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Every suicide where the deceased had experienced abuse at home should be treated as a possible murder case, according to calls from campaigners who seek to make perpetrators responsible for the devastating impact of their behavior.

This step is essential because law enforcement are not doing enough to hold offenders accountable in cases of self-inflicted death after domestic abuse.

“Time and again, there is systemic and structural failure, particularly within the criminal justice system, to examine these fatalities with the gravity they deserve,” stated a co-director of a advocacy organization at a significant meeting in Westminster earlier this week.

The meeting, arranged by a group running a “Self-Inflicted Death is Murder” initiative to advocate for reform in the legal framework, united relatives who had suffered bereavement to suicide after domestic abuse.

Individual Accounts of Tragedy

One mother lost her daughter her 23-year-old daughter in spring 2023. Prior to her passing, Chloe had reported her former partner to police, providing a two-hour video interview 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 jailed for an additional term after a another victim 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 laws were already in place, they just were rarely applied to achieve convictions.

“I concluded it wasn’t a fresh legislation I required as current statutes were in place, and after finding out how much my child had been failed previous to her taking her life by the authorities and numerous services, they needed to do their job properly, and practices needed to change,” she explained.

“More than four dozen relatives have contacted me and only four of us have had a conviction,” she continued. “I was so shocked to see so many families who have been fighting the authorities and CPS for years and receiving no resolution for their child or brother or sister and didn’t have a voice in case it impacted investigations that weren’t possibly going anywhere.”

Further Heartbreaking Account

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

“She was energetic, she was caring,” she said. “She was full of promise, and she was an amazing, deeply devoted mother to her kids, and she took her own life after 24 months in a relationship where she was systematically destroyed by her companion,” she said.

“She was physically beaten, she was mentally tormented, she was controlled and dismantled gradually until she could not see a path ahead. The man who did this to her went unpunished, because we call it self-inflicted death, we close the file and we move on.

“But I could not move on,” she remarked, “and I have not managed to let go. Honestly, Hannah did not merely take her own life. She was killed. Her death was gradual and intentionally over a two year period, and when I approached the authorities, when I begged them to investigate what he had done to her, I was told that there was no action that they were able to take.

“No inquiry was conducted into her death. The domestic violence fatality analysis, which I had to fight for, took five years and had no impact. A lengthy coroner’s hearing determined self-inflicted death, despite huge evidence over a extremely distressing four day period of domestic abuse and shortcomings by multiple services.”

The parent informed the gathering that for a decade she has “struggled against a system that ignores what is obvious”.

She said the suicide is homicide campaign was vital “because when an individual dies by suicide after they’ve endured domestic abuse, we have to examine it for what it truly represents, which is murder.

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

“The statutes exist. We need the will, we need law enforcement to investigate properly. We need the Crown Prosecution Service to prosecute. We need judges to recognize that verbal abuse and manipulation can cause death just as much as hands and weapons.”

Political Response

At a second meeting in the House of Commons, chaired by a opposition politician, and including the government official, the bereaved relatives again shared their experiences.

A parliamentary under-secretary told the meeting: “Such fatalities are often written off as if they were their own choice, they opted for this, when, in truth, these were the culmination of in fact, another person’s abuse, and these aren’t isolated stories.”

“Our law is broken, we are aware,” she said. “Particularly around homicide or unlawful killing, it is piecemeal. It’s not written in statute anyway, it has been developed with traditional legal customs for generations, and it is outdated, quite frankly, given the society we inhabit today.

“I will not claim that it’s going to be simple to fix. It is extremely complicated and difficult, particularly when you consider the issue of murder, but we acknowledge that it requires examination.”

Legal Authority Comment

A spokesperson for the legal body said: “Family violence is a heinous crime and our legal officers are actively advised to consider homicide allegations in self-inflicted death instances where there is a known context of family violence or other controlling or coercive behavior.

“We have in the past prosecuted a several individuals for leading to the fatality of a partner they mistreated, encompassing in cases which are ongoing.

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