About Domestic Homicide and Murder-Suicide

Introduction

Intimate partner violence is all too common throughout the world and takes many forms. The most serious of these is homicide by an intimate partner. The fear of being killed, in fact, is a major dynamic in male-on-female violence and sometimes in motivating women to kill the perpetrator of abuse out of fear or desperation.

Facts on Domestic Homicide

In the U.S., estimates from the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) are that more than three women a day are killed by their intimate partners. Women are killed by intimate partners more often than by another acquaintance of stranger. Most of these murders involved were preceded by physical and psychological abuse.

Outside the domestic realm, males are killed much more often than females; they are killed most often in fights with other men.

According to the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reports, 1,055 women and 287 men were murdered by their intimate partners in 2005. These figures are striking, because in the past, in the 1970s and earlier, the numbers of men and women so victimized were about even. In other words, there has been a significant decline in the numbers of men killed by their partners but not for women.

The number of men who were murdered by intimates dropped by 75% between 1976 and 2005 (BJS). The number of black females murdered in this time has declined but the number of white females murdered has dropped only by 6%. Statistics Canada (1998, 2005), similarly, reveals a sharp decline in the numbers of male domestic homicide victims but not of female victims of homicide.

The reason that women are resorting less to murder of their partners is most likely because many of these women were battered women who felt trapped in a dangerous situation. Today, the presence of violence prevention programming and the availability of shelters are paving the way to other options. The fact that domestic violence services apparently are saving the lives of more men than women is a positive, though unintended consequence of the women’s shelter movement (see van Wormer and Bartollas, 2007).

Situations of Domestic Murder Suicide

The National Violent Death Reporting System (NVDRS) is a recently developed state-based surveillance system that includes data from 17 states as of 2007. Now for the first time, a national data base exists that reveals the numbers of homicides that end in suicide. The goal is to collect data on homicide for all 50 states. Results so far reveal that over 90% of the perpetrators of murder-suicide are male. About one third of these male perpetuated homicides end in suicide. (Data available at www.nvdrs.com.)

These results are consistent with those of the Violence Policy Center (VPC). The VPC bases their findings on an Internet search of media accounts of deaths by murder-suicide. VPC reports that a total of 591 murder-suicide deaths took place nationwide in the six months between Jan. 1 and June 30, 2005.

As reported by the Violence Policy Center (2005), the pattern of the murder-suicide is predictable: the pattern involves a male perpetrator, female victim, a decision by the woman to leave the man, and a gun. A handgun was used in 92% of the incidents. The offender was 6.3 years older on average than the victim. Texas had the highest number of cases; the typical Florida pattern involved an elderly male caregiver overwhelmed by his inability to care for an infirmed wife.

Some researchers argue that murder is the primary motive in such cases; others point to the double and multiple killings as a form of extended suicide (van Wormer and Bartollas, 2007). The urge to kill can be described as an urge toward total self-destruction including the destruction of the person who rejected him.

The pattern that emerges in these cases involves intimate partners in the 20 to 35-year-old range: The man is abusive, psychologically and/or physically. Obsessed with the woman to the extent that he feels he can’t live without her, he is fiercely jealous and determined to isolate her.

Characteristically, suicidal murderers have little regard for the lives of other people; they would be considered, in mental health jargon, to be antisocial. Yet they are so emotionally dependent on their wives or girlfriends that they would sooner be dead than to live without them. When the girlfriend/wife makes a move to leave, her partner is absolutely distraught in the belief that he can’t live without her.

[Read the rest of this article on www.helpstartshere.org]

Posted in Family Safety, Help Starts Here, Issues & Answers, Kids & Families, Relationships, Relationships and Marriage |

10 Responses to “About Domestic Homicide and Murder-Suicide”

  1. michael shaffran Says:
    December 21st, 2008 at 3:12 am

    This is a well written article. Clearly, this is important information that all Social Workers and helping professionals should know about. What strikes me about the article and its research is the lack of solutions to these problems. Obviously, these problems are complex: economic ,psychological and societal factors that converge to make a toxic mix that leads to these horrendous, tragic circumstances. I’d like to see more mentioned about ways to prevent these tragedies. Whether it’s attachment theory or economic theory, let’s have
    some practical guidelines for solving these societal problems that affect us all.

