Women are more rarely perpetrators than victims of homicide, having committed 10% of homicides worldwide in 2021, but when they kill, they often kill a partner or a family member with a history of abuse. According to research conducted in 2021 into the cases of women who are on death row for homicide in the USA, Malawi, and Tanzania, in the 70 cases a history of abuse was found.
The NGO reports that in most cases women who commit crimes in conditions of abuse are not tried fairly, as lawyers often do not know how to handle trauma and abuse, legal systems do not take into account the psychological impact of violence, coercion, and coercive control, while most states do not have legal mechanisms that recognize a history of abuse as a mitigating factor.
In all 70 cases of women on death row for homicide in the USA, Malawi, and Tanzania that were examined, there was a history of abuse.
Nevertheless, internationally there are signs of progress. In the United Kingdom, in the case of Sally Challen, who killed her husband in 2011, the term “coercive control” was accepted for the first time, changing the charge from premeditated homicide to manslaughter and reducing her sentence.
Also in 2021, in Kenya, a judge ruled that Truphena Aswani acted in self-defense when she killed her husband after years of violent abuse, sentencing her to one day in prison.
Source: Guardian
