicide in which the deceased had experienced abuse at home must be treated as a potential murder case, as per calls from advocates who aim to make perpetrators accountable for the catastrophic impact of their behavior.

This step is essential because law enforcement are not doing enough to hold offenders to justice in instances of self-inflicted death following family violence.

“Time and again, there is widespread breakdown, especially within the criminal justice system, to examine these fatalities with the seriousness they deserve,” stated a co-director of a campaign group during a landmark meeting in Westminster recently.

The meeting, arranged by a organization running a “Suicide is Homicide” initiative to fight for reform in the criminal justice system, united families who had lost loved ones to self-inflicted death after domestic abuse.

Personal Stories of Tragedy

Sharon Holland lost her daughter her 23-year-old daughter in March 2023. Before her death, Chloe had informed her former partner to authorities, providing a lengthy recorded statement as evidence against him.

After her death, the perpetrator was found guilty of coercive and controlling behavior and imprisoned for over three years. He was subsequently sentenced for three years and seven months after a another victim stepped up to disclose that she had been in a harmful partnership with him.

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

“I concluded it wasn’t a new law I required as existing laws were already there, and after learning how much my daughter had been let down before her death by the authorities and many other agencies, they had to do their job properly, and things required reform,” she said.

“Over 47 families 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 prosecution service for years and getting no justice for their offspring or brother or sister and could not speak out in case it impacted inquiries that were not progressing.”

Another Tragic Case

One mother’s daughter Hannah died in spring 2017, in what she called “the final act of violence” in a prolonged pattern of mistreatment.

“She was vibrant, she was loving,” she stated. “She was full of promise, and she was an exceptional, deeply devoted mum to her two children, and she took her own life after two years in a relationship where she was systematically destroyed by her companion,” she said.

“She endured physical assaults, she was psychologically tortured, she was dominated and dismantled gradually until she could not see a path ahead. The individual who caused this walked free, because we label it suicide, we close the file and we move on.

“Yet I was unable to continue,” she remarked, “and I haven’t been able to move on. In truth, she 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 look into what he had done to her, I was told that there was no action that they were able to take.

“There was no investigation into her passing. The domestic violence fatality analysis, which I had to fight for, required five years and changed nothing. A four day inquest found death by suicide, despite substantial proof over a extremely distressing four day period of domestic abuse and failings by various agencies.”

The parent informed the gathering that for eight years she has “been fighting a establishment that refuses to see what is obvious”.

She said the suicide is homicide movement was vital “because when an individual takes their own life after they’ve suffered domestic abuse, we have to investigate it for what it really is, which is murder.

“We need to apply the laws we currently have effectively and it really isn’t happening at the moment, and we need to hold abusers accountable for pushing their targets to suicide.

“We have the laws. We require determination, we need police to investigate properly. We need the prosecution authority to prosecute. We need the judiciary to understand that verbal abuse and manipulation can cause death equally to physical force and arms.”

Government Reaction

At a second meeting in the Parliament, led by a Labour MP, and including the safeguarding minister, the bereaved relatives again told their stories.

A parliamentary under-secretary informed the assembly: “Such fatalities are often dismissed as if they were their decision, they opted for this, when, reality, these were the culmination of in fact, somebody else’s violence, and these aren’t rare incidents.”

“The legal system is flawed, we are aware,” she said. “Particularly around murder or manslaughter, it is piecemeal. It lacks statutory basis regardless, it has been shaped with traditional legal customs for centuries, and it is no longer fit for purpose, quite frankly, given the society we inhabit today.

“I’m not going to pretend 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 needs to be looked at.”

Prosecution Service Statement

A representative for the prosecution service said: “Family violence is a heinous crime and our prosecutors are regularly instructed to consider homicide allegations in self-inflicted death instances where there is a established background of family violence or other manipulative conduct.

“We have previously charged a several individuals for causing the death of a companion they mistreated, including in cases which are ongoing.

“We are collaborating with police and other parties to ensure these types of crimes are clearly recognized – so that we can bring perpetrators accountable for the complete scope of their wrongdoings.”