Gender‐relatedkillingofwomenandgirls
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PERPETRATORS OF INTIMATE PARTNER KILLINGS
OF WOMEN AND GIRLS
Victim and perpetrator characteristics
Research shows that the killing of women and girls by intimate partners does not result from random or
spontaneous acts.
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It is therefore useful to identify and analyse the factors that precede such killings, along
with the traits and characteristics of the perpetrators, among whom considerable gender differences exist.
For example, male and female perpetrators of intimate partner homicide seem to belong to distinct
groups,
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not only in terms of prevalence rates, but also in terms of the motivations behind the offence:
motivations typically reported by men include possessiveness, jealousy and fear of abandonment, while
motivations reported by women relate to extended periods of suffering physical violence.
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A recent
Australian study on intimate partner homicide concluded that the majority of such homicides (80 per cent)
involved men killing a current or former intimate partner. Nearly a quarter of such men were known to the
authorities for having been violent towards their intimate partners in the past. It was also found that almost
half of the men killed their partner within three months of the relationship ending.
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Some studies have shown that, on average, both victims and offenders in intimate partner homicide are
older than victims of non-intimate partner homicide. Studies in the United States have indicated that
female victims of intimate partner violence tend to be younger than their assailants,
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as female victims
are often in relationships with men who are older than them.
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Couples with large age discrepancies were
found to be at a particularly high risk for this type of homicide, especially when the male partner was
around 15 years older than the female partner.
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Earlier studies have indicated that male perpetrators of intimate partner homicide in the United States are
disproportionately poor, young and members of minority ethnic groups, often with a history of violence
and substance abuse.
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What emerges from studies that compare intimate partner homicide perpetrators with perpetrators who
kill outside the family is that intimate partner homicide offenders tend to be more “conventional” than
men who kill other men
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and compared with the perpetrators of other types of homicide.
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In the United
Kingdom, in a study that compared over 100 male intimate partner homicide offenders with over 400
male/male homicide perpetrators, it was found that intimate partner homicide perpetrators had achieved
a higher level of school education and were less likely to be unemployed than perpetrators of other types
of homicide.
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Also, male intimate partner homicide offenders were found to be less likely to have a
……………..
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Adams, D., Why Do They Kill? Men Who Murder Their Intimate Partners (Nashville, Tennessee, Vanderbilt University Press, 2007).
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Caman, S. et al., “Differentiating male and female intimate partner homicide perpetrators: a study of social, criminological and clinical
factors”, International Journal of Forensic Mental Health, vol. 15, No. 1 (2016) pp. 26–34.
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Belknap, J. et al., “Types of intimate partner homicides committed by women: self-defense, proxy/retaliation, and sexual
proprietariness”, Homicide Studies, vol. 16, No. 4 (November 2012), pp. 359–379.
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Domestic Violence Death Review Team, Australian Domestic and Family Violence Death Review Network: Data Report 2018 (Sydney,
2018), p. xii.
103
DeJong, C., Pizarro-Terrill, J. and McGarrell, E. F., “Can situational and structural factors differentiate between intimate partner and ‘other’
homicide?”, Journal of Family Violence, vol. 26, No. 5 (July 2011), pp.365–376.
104
Breitman, N., Shackelford, T. K. and Block, C. R., “Couple age discrepancy and risk of intimate partner homicide”, Violence and Victims,
vol. 19, No. 3 (June 2004), pp. 321–342.
105
Garcia, L., Soria, C. and Hurwitz, E. L., “Homicides and intimate partner violence: a literature review”, Trauma, Violence and Abuse, vol. 8,
No. 4 (October 2007), pp. 370–383.
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Weiner, N.A. et al., Violence: Patterns, Causes, Public Policy (Belmont, California, Wadsworth Publishing, 1990).
107
Kivivuori, J. and Lehti, M., “Social correlates of intimate partner homicide in Finland: distinct or shared with other homicide types?”,
Homicide Studies, vol. 16, No. 1 (February 2012), pp. 60–77.
108
Dobash, E. R. and Dobash, R. P., When Men Murder Women (New York, Oxford University Press, 2015); Weizmann-Henelius, G. et al.,
“Gender-specific risk factors for intimate partner homicide: a nationwide register-based study”, Journal of Interpersonal Violence,
vol. 27, No. 8 (May 2012), pp. 1519–1539.
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Dobash et al., “Not an ordinary killer: just an ordinary guy”.