  2. John McLaughlin Says:
    January 10th, 2009 at 7:54 pm

    Interesting article. Clearly domestic violence homicides are extremely predictable and more importantly preventable. While most do not clearly understand the risk factors, each domestic violence homicide I have investigated and study were extremely predictable and preventable. These include the recent incident that happened on Dec. 24, 2008 in West Covina, Ca. (Ex-husband showed up in Santa suit and killed 8 members of ex-wife’s family).

    There is an excellent program I use called MOSAIC that was developed as a risk assessment tool for domestic violence. It has shown to be highly reliable in a study by the Department of Justice. For more information you can view http://www.bmaa.com, where there is a MOSAIC link.

    Above and beyond the mental health issue involved in DV, there is a greater need for collobration needs to continue. Quite frankly, the educational institutions need to do a better job in providing courses in DV. Some offer a class as an elective and others offer no class whatsoever. This is probably one of the most significant issues in child welfare, as studies show a direct relationship between child abuse and domestic violence.

    Additionally, although the attention is focused on DV homicides, it is important to understand a person does not wake up one day and kill their spouse. There is a pattern of behavior that exist in every DV case. It is important to look for it in every case, because if you can identify it, you may just prevent a homicide.

    Best Regards,

    John McLaughlin
    http://www.bmaa.com

  3. Linda Flood, MSW Says:
    April 23rd, 2009 at 6:53 pm

    I am an advocate against domestic violence and would love to work in a domestic violence court or for the Childrens Law Center or Legal aid Society. I was motivated and inspired by the article, I do believe it is important to have more classes in this area as well as training- It breaks my heart everytime a women loses her life or a child suffers due to domestic violence. From a different perspective, there are alot of resources for women in a violent relationship-if she can get away alive- but what if the abuse changes- when there is a history of violence and it just becomes emotional- it promotes a cycle of lerned helplessness- often there needs to be a police report for a women to obtain housing- so much has changed but alot needs to be done.

  4. Linda Flood, MSW Says:
    April 23rd, 2009 at 6:54 pm

    sorry spelling-I meant learned helplessness

  5. Rhonda Phillips Says:
    May 3rd, 2009 at 2:48 pm

    I have said for years there needs to be a domestic violence prevention program for the public schools. This way our future generation could be educated about the common characteristics of batterers and victims and just maybe they might see some of these characteristics within themselves and counseling could be provided at the school level. To me, this is just as if not more important than the DARE programs in the 80’s. There are not enough shelters for battered women and a program such as this would be very valuable in decreasing the need for such a shelter.

  6. Debra Baker LMSW Says:
    June 11th, 2009 at 9:50 pm

    I believe that violence in the home has increased largely due to the lack of security in the job market. At one time a man may keep a job with one company and work his way up in the company and actually be able to retire with a good pension. We know that men value themselves by the job that they hold .And in a time when good jobs are not only hard to find they can often be short lived as many companies are closing. Therefore many men devalued themselves.

  7. Lydia Chang Says:
    June 12th, 2009 at 9:49 am

    I believe not only shelters for women are important, for real and practical purposes, prevention should start with the wedding or the co-habitant condition, tell the couple
    that NO DOMESTIC VIOLENCE, VERBAL OR PHYSICAL; THERE will be consequences
    in the court (the Law), the emotional and psychological consequences as a result
    of the violent behavior. Tell the couple that YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO LEAVE your
    couple if necessary and you just leave. It’s not your fault that you get abused, it’s the
    partner’s uncontrollable, unlawful, unreasonable and inhuman behavior that causes
    the violence. Then give them the resources where they can get help.

  8. cynthia hartdegen Says:
    July 6th, 2009 at 11:37 am

    One of the best gifts I received from Nasw central was a one sheet “100 things you can do to prevent violence”. I think it was the theme of 1980 (+/_), and I still have the poster (now raggedy). It included items such as: Wear clothing associated with another country; Let someone go ahead of you in traffic; Object to jokes that condone violence; Speak out against expressions of hate; Monitor the media …and 95 other good ideas.
    Is that poster in an archive somewhere?
    We still need reminders.

  9. Delores Crosby Says:
    July 11th, 2009 at 4:23 pm

    I truly believe and agree with the statedment that dv prevention should start in the schools and community centers where young people hang out. I feel we can get to them while their young their maybe a another life saved in the future. We never know what these children or young people are witnessing at home!

  10. Savita Says:
    September 1st, 2009 at 2:30 pm

    It is relay tru!

    I am fan of u postings

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