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Every suicide in which the deceased had endured domestic violence must be treated as a possible murder case, as per demands from advocates who seek to make perpetrators accountable for the catastrophic impact of their behavior.

This move is necessary because law enforcement are failing to hold offenders to justice in cases of suicide after family violence.

“In case after case, there is widespread breakdown, particularly within the criminal justice system, to examine these deaths with the seriousness they deserve,” remarked a co-director of a advocacy organization at a significant meeting in Westminster earlier this week.

The meeting, arranged by a group running a “Suicide is Homicide” initiative to fight for reform in the legal framework, brought together families who had suffered bereavement to suicide after family violence.

Personal Stories of Tragedy

One mother lost her daughter her 23-year-old daughter in March 2023. Prior to her passing, the young woman had reported her ex-boyfriend to police, providing a lengthy recorded statement as evidence about his conduct.

After her death, the individual was found guilty of coercive and controlling behavior and jailed for 41 months. He was later jailed for three years and seven months after a another victim stepped up to disclose that she had been in a violent and abusive relationship with him.

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

“I decided it wasn’t a fresh legislation I required as current statutes were already there, and after finding out how much my daughter had been let down previous to her death by the police and numerous services, they needed to do their job properly, and things required reform,” she said.

“Over 47 families have found me and only four of us have had a guilty verdict,” she continued. “I was so shocked to see so many families who have been fighting the authorities and prosecution service for years and getting no justice for their offspring or sibling and didn’t have a voice in case it affected inquiries that weren’t possibly going anywhere.”

Another Tragic Case

Saskia Lightburn Richie’s child her 30-year-old daughter died in spring 2017, in what she described as “the ultimate abusive action” in a campaign of abuse.

“She was energetic, she was caring,” she stated. “She was full of promise, and she was an exceptional, deeply devoted mother to her two children, and she took her own life 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 broken down gradually until she was unable to envision a path ahead. The individual who did this to her walked free, because we call it self-inflicted death, we close the file and we proceed.

“Yet I was unable to continue,” she said, “and I haven’t been able to move on. In truth, she didn’t just die by suicide. She was killed. 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 inflicted upon her, I was told 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 four day inquest determined death by suicide, despite huge evidence over a extremely distressing four day period of domestic abuse and shortcomings by various agencies.”

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

She emphasized the suicide is homicide campaign was critical “because when someone takes their own life after they’ve suffered domestic abuse, we have to examine it for what it really is, which is homicide.

“We must use the legislation we already possess 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 Crown Prosecution Service to take legal action. We need judges to recognize that verbal abuse and manipulation can cause death equally to hands and weapons.”

Political Response

At a follow-up gathering in the Parliament, chaired by a Labour MP, and attended by the safeguarding minister, the grieving families again shared their experiences.

A parliamentary under-secretary told the meeting: “Such fatalities are often dismissed as if they were their own choice, they chose to do this, when, in truth, these were the result of actually, somebody else’s violence, and these are not rare incidents.”

“Our law is broken, we are aware,” she stated. “Especially around murder or unlawful killing, it is fragmented. It lacks statutory basis regardless, it has been shaped with traditional legal customs for generations, and it is no longer fit for purpose, quite frankly, it’s the world we currently live in.

“I’m not going to pretend that it’s going to be easy to fix. It is incredibly complex and challenging, especially when you consider the matter of murder, but we acknowledge that it needs to be looked at.”

Prosecution Service Statement

A spokesperson for the legal body said: “Family violence is a terrible offense and our legal officers are regularly instructed to consider murder and manslaughter charges in suicide cases where there is a known context of domestic abuse or other controlling or coercive behavior.

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

“We are collaborating with police and other stakeholders to guarantee these types of crimes are clearly recognized – so that we can hold offenders to justice for the full extent of their wrongdoings.”