Female Perpetrated Homicide in Victoria Between 1985 and 1995

Abstract

This article presents findings of research on women who kill. All cases in which a woman was investigated by police as a perpetrator in a homicide in Victoria,Australia,between 1985 and 1995 were examined.The aim was to investigate the range of circumstances in which women kill. Seventy-seven cases were identified.The primary source of data was the Victorian Coroner 's office.Initially it was expected that most women would have killed a partner as a result of the experience of long-term violence. However,the findings of the study show that the situation with respect to women and those they kill is more complex.Three primary relationship categories were identified:women who kill their partners,women who kill their children and women who kill non-intimates.The third category primar- ily involved women who killed friends and acquaintances.This paper will argue that the homicide literature fails to provide a conceptual framework for understanding women who kill and hence contributes to the cultural stigmatising of violent women as “mad” or “bad”.

Does Gender Affect Judges’ Perceptions of Sexual Assault Cases?

“…These additional noted differences (e.g. females viewed as more depraved or cruel) fit with the double deviance or evil woman theory (Embry & Lyons, 2012;Kirkwood, 2003;Mustard, 2001;Nagel & Hagan, 1983;Rodriguez, et al, 2006;Spohn & Spears, 1997;Steffensmeier et al, 1993). A recent study by Damiris, et al, (2021) also reported similar findings in relation to violent female sexual offenders being described by judges in an emotive way and FSOs being seen as particularly heinous.…”

“…their first deviant behaviour) are seen as having also deviated from their expected gendered feminine social roles (i.e. their second deviant behaviour) of being caring and law-abiding citizens (Deering & Mellor, 2009;Kirkwood, 2003;Nagel & Hagan, 1983;Spohn & Spears, 1997;Shields & Cochran, 2020); therefore, female offenders who appear before the courts are more likely to be punitively sanctioned than males who have been sentenced for the same crime. To date, researchers who have examined sentencing outcomes for female and male criminal offenders have found little evidence of harsher outcomes and therefore little or no support for the double deviance perspective (Embry & Lyons, 2012;Mustard, 2001;Rodriguez et al, 2006;Shields & Cochran, 2020;Steffensmeier et al, 1993).…”

Hands-on Killing of Intimate Partners as a Function of Sex and Relationship Status/State

“…Men are more likely to kill in response to a partner's infidelity (Daly & Wilson, 1988), whereas motivations for women are more likely to include want for resources (Kirkwood, 2003) and fear for themselves or their children (Johnston & Hotton, 2003). Both men and women report feelings of anger in response to jealousy-inducing stimuli, but they also experience sex-differentiated feelings (Pietrzak, Laird, Stevens, & Thompson, 2002).…”

Women Accused of Homicide: The Impact of Race, Relationship to Victim, and Prior Physical Abuse

“…"Studies of women who kill violent partners have led to the development of a concept known as 'battered woman syndrome' which has been popular both as a theory of women's homicide and as a legal tool used in conjunction with defenses to murder" (Kirkwood, 2003: 3). Kirkwood (2003) shows that the lack of knowledge and understanding of women who kill results in a situation where women who do kill are highly stigmatized. They are what Heidensohn (1985) and Lloyd (1995) refer to as "doubly deviant and doubly damned" (cited in Kirkwood, 2003: 3).…”