Intimate partner stalking and femicide: urgent implications for women's safety

Abstract

This study describes the type and extent of intimate partner stalking and threatening behaviors that occurred within 12 months prior to a major assault or attempted or actual partner femicide and specifies which behaviors were associated with an increased risk of potential or actual lethality. The design was a ten-city case-control study of 821 women: 384 abuse victims and 437 attempted or actual femicide informants. Data were derived using a 16-item inventory. Logistic regressions, with adjustments for demographic variables, were used to identify the significant perpetrator behaviors associated with attempted/actual femicide. Women who reported the perpetrator followed or spied on them were more than twice as likely t o become attempted/actual femicide victims. Threats by the perpetrator to harm the children if the woman left or did not return to the relationship place the woman at a ninefold increase in the risk of attempted/actual femicide. Conclusions are that certain stalking and threatening behaviors are strong risk factors for lethality, and women must be so advised.

Fatal intimate partner violence against women in Portugal: A forensic medical national study

“…Our share of victims with additional non-fatal injuries (56.5%), perpetrated just before their deaths, was somewhat slightly lower than the share reported by other foreign studies (65% to over 80%) 12,18,35,49 and it was mainly produced by blunt force, with multiple injuries, and located in the upper limbs. Among all victims, 30.6% of the women presented defense wounds, as in a study on overall homicidal deaths which concluded that 33% of the cases had self-defense injuries on the upper extremities 50 .…”

Medico legal and epidemiological aspects of femicide in a judicial district of north eastern Italy

“…13e15,33 Unlike other studies, we did not find the following risk factors to be predominant: a) history of stalking: we only encountered this phenomenon in a small number of cases, unlike McFarlane et al, who found a strong association between stalking and homicide or attempted homicide, with documented stalking episodes during the 12 months prior to the attack in 68% of their sample. 34 In this regard, Ianni found that in Italy, of the approximately 200 women killed every year in crimes of passion, about 80 had been previously molested or stalked by the perpetrator. 35 b) chronic alcohol abuse by the perpetrator: this was not a relevant feature of the victims of the intimate partner femicide we examined (though it was relevant among the victims of femicide in general).…”

Harm Associated With Stalking Victimization

“…Much of this violence is in the form of kicks, punches, slaps or indecent assault [14]; but attacks can also be serious and even fatal [15]. Thus a stalking victim's fear of violence is not misplaced.…”