1. Learning from Domestic Homicide Reviews
Gillian Dennehy, Domestic Homicide Review Manager
Standing Together Against Domestic Violence

2. Standing Together: Building the CCR

3. Standing Together and DHRs
CCR principles
Perpetrator Accountability
NOT a blame game
Informal Networks-AAFDA
Intersectional; Victim shoes
National
Unique
Dissemination of learning

4. Coordinated Community Response (CCR) and Risk
Key Initiatives in UK:
DASH RIC Checklist
IDVA
MARAC
Training

5. Key Legal Remedies CRIMINAL CIVIL
Family Law Act 1996 ( amended by DV Crime & Victims Act 2004) –Non Molestation Order, Occupation Orders,
DVPO 2014
Clare’s Law 2014
Cross- Gov. Definition of DA (includes CC) 2013
Protection from Harassment Act 1997 Remedies –Restraining Order, 2012 Stalking Offence
IDAP in sentencing
From 2015:
Offence of Coercive Control
Currently:
Ratification Istanbul
DV and Abuse Bill 2017

6.     Case Analysis Report 32 homicides
75%
25%
Intimate Partner Homicide- 24
Family-Related Homicide-8
Partner or ex-partner 23
Murder-suicide 4
Partner also carer 6
Matricide 5
Patricide 2
Fratricide 1 




7. Overview of Victim Demographics5 5 5
Sex
Disability
85% female 27
19% disability 27 1 10
Age
Sexuality 15
20-81; Mean 41
Over ¼ IPH over 58
1 gay male victim 31 7
Ethnicity 17
Children 7
71% / IPV cases
5/8 AFH BME ⅓ IPH Black Women 15 17

8. Safeguarding Children
Key Themes from DHRs
Identification/assessment and referral pathways
Primary Care and Mental Health
Not always considered, thresholds for assessment, accountability
Age, disability, caring responsibilities
Hold vital information, wider community involvement
Risk
Health
Safeguarding Children
Safeguarding Adults
Informal Networks

9. Findings: Common Risk Factors
Separation*
Suicide and attempts of perpetrator
Older women
Disability
Caring relationship
Abuse to previous partners Wider offending history Coercive Control Jealous surveillance

10. Women killed in the context of separation –’separation as a process not a single event’
Femicide Census,

11. Findings for Risk Assessment
FAILURE TO IDENTIFY AND ASSESS RISK
LACK OF UNDERSTANDING OF COERCIVE CONTROL
NOT ‘WEIGHTING’ VICTIMS CONCERNS
INCIDENTS VIEWED IN ISOLATION
NOT VIEWING RISK AS DYNAMIC
BAIL CONDITIONS SEEN AS ‘MANAGING’ RISK

12. What About The Person Who Is The Risk?

13. Risk: Key Recommendations Summary
Victim’s perception of danger is crucial.
Not view incidents in isolation- context is everything
Need to improve understanding of coercive control and inherent high risk of non-physical abuse
Risk is fluid, dynamic – need to be regularly reassessed at ‘critical points’
Risk assessment with perpetrators needs to be built in to the practice of many agencies
Point out and do not go through

14. The Way Forward: The CCR

15. Overall Recommendations:
STRUCTURE
Leadership
Create DA policies
Embed training
Create referral pathways and links with specialist services, MARAC
Improve mechanisms for information sharing
Improve links between health services
Embedded DA leads
Opportunities for commissioning – IRIS, IDVAs etc.
PRACTICE
Training
Implement enquiry
Child Safeguarding: Victim Centred and Perpetrators held to account
Multi-agency working
Recognise Link with Caring
Co-location
Leads / Champions
Resources
Record keeping
Joint assessments
Integrated working
Information sharing
Perpetrators

16. Empowering rather than Disempowering Survivors:
"Activists and advocates need to be continually reflective about how institutions, such as the criminal justice system, reproduce relations of domination in society, whether gendered, racialized, or classes. And the workings of power are often far more visible to women on the margins of society, or those situated in the intersections of different relations of inequality, than to those nearer the center.“ Ellen Pence

17. Thank You! Enquiries Welcome!
DHR Manager: Gillian Dennehy Link to DHR Case Analysis